Terri Gibbs

During the early 1980s country-pop singer, songwriter and keyboardist Terri Gibbs attained moderate success before she resumed performing the gospel music of her youth. Born in Miami in 1954, she was raised in Augusta, Georgia from the age of one; blind since birth, she began playing piano at three. Her listening encompassed gospel alongside early rock & roll, pop and soul, especially Ray Charles, and she regularly tuned in to the Grand Ole Opry. Choir work and talent contests filled her childhood, one of which brought a backstage introduction to Chet Atkins. He requested a demo tape, and at 18 she followed his recommendation by relocating to Nashville. Limited label interest prompted a move instead to Miami, where she played keyboards with the band Sound Dimension. Gibbs left that group in 1973 to attend college, yet she withdrew after a year to concentrate on songwriting, returned to Augusta, assembled her own band in 1975 and performed locally for several years. The demo reached producer and songwriter Ed Penney, who signed her to MCA in 1980.

The title track of her debut album Somebody's Knockin' became a major crossover success in 1981, climbing to the country Top Ten while nearly matching that position on the pop chart and reaching the adult contemporary Top Five. Follow-up single "Rich Man" earned a country Top 20 placement, after which Gibbs received the ACM's Best New Female Vocalist honor and the CMA's first Horizon Award. Two subsequent albums, 1981's I'm a Lady and 1983's Over Easy, failed to replicate the debut's commercial reach, and although she scored two additional Top 20 country hits with 1982's "Ashes to Ashes" and 1983's "Anybody Else's Heart but Mine," neither approached the impact of "Somebody's Knockin'." Between 1981 and 1982 she toured extensively with George Jones and frequently joined him for duets onstage.

Following an extended recording absence, Gibbs returned to country gospel with the 1987 album Turn Around, which earned a Grammy nomination and produced CCM chart entries "Unconditional Love," "Comfort the People" and "Promised Land." After issuing 1990's What a Great Day on the independent Morning Gate label, she withdrew from music to raise a family with Grovetown, Georgia city councilman David Daughtry, whom she married on April 28, 1988; they had a child in 1989 and remained together until his death in 2008. During the marriage she released only one project, 2002's No Doubt About It on TGM Records, but resumed regular recording for the label after Daughtry's passing, delivering Your Grace Still Amazes Me in 2010, a newly recorded hits collection in 2014 and Sum It All Up in 2017.