Sabrina Starke

by Jason Birchmeier Sabrina Starke is a soul-jazz singer/songwriter based in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, who made her full-length debut in 2008 with the Top Ten hit album Yellow Brick Road. Born on August 9, 1979, in Paramaribo, the capital city of Suriname, a small Dutch-speaking country of 500,000 people in northern South America, she made her recording debut in 2008 with the single "Do for Love" on the Star-K label. Co-written by Starke and produced by Beat Royalty (the Dutch production team of Chris Kooreman and Edo Plasschaert), "Do for Love" eventually rose to Top Ten success in the Netherlands and garnered the attention of EMI, which signed the singer/songwriter to a major-label recording contract with its famed Blue Note Records division. Starke's full-length album debut, Yellow Brick Road, likewise rose to Top Ten success over time. A stylistic mix of soul and jazz, along with folk and R&B, the Beat Royalty-produced album spawned the follow-up hit singles "Foolish" and "A Woman's Gonna Try." Yellow Brick Road was re-released with bonus material in 2009.