“My childhood was extreme.”

American singer-songwriter and pianist

Tori Amos is an American singer-songwriter and pianist. A classically trained musician with a mezzo-soprano voice, she began as a child prodigy and later came of age as a pianist in Washington, D.C. bars. She first drew attention in the 1980s as the lead singer of the short-lived pop-rock group Y Kant Tori Read. Amos achieved her breakthrough as a solo artist in the early 1990s. Her songs often address sexuality, feminism, politics, and religion, and her work is marked by the combination of piano-driven music and personal, often provocative themes.