Crystal Gayle

Before country was cool, Crystal was class



Never has one reviewer captured a platinum clad, Grammy Award winning career so beautifully in so few words.



Crystal encapsulates everything the dazzling qualities of her name impliesalthough that name came to her in quite an unusual fashion. Crystal came at the suggestion of Brenda Gayle Webbs older sister, Loretta Lynnwho knowing there was already a Brenda Lee currently successful in the music industrysuggested her younger sibling adopt the name Crystal when she began recording.



In the mid 70s, Crystal was the focal point of her own one hour prime time special on CBS televisiona special that earned the glowing praise of viewers and critics alike. Chic, hip, and cool with a romantic mane of hair that swept around her ankles, in one evening of television Crystal Gayle moved country music to the highest platform it had yet reached in the eyes of the viewing and listening nation.



The blue eyed beauty from the Appalachian coal mining town of Paintsville, Kentucky would never again linger in the shadow of being Lorettas baby sister. Drop dead beautiful and dressed in designer threads, Crystal took country music to town on her arm in the 70s and introduced it to mainstream audiences.



Her first album project began a roll out of smash singles to come. Wrong Road Again, (her first of many hit singles with producer Allen Reynolds) became her debut Top 10 record. Ill Get Over You, became her first 1 single. By her fourth album, We Must Believe In Magic, Crystal Gayle became the first female artist in country music history to achieve platinum album sales. Driving the engine of the album was the song that was to become her enduring career signature song to date: Dont It Make My Brown Eyes Blue.



Brown Eyes opened the worlds eyes to Crystal Gayle. She became a household name in homes, grand and small, from Louisville to Leningrad.



The glamour and the mystique of the Crystal Gayle phenomena made her an instantly in demand artist. From symphony halls to Carnegie Hallfrom the best kept stages in Las Vegas to the prestige of the London Palladium. one word "Crystal" crossed musical genres and oceans.



In the wakeher hit list of platinum and gold record sales was to be matched only by her awards and accolades. CMAs Female Vocalist Of The Year, for two consecutive years, she became a Grammy Award Winner for Best Female Vocal Performance, thanks to her beloved Brown Eyes a song that she today admits she has never grown tired of singing. Crystal swept the Academy Of Country Music Awards for three of their Top Female Vocalist statuettes. As her music and her career path widened to mainstream audiencesso did her accolades. She is the recipient of three American Music Awards voted by the nation as Americas Favorite Female Artist.



Breaking through the unusual genre boundaries faced by most artists has allowed Crystal Gayle a beautiful advantage: doing projects close to her heartjust for the sheer love of the music in question. One of the most meaningful was Crystal Gayle Sings The Heart And Soul Of Hoagy Carmichael, a stunning, critically acclaimed collection of 15 of the great composers favorite classics. One of my personal career highlights was getting to meet and sing with Hoagy on a television special, Crystal recalls. Crystal not only breathed new life into the Carmichael classics, but produced a must have album of her career that included such immortals as Stardust, and Two Sleepy People.



Success swept around her as gracefully as her trademarked long hair. Her inspirational album, Someday, was nominated for a Grammy. With the advent of the new millennium, Crystal recorded In My Arms, an enduring collection of childrens lullabies, The project was an outgrowth of her love for the littlest of listeners, and of her visit to Sesame Street to sing with Big Bird to a new generation of music lovers.



One of the most fitting honors in her career came in 1999 when Dont It Make My Brown Eyes Blue was recognized by ASCAP as one being one of the ten most performed songs of the 20th century.



Like fine wine time has been nothing but kind to Crystal Gayle.