Gladys Knight

Since she first started releasing music in the '60s, Gladys Knight—a.k.a. the “Empress of Soul”—has been one of the most recognizable and iconic voices in R&B, both as a solo artist and alongside her longtime group, The Pips. Born in Atlanta in 1944 and raised in a musical family, she’d go on to release or appear on career-defining hits including “Midnight Train to Georgia,” “I Heard It Through the Grapevine,” and “That’s What Friends Are For.” She's become a legend in her own time, her signature smoky voice letting her dabble in gospel and pop throughout her career. While the earliest days of her music career placed her alongside James Brown and Etta James, as her career progressed Knight continually worked with contemporary artists including Brandy, Chaka Khan, and Tamia. And in 2020, she staked her claim to a new generation of fans when she took on fellow soul icon Patti LaBelle in a historic Verzuz battle.