The award-winning indie rock trio BETTY is Alyson Palmer (vocals, bass, guitar), Elizabeth Ziff (vocals, guitar, electronic programming) and her sister, Amy Ziff (vocals and cello. They use beguiling melodies, compelling lyrics, and signature harmonies to create energetic live shows that mix music, performance art, politics, and comedy.
BETTY sings of joy, love, longing, lust, food, heartbreak, and the universal hilarity of human existence. More than a band, BETTY uses music to channel their passion for representation, fairness, and equality.
In addition to creating, performing, and recording together as a group of independent artists since 1986, BETTY travels the world as Arts Envoys for the US Department of State. To further their humanitarian outreach and cultural diplomacy, Gloria Steinem advised them to form a nonprofit, which they did in 2014. The BETTY Effect’s mission is using music and performance techniques to help others communicate and connect for personal power, social progress and peace, especially women and girls, LGBTQIA and other marginalized communities.
BETTY has been featured on national and international radio, television—including their iconic theme songs for The L Word and HBO’s Encyclopedia—and in films, commercials, jingles, recordings, streaming projects, and concert venues across five continents. They have contributed as guest artists to dozens of recordings and compilation albums, and their soundscapes can be heard in art installations at The Smithsonian Institute and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. Their Off-Broadway musical, BETTY RULES, was another diamond in a glittering string of hits directed by Michael Greif (Days of Wine and Roses, Hell’s Kitchen, Dear Evan Hanson, Next to Normal, RENT.)
As activists, BETTY uses their music to work for equal rights, peace, reproductive health, education, and the environment. In their long award-winning career, they are proudest about lending their voices to hundreds of events over the decades that have improved lives, changed policy, and raised millions of dollars for worthy causes.
The band’s podcast, BETTY: GIRLBAND, is the raucous as-true-as-can-be-remembered history of an oddball all-girl American trio from the Reagan ’80s to now, told in music, stories, and guest interviews.
BETTY played their first gig in Washington, DC, in 1986 as a birthday request for the owner of the legendary 9:30 club, Dodie Bowers. Within a year, they were touring North America and Europe, had written and performed a musical in two acts, and had won their first of many awards, WAMA’s Entertainer of the Year 1987. After they were cast in HBO’s groundbreaking TV series with Children’s Television Workshop, “Encyclopedia,” the trio moved to New York City.
BETTY continues to fight as musical warriors for self-advocacy, fairness, and equality. No matter where chance takes them, they go, which may be one reason the trio has far outlasted the majority of bands … and most relationships!
Art. Adventure. Activism … BETTY RULES!