Peter Cetera

Singer-bassist Peter Cetera's smooth tenor and precise delivery fueled some of the biggest soft rock and adult contemporary hits of the 1970s and 1980s, both as a member of Chicago and as a solo artist with such mellow ballads as "You're the Inspiration," "The Glory of Love" and "After All." Cetera toiled in a variety of Chicago area garage bands before joining The Big Thing, a jazz/rock outfit that found fame as Chicago in the early 1970s. Cetera soon established himself within the band's ensemble arrangement with his blue-eyed soul inflection and penchant for gentle ballads like "If You Leave Me Now," which became the band's first No. 1 single in 1976. By the early 1980s, Cetera would become the dominant force in Chicago due to heartfelt hits like "You're the Inspiration" and "Love Me Tomorrow," which eventually prompted him to split with the group and launch a solo career. He proved immediately successful in this regard, earning a Grammy and Oscar nomination for "The Glory of Love" from the "Karate Kid Part II" (1986) soundtrack before mining more chart gold with such polished fare as "The Next Time I Fall" and "After All." Changing tastes in pop tastes ushered Cetera away from the charts in the early '90s, though he remained a much-loved concert attraction, where he recounted his biggest hits to a faithful audience. Cetera's distinctive voice and talent for memorable pop ballads preserved his status as one of the most popular romantic singers of the Seventies and beyond.