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Biography of Kathy Mattea
Grammy® Award-winning artist Kathy Mattea teams up with the legendary George Jones on the buddy song "You've Got a Friend in Me," from Toy Story. Mattea recently completed her forthcoming album, Love Travels, a follow-up to the 1994 smash Walking Away A Winner.
The Charleston, West Virginia, native sang in church groups and local theaters while growing up, and she moved to Nashville after attending West Virginia University. Soon after, Mattea met producer Allen Reynolds and made six albums with him between 1984 and 1991. In 1990, she released A Collection of Hits, featuring her most popular songs. A year later, Mattea traveled to Scotland and recorded Time Passes By with Scottish folk artist Dougie MacLean.
Over the next few years, Mattea kept busy with several projects, including the 1992 smash album Lonesome Standard Time. She also recorded Good News, a collection of holiday tunes, and was one of several guest stars featured in the Dolly Parton comic tune "Romeo" -- both Good News and "Romeo" were honored with Grammy® nominations. Mattea also contributed a duet version of Jackson Browne's "Rock Me on the Water" to Red Hot + Country, the fourth installment in a series of AIDS benefit albums.
Each of her albums has met with increasing success among country audiences and critics. Heartfelt narratives like "Love at the Five and Dime" and "Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses" proved the commercial insight of Mattea and Reynolds's direction and established a precedent of folk-country fusion. Mattea received two Grammy® Awards and was twice named the Country Music Association's Female Vocalist of the Year.
A few years ago, Mattea joined Willie Nelson and a host of musicians in National Public Radio's Lone Gone Lonesome Blues: The Music of Hank Williams, and she contributed a performance to The Beatles Songbook -- an installment of PBS's In the Spotlight music series.