Amanda Palmer Bio
Amanda MacKinnon Palmer (born April 30, 1976) is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and performance artist. She first drew widespread attention as the lead vocalist, pianist, and lyricist of the duo the Dresden Dolls, the band she co-founded in 2000 with drummer Brian Viglione. Beyond the duo, Palmer has built a long solo career and has also performed as part of Evelyn Evelyn with Jason Webley and as the frontperson of Amanda Palmer and the Grand Theft Orchestra. She is recognized for her theatrical stage presence, devoted cult following, and pioneering use of crowdfunding platforms such as Kickstarter and Patreon to fund her music and tours.
Early Life and Background
Amanda MacKinnon Palmer was born in New York City and grew up in Lexington, Massachusetts. Her father, Jack Palmer, was a physicist, and her mother, Katharine Mockett, was a computer programmer. Her parents divorced when she was one year old, and as a child she rarely saw her father. Her maternal grandfather, Alfred E. Mockett, served on the board of directors of the Beneficial Corporation.
Palmer attended Lexington High School, where she was active in the drama club and began developing her love of performance. She later attended Wesleyan University, where she studied theater and was a member of the Eclectic Society. She graduated from Wesleyan in 1998 with a BA in German Studies and later dropped out of a graduate program at Heidelberg University.
During her college years and after graduating, Palmer spent several years busking as a living statue called the Eight Foot Bride in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Edinburgh, Berlin, Melbourne, and St. Petersburg, Russia. The Melbourne trip led to a meeting with her future collaborator, Jason Webley. She later referenced this street performance work in Dresden Dolls songs such as The Perfect Fit and in the A is for Accident track Glass Slipper.
Path to Music
In 1999, Palmer founded the Shadowbox Collective, a performance group devoted to street theatre and original theatrical shows, including the 2002 play Hotel Blanc, which she directed. The collective served as a training ground for her later cabaret-style rock performances and helped her build a community of performers, fans, and visual artists in the Boston area.
At a Halloween party in 2000, Palmer met drummer Brian Viglione, and the two soon formed the Dresden Dolls. Before signing with a major label, the duo recorded their self-titled debut in 2002 with producer Martin Bisi. To expand the performance experience, Palmer began inviting Lexington High School students to perform short drama pieces at Dresden Dolls live shows, a project that grew into the Dirty Business Brigade, a troupe of seasoned and new artists that performed at many of the duo’s gigs.
The Dresden Dolls signed with Roadrunner Records and built a devoted following through nonstop touring and theatrical shows. In 2006, the band published The Dresden Dolls Companion, a book featuring words, music, and artwork by Palmer, along with a partial autobiography. That same year, Palmer conceived The Onion Cellar, a musical production based on a short story from The Tin Drum by Günter Grass, which the Dresden Dolls performed with the American Repertory Theater at the Zero Arrow Theatre in Cambridge, Massachusetts, from December 2006 through January 2007.
Amanda Palmer Career
Early Career (2000–2007)
Palmer’s first major musical project, the Dresden Dolls, produced two studio albums and constant touring that established her reputation for dark cabaret, piano-driven rock, and dramatic stage shows. In June 2007, the duo joined the True Colors Tour 2007, which included Palmer’s debut at New York City’s Radio City Music Hall and her first review in The New York Times. Later that year, the band broke up in 2008, but Palmer and Viglione continued to collaborate on several minor reunions in the years that followed.
In September 2007, Palmer and Jason Webley launched a new project, Evelyn Evelyn, with the EP Elephant Elephant, in which the duo performed as fictional conjoined twin sisters named Eva and Lyn. The concept grew into a full album and graphic novel released in 2010, along with a worldwide tour.
Breakthrough (2007–2010)
In June 2008, Palmer established her solo career with two performances with the Boston Pops. Her first solo studio album, Who Killed Amanda Palmer, was released on September 16, 2008. Ben Folds produced and also played on the record. The title was a play on the Twin Peaks phrase Who killed Laura Palmer? A companion photography book, Who Killed Amanda Palmer: A Collection of Photographic Evidence, followed in July 2009, featuring photography by Kyle Cassidy and stories by Neil Gaiman.
During this period, Palmer also expanded her theatrical work. In 2010, she returned to the American Repertory Theater for a two-month run of Cabaret, starring as the Emcee. The same year, the Dresden Dolls reunited for a United States tour that started on Halloween in New York City and ended in San Francisco on New Year’s Eve. Palmer also recorded Amanda Palmer Performs the Popular Hits of Radiohead on Her Magical Ukulele, an album that grew from a ukulele she had picked up during a concert as a joke and then turned into a regular part of her repertoire.
Notable Works and Milestones
Palmer’s most recognized solo records include Who Killed Amanda Palmer (2008), Theatre Is Evil (2012), and There Will Be No Intermission (2019). In 2012, she launched a Kickstarter campaign for Theatre Is Evil that was supported by 24,883 backers for a total of $1,192,793, at the time the most funds ever raised for a musical project on Kickstarter. In August 2013, she made her Lincoln Center debut, and in November 2014 she released the memoir The Art of Asking, which expanded on a popular TED talk and made the New York Times Best Seller list.
Amanda Palmer Award Nominations
The provided sources do not include a verified list of formal award nominations for Amanda Palmer across her career, and any specific nomination totals or categories cannot be confirmed at this time. This section is therefore limited to the verified performance and crowdfunding milestones covered elsewhere in this article.
Amanda Palmer Awards Won
The provided sources do not list specific major industry awards won by Amanda Palmer, such as Grammy Awards, Brit Awards, or equivalent formal honors. Verified achievements in the available materials include chart and sales milestones, such as her New York Times Best Seller status for The Art of Asking, and crowdfunding records, including raising $1,192,793 on Kickstarter for Theatre Is Evil. A detailed wins table is not included because the underlying totals cannot be confirmed.
Amanda Palmer Family
Amanda MacKinnon Palmer was born to Jack Palmer, a physicist, and Katharine Mockett, a computer programmer. Her parents divorced when she was one year old, and as a child she rarely saw her father. Her maternal grandfather, Alfred E. Mockett, served on the board of directors of the Beneficial Corporation. Palmer and her father later collaborated musically, recording the album You Got Me Singing in 2016 and performing concerts together in support of it.
Personal Life
Palmer has said that she is bisexual and has spoken publicly about her open relationships and feminist views. She has practiced yoga and meditation and wrote the 2008 article Melody vs. Meditation for the Buddhist publication Shambhala Sun, now known as Lion’s Roar. For more than a decade, she lived in an independent artists’ cooperative called the Cloud Club in Boston, Massachusetts.
Palmer married British author Neil Gaiman in a private ceremony in January 2011, in the parlor of writers Ayelet Waldman and Michael Chabon. The couple had a son together in 2015 and maintained an open marriage. In November 2022, Palmer and Gaiman announced in a joint statement that they would divorce, and the divorce was finalized later that year. Palmer has continued to perform, release music, and maintain an active presence on Patreon.