Becky Stark

Becky Stark
Background information
Birth name	Rebecca Ann Stark
Born	1976 Culver City, California, U.S.
Origin	California, U.S.
Genres	Indie rock, folk, punk
Instruments	Vocals | Drums | Guitar | Tambourine
Years active	2004 - present (Lavender Diamond)
Labels	Matador, Rough Trade, Cold Sweat
Associated acts	Mystical Unionists The Living Sisters The Decemberists John C. Reilly and Friends

Becky Stark is an artist, singer, songwriter and entertainer from Los Angeles, California. She is the voice of the band Lavender Diamond. In an article about Stark in the New York Times called "North American Songbird," Zoe Wolf wrote "Picture Lucille Ball and Tinkerbell engaged in a duet and you have an apt metaphor for the neo-folk singer Becky Stark, who suggests an impish fairy from a faraway land. "

Raised in Maryland where she began performing as a child, at the age of 13, she travelled to the former Soviet Union as part of a U.S. State Department-Sponsored Peace Mission, a travelling musical about peaceful ecology. For four years in junior high school she was the co-host and head reporter for the weekly children's television news magazine Kids' Point of View Television-KPOV'TV - a half hour show broadcast weekly between the WWF and the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling. At 18 she starred in the feature film Willa, An American Snow White for PBS. Throughout high school she studied classical singing and learned an extensive repertoire of classical, popular and jazz songs.

She studied Comparative Literature (English and Russian) and Art/Semiotics at Brown University. In Providence she was part of the Fort Thunder art movement and formed a theater troupe with artist and filmmaker Xander Marro. The two created a travelling operetta called Birdsongs of the Bauharoque, a fairytale fable about peace coming to planet Earth. They toured the U.S. and Canada for two months with their punk puppet opera.

After college she became a full-time student at the Merce Cunningham Dance Conservatory in Manhattan where she studied modern dance. Seeking a warmer climate she moved to Los Angeles and became immersed in the music, comedy, film and cabaret scenes. She performed a comical variety of jobs including magician's assistant. She appeared in High School Record- an underground favorite at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival. In the film she plays the teacher of students from the LA bands No Age, Mika Miko, Silver Daggers and others. She has created and performed numerous folk story operettas, including an adaptation of the Little Match Girl. She appeared in the original production of acclaimed New Wave opera visionary Ruth Margraff's The Cry Pitch Carols.

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