Sophie Ballantine Hawkins is an American singer-songwriter. Born in New York City, she attended the Manhattan School of Music for a year as a percussionist before leaving to pursue a music career. In the 1990s, she achieved critical and commercial success with her first two albums, producing a string of single hits including "Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover", "Right Beside You", and "As I Lay Me Down". A dispute with her record label Sony Music over her third album, Timbre, led her to establish her own independent label, Trumpet Swan Productions, which has published her subsequent recordings.