Joanna Stingray

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Joanna Stingray
Joanna Stingray in Don't Come Down On Me music video (2016)
Joanna Stingray in Don't Come Down On Me music video (2016)
Born
Joanna Fields

(1960-07-03) July 3, 1960 (age 61)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
Other namesJoanna Fields
Occupationmusician, producer
Known forPopularising post-Soviet rock music in the US

Joanna Stingray (Russian: Джоанна Стингрей Dzhoanna Stingrey, [dʐɐˈanə sʲtʲɪnˈɡrɛj], born Joanna Fields,[1] 1960, USA) is an American singer, actress, music producer and socialite. She was a key figure in popularising Soviet and Russian rock music and culture in the West in the 1980s.

Biography[]

Born Joanna Fields, Stingray is a native of Los Angeles, California. In 1983, Stingray released her U.S. 12-inch, 4-track debut, Beverly Hills Brat, under the name Joanna.[2] In her early musical career, she performed at Studio 54.[3]

In 1984, aged 23, Stingray travelled to Leningrad as a tourist with her sister, who was studying in London and had an opportunity to take a trip to visit the Soviet Union for one week.[4] In Leningrad, she was introduced to Boris Grebenshchikov of the rock group Akvarium.[2] Impressed by Grebenshchikov, and other artists' music, Stingray began smuggling the music of underground Soviet rock bands beyond the confines of the Soviet Union.

On July 27, 1986, Australian record company Big Time Records, released Red Wave: 4 Underground Bands from the Soviet Union, a double album consisting of songs collected and produced by Stingray. Each record side includes songs by one artist and the bands included are Akvarium, Kino, Alisa and Strannye Igry (Strange Games). It was the first release of Russian rock music in the United States. The record caught the attention of popular western artists, among them David Bowie and Andy Warhol. The Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachov also got to know about it; surprised that this music was published by a foreign company, he instructed the minister of culture to ease the publication of music of young Soviet musicians inside the country.[5]

Stingray spent most of the decade living in Russia, where she worked variously as a musician, actress and television presenter before returning to the United States in 1995.[2]

In 2019, Stingray published a two-volume memoir in Russian, describing her experiences in the Soviet rock scene. In September 2020, the English-language version of the memoir, Red Wave: An American in the Soviet Music Underground, was released.[6]

Film, stage and television appearances[]

In 1993 Joanna was cast in the film Freak (Russian: «Урод»), directed by Roman Kachanov. In 1996 she collaborated with Aleksandr Lipnitsky to produce Sunny Days (Russian: «Солнечные дни»), a documentary film about the life of Viktor Tsoi.

On 20 June 1992, Stingray took part in the memorial concert to Viktor Tsoi held at Moscow's Luzhniki Stadium. She performed alongside  [ru] (bass guitar, Strange Games),  [ru] (guitar, Center) and Aleksandr Vasilyev (percussion, Center).

Personal life[]

Stingray married and divorced the guitarist from the band Kino, Yuri Kasparyan.[1] Her second marriage was with another Russian musician, Aleksandr Vasilyev, in 1991.[7] Stingray is currently married to Richard Best, an architect from California.

As of 2004, Stingray was the executive director of the Beverly Hills High School Alumni Association and working part-time as a real estate agent.[2]

Discography[]

References[]

  1. ^ Jump up to: a b Гусева, М.; Трушкин, А. (January 16, 1991). История Джоанны Стингрэй, которая любила русский рок и вышла замуж. Komsomolskaya Pravda (in Russian). Retrieved June 15, 2017.
  2. ^ Jump up to: a b c d Chernov, Sergey (December 17, 2004). "The Return of Stingray". The St. Petersburg Times. Archived from the original on 2011-06-15. Retrieved 1 February 2014.
  3. ^ Bennetts, Marc (2019-06-05). "Joanna Stingray – the woman who smuggled punk rock out of the USSR". The Guardian. Retrieved 2021-03-06.
  4. ^ Boyarinov, Denis (2016-03-14). "Joanna Stingray, a California Girl in the U.S.S.R." The Moscow Times. Retrieved 2020-01-27.
  5. ^ Kushnir, Alexander (2013-07-28). "Red Wave: How Soviet rock made it to the US". Russia Beyond. Retrieved 2020-01-27.
  6. ^ Razor, Sasha (2020-10-17). ""This Decadent Western Thing": Joanna Stingray on the Soviet Underground Rock Scene". Los Angeles Review of Books. Retrieved 2021-03-06.
  7. ^ "Джоанна Стингрей". 24SMI (in Russian). Retrieved 2020-11-19.

External links[]

Retrieved from ""