With the voice and the hair of the fairy story Princess, Rapunzel, this country singer made a name for herself in the early 1970’s when country music was making a move to being more pop oriented making it the modern sound of Nashville.

Crystal Gayle was born on January 9^th 1951 in Paintsville, Kentucky and grew up in Wabash, Indiana. Even at an early age Crystal was exposed to music when she sang backing vocals with her brother’s band. While in high school she also performed folk music and learned to play the guitar.

Not long after graduating from high school Crystal married her high school sweetheart, Bill Gatzimos with whom she went on to have two children with, Catherine and Cris.

Crystal’s older sister Loretta Lynn also joined the realms of country music and signed to the Decca Record label and it was though Loretta that Crystal achieved her first signing with the label in 1970. The sister’s country sounds vary with Lynn’s being much more traditional and her younger sister’s being more pop oriented.

The early 70’s saw Crystal breaking away even further from the usual country sound when she signed with United Artists where she recorded many of her lesser known tracks such as ‘Wrong Road Again’ which reached number 6 in the charts, ‘I’ll Get Over You’ which made it number 71 in the Hot 100 and ‘I’ll Do it All Again’ which soared to number 2.

But her biggest hit was yet to come with the release of the jazz sounding ballad ‘Don’t it Make My Brown Eyes Blue’ which made number 1 in the country charts but this time it also saw Crystal at number 2 in the pop charts in 1977. She was the first country singer to achieve platinum status with an album, ‘We Must Believe in Magic.’

Following her success in the music charts Crystal went on a world tour with Kenny Rogers and later with Bob Hope where she was the first person to tape a performance on the great Wall of China. After her success with, ‘Don’t it Make My Brown Eyes Blue’ in 1977 Gayle only had two other significant hits during her career. 1978 brought the ballad "Talking In Your Sleep" and 1979 gave Crystal the number 15 hit "Half The Way".

In 1978, Gayle released the album, "When I Dream" which gave her three Top 3 Country hits "Talking In Your Sleep", "Why Have You Left The One You Left Me For" and "When I Dream". After this string of hits Gayle left United Artists in 1979 and signed with Columbia.

The early 1980’s still gave Crystal number one hits in the Country charts but her cross over into pop was not as successful. Later in 1985 Crystal recorded a duet soundtrack for the "Dallas" television series which starred Larry Hagman and Victoria Principal. The song, "Makin' Up For Lost Time’ reached number 1 in the Country charts and became Gayle's last AC chart appearance.

With hair reaching to the ground Crystal has always cut a beautiful figure when performing on stage and as such was voted one of the most beautiful people in the world in 1983. She frequently stands with her back to the audience when performing showing her beautiful trestles flowing back and forth as she moves in time to her singing. To prevent her tripping on her hair while on stage Crystal always wears high heeled shoes.

Gayle and her family now live in Nashville where she owns a gift store selling gifts and jewelry. She has also become the proud grandmother to one grandchild, Elijah.

ABB