Lisa Lee Dark
Opera singer
Lisa Lee Dark was born on 16 April 1981 in the Clydach area of Swansea, Wales. She was born with congenital adrenal hyperplasia, a rare condition that led doctors to raise her as male; she did not discover she was biologically female until she was 19. She has spoken openly about the severe bullying she experienced at her all-boys comprehensive school as a result of being different, which left her with lasting agoraphobia and post-traumatic stress.
She was discovered singing in a Swansea park at the age of 12, and went on to build a career as an opera singer, songwriter and voice actress, releasing a compilation of a decade's recordings in 2000 titled The Unknown Story of Lisa-Lee Dark, followed by the album Breath of Life in 2004, which had sold around 50,000 copies by 2009. She has released several further albums, including one recorded in French, and has also worked on film soundtracks, backing tracks and voiceovers. Her distant relatives include the celebrated 19th-century Italian opera singer Adelina Patti.