She made her debut at the Apollo Theater at age four and had a contract with RCA Records when she was only five. Quincy Jones and Dinah Washington have proclaimed themselves as her godparents. By the late 1960s Austin was a prolific session musician and commercial jingle singer. By the 1980s she was signed to Jones’s Qwest Records and she began having hits. She charted twenty R&B songs between 1969 and 1991 and had success on the Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart, where she hit number one in 1981 with “Do You Love Me?” / “The Genie.” The album containing that hit, Every Home Should Have One, also produced her biggest mainstream hit. “Baby, Come To Me,” a duet with James Ingram, peaked at number 73 on the Hot 100 in early 1982. After being featured as the love theme in a prominent storyline on the soap opera General Hospital, the song re-entered the pop chart in October and went to number one in early 1983. Austin continued to have minor chart hits through the remainder of the 1980s, although no other singles reached the Hot 100 Top 40. She does not have chart hits today but she still produces new music. |
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