JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A new date has been announced for seven-time Grammy winner Gladys Knight’s Jacksonville show. The legendary 80-year-old singer was scheduled to perform at Jacksonville’s Florida Theatre last week when she and another family member got ill backstage.
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The new date for the show is 8 p.m., July 15, the Florida Theatre announced. The March 8 tickets for the cancelled show will be honored at the July show.
“Please hold on to your tickets to the original date as they will be honored for the rescheduled show,” a Florida Theatre news release states.
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Knight took to Instagram after getting ill and canceling her Jacksonville show stating, “Hi my loves! I have that flu that is going around and am already feeling better. I’ll see everyone real soon and appreciate the good wishes.”
Tickets to the July show are still available. Click here for more information.
Legendary career
Born in Georgia Knight began performing gospel music at age four in the Mount Mariah Baptist Church and sang as a guest soloist with the Morris Brown College Choir. Three years later, she won the grand prize on television’s Ted Mack’s Amateur Hour, and the following year, her mother Elizabeth Knight created the group consisting of Gladys, her brother Bubba, her sister Brenda, and her cousins William and Elenor Guest. They called themselves The Pips in honor of their cousin/manager, James Pip Woods. In 1959, Brenda and Elenor left the group, replaced by cousin Edward Patten and friend Langston George. The group was renamed Gladys Knight & The Pips, and following George’s departure in 1962, the classic line-up was in place.
The group debuted their first album in 1960, when Knight was just 16. With Knight singing lead and The Pips providing lush harmonies and graceful choreography, the group went on to achieve icon status, having recorded some of the most memorable songs of the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. Top 20 hits, like “Every Beat of My Heart,” “Letter Full of Tears,” “I Heard it Through the Grapevine” and “If I Were Your Woman,” set the stage for an amazing run in the mid-1970s, with Top 10 gold-certified singles like “Neither One of Us (Wants to be the First to Say Goodbye),” “I’ve Got to Use My Imagination,” “Best Thing to Ever Happen to Me” and the #1 smash “Midnight Train to Georgia” established Gladys Knight and The Pips as the premiere pop/R&B vocal ensemble in the world. Knight enjoyed another #1 hit in 1985 when she teamed with Stevie Wonder, Elton John, and Dionne Warwick on “That’s What Friends Are For.”
In 1995, Knight earned her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and the next year, Gladys Knight & The Pips were inducted into the Rock ‘N’ Roll Hall of Fame.
All told Knight has recorded more than 38 albums over the years, including four solo albums during the past decade: Good Woman (1991); Just for You (1994); the inspirational Many Different Roads (1999); and At Last (2001). At Last showed the world that she still has what it takes to record a hit album, employing the talents of contemporary producers like Randy Jackson, Gary Brown, James D.C. Williams III, Jon John, Jamey Jaz, Keith Thomas, Tom Dowd, and Tiger Roberts.
*Background information provided by Florida Theatre
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