As said by other answers, the Empty Star/Filled Star style (and the star itself) is very common, so recognition is likely to be high among users. I don't have relevant statistics to back this up, but I can certainly anecdotally say I've seen it a lot. I think you can also look to how websites handle Like and Dislike buttons, as they perform a similar function.
In the absence of stats, we can look to how large corporations handle this issue though to get some information that might have the benefit of research behind it.
Microsoft has used the star to represent favorites for many versions of its OS now, but this isn't so relevant to us because there's no actual button for favoriting as I can tell in Windows 7. I can confirm that they've also avoided this issue in Internet Explorer by using the star to simply toggle the Favorites bar, from which the user is able to add or remove the page from their favorites.
Turning to my development tools, having reviewed the 2015 Visual Studio Icon Set to see what icons pertain to favorites, they have both an Add to Favorites icon and icons with filled and empty stars (these aren't for star ratings; there's another set for those too with half stars), so there's no clear answer there.
For reference, here's Visual Studio's Add to Favorites Icon:
(I this this style of button is an acceptable concession to those who might not get why a star is there in the page, but whether this is desirable to you might be dependent on your target audience and app's overall layout.)
In fairness to Apple, I had a quick search for what OSX does, and it seems (please correct me if I'm wrong) they just believe in a pane on the side of the file explorer where you drag commonly used folders for quick access. Although not really relevant at first glance, it does inform us that maybe you could have a tap or tap and hold behavior on the artist's name to prompt to add to favorites, but this isn't really in line with the goal of visually obvious actions that you're aiming for.
Google meanwhile opts for state-as-action buttons for dual state concepts like favorites. Like/dislike buttons on Youtube are a good example (they highlight blue when checked, and are a dull grey color when not). Their Chrome browser is another. It has an empty star on the right hand side of the address bar, which is filled when you're on a page that you've already favorited. The one nice thing they do is provide a visual feedback and editing stage after you hit the star, to allow the user to specify what folder the favorite is in, the title, etc.
Like so:

What this means is that it's clear what has happened when the user presses the button, in the event the user is computer illiterate.
In the mobile context, this could be as simple as having a dialog popup appear at the bottom of the app for a short period saying "Added to Favorites!", before fading away.
I don't have a picture, but the Youtube App on Android does this exact behavior when you add a video to a category (like Watch Later or indeed Favorites (although the addition isn't a one button press operation)), or like/dislike/unlike/undislike a video. A small notification pops up and then vanishes. The same is true of Chrome for Android (where the favorites icon is in the sandwich menu at the top right, also in a state as action style), opting for a brief notification instead of a window with options like its desktop version. I believe this behavior is in keeping with Google's Material Design standards on Acknowledgement (I would link it, but alas, I'm limited to two), which states:
Acknowledgement removes uncertainty about implicit operations that the system is taking. It may be paired with an option to undo the action.
[When an action is executed] ...An acknowledgment in the form of a toast appears, then fades after a few seconds.
You might be able to tell my bias as I've lingered on this last option for a while, but I think it's sensible (and clear as to what has happened), particularly because it's difficult to miss, accidentally performing the operation won't cause any damage and undoing it is as easy as tapping the button again.
Granted, It isn't a substitute for statistics pertaining to user recognition, but we can at least surmise that Google thinks that this approach is appropriate for its not insignificant target audience.