Sara Evans

 Sara Lynn Evans; born 5 February 1971, is an American country music performer and songwriter. She is also an actor, record producer, and an author. Five of her songs reached the top spot on the Billboard country songs charts and she has sold over six million albums. Nine more singles reached the Billboard top ten with songs like "I Could Not Wait for More", "I Keep Looking" as well as "Cheatin'". The top 20 charting singles are "Saints & Angels", "Backseat of a Greyhound Bus" and "As If" The singer has received numerous awards from both the Academy of Country Music and the Country Music Association. The Academy of Country Music as well as the Country Music Association have nominated Evans for numerous other accolades such as Female Vocalist and Single of The Year. Evans was born in New Franklin, Missouri, and she began singing with her siblings as part of the Evans Family Band. They performed in New Franklin, Missouri throughout her teenage and childhood years. Evans and her brother Matt Evans, and her older brother Matt Evans started their own band in her teens. They relocated to Nashville, Tennessee in 1991 in order to pursue a career as country musicians. Evans met Craig Schelske in Nashville. She briefly lived in Aumsville, Oregon, before returning to Nashville. After returning to Nashville, Evans found work as a demo singer and this led to her signing a recording deal with RCA Records. The first album she released, Three Chords and the Truth was released in 1997. It was followed by No Place That Far (1998) the second single with the same name topped the Billboard country chart.Evans had her greatest popularity in the late 2000s when she released the albums Born to Fly (2000), Restless (2003) and Real Fine Place (2005). The albums sold more than one million copies and contained the top country hit singles "Born to Fly", "Suds in the Bucket" and "A Real Fine place to begin". In 2006, Evans appeared as a contestant on Dancing with the Stars before she walked out. Evans removed herself from her music career in order to focus on her family, before to release an album called Greatest Hits package in 2008. Her sixth studio album, called Stronger she launched her career again. The album was supported by "A Little Bit Stronger" which topped the charts for two weeks. Following the release of Slow Me Down (2014), Evans left RCA and formed her own record label. In 2017, she released her first album under the label called Words. The music of Evans was originally inspired by honky-tonk and neotraditional, but she began focusing more on pop country songs following her sophomore album. While critical reception to her entire catalog is mixed, a lot of reviewers have praised the power and twang of her voice.