Stephanie de Sykes

Stephanie De Sykes ( Ryton; born 1948) is an English singer and actress.

Early life She attended Brays Grove School in Harlow, Essex; she returned to the school for a final reunion in June 2008 as guest of honour.

Career Solo singer De Sykes began her career as a session singer, often releasing tracks under other names. Her first release in 1972 was "Bright Shines The Light" on the Polydor label, credited as 'Verity'. She had her first hit in 1974 with the Roger Holman/Simon May penned "Born with a Smile on My Face" which reached number two in the UK Singles Chart. The song featured in the ATV British TV serial "Crossroads", De Sykes played a character called Holly Brown in 1974. She also recorded the theme tune to the television programme The Golden Shot with the group Rain that same year. The theme song, "Golden Day", was written for them by Lynsey de Paul and Barry Blue. which was featured at Meg Mortimer's wedding in the UK TV soap opera in 1975. De Sykes appeared in the show as singer 'Holly Brown'. She also had a starring role in the comedy Side by Side.

She was once a background vocalist of Love & Kisses, a concept group by producer Alec R Costandinos. She also sang with the group "Sphinx" and soon after provided background vocals for Meat Loaf's 1984 album Bad Attitude, which included the Jim Steinman penned single, "Nowhere Fast".

As a human rights activist, her 2015 song "Bomb Babies" was chosen as the opening track for the pro-peace anti-war album Not In Our Name, a collaboration of singers and musicians, songwriters and poets.

Personal life De Sykes lived with Stuart Slater (born Stuart Leslie James Slater, 14 July 1945, Liverpool), lead singer of The Mojos, with whom she had two sons: musician Toby Slater;

She was then in a relationship with the comedian and broadcaster Angus Deayton, and was credited with some of the female vocals on the 1985 second album of his parody band, The Hee Bee Gee Bees. Their relationship broke up in the early 1990s, after he began an affair with scriptwriter Lise Mayer in 1991.