Kathy Mattea has played bluegrass country and western since 1976, when she joined her first band in college. She started recording in 1983 and has recorded 17 albums, with thirty singles claiming a spot in the Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks charts, with twelve in the top ten and her hits "Goin' Gone" (1987), "Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses" (1988), "Come From the Heart" (1989) and "Burnin' Old Memories" (1989) reaching the number one spot.
She’s won three Academy of Country Music awards, four Country Music Association awards and Grammys in 1991 for Best Female Country Vocal Performer with the single “Where You’ve Been”, and in 1994 for Best Southern, Country or Bluegrass Gospel Album with her 1993 effort, Good News.
She also has a genuine philanthropic streak, being an outspoken supporter of HIV/AIDs charities during the 1990s epidemic in the somewhat conservative context of country music. She was given two awards for her efforts the Minnie Pearl Humanitarian Award and the Harvard AIDS Institute Leadership Award.
She’s a well-accomplished old dame and, at 55, she’s as young and sprightly as in her late 1980s heyday. It’s truly an honor to watch such an established country star perform and it’s a night we’ll all remember as being great.
Em Beihold
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