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Amy GrantandVince Gillwent from singing “House of Love” to finding love with each other.
The “Queen of Christian Pop” and the Grammy award-winning country singer met in late 1993, however, they were both married to other people at the time. The two artists then formed a friendship and began collaborating on music together.
It wasn’t until after their respective marriages ended that the musicians' relationship turned romantic.
“The truth is there was never a magic plan, ‘I’m going to go do this and a couple years later you go do this,’ " Gill said during a 2003 interview withLarry King. “There wasn’t ever even a discussion. I got a divorce. And I said, ‘Well, I think [Amy will] probably stay.’ I really did. That’s how I felt.”
The pair began dating in 1999 and got married the following year, bringing together their two families — Grant has three children, Matt, Sarah and Millie, with her ex-husband, Gary Chapman, while Gill shares daughter Jenny with his ex-wife, Janis Oliver.
From writing music together to celebrating anniversaries, here is everything to know about Amy Grant and Vince Gill’s relationship.
It was Grant’s holiday tune “Tennessee Christmas” that first caught Gill’s attention. During an appearance onI Played The Ryman, the country singer recalled hearing the song on the radio in 1983.
“I was driving around somewhere in Nashville and I heard her voice and I pulled the car over. I said, ‘There’s something in that voice, it’s connecting to me,’ and little did I know how much,” Gill recalled.
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The couple officially met in 1993 when Grant joined Gill at his “Christmas With Vince Gill” holiday event in Tulsa, Oklahoma, according to theOklahoman.
“We actually crossed paths many times before we actually worked together. We sang for the troops during Desert Storm at Fort Campbell [in Tennessee]. And I just thought he was a nice guy. And then we worked together Christmas of ‘93 and actually performed together,” Grant told King in 2003. “I was just captivated with his personality. I just thought he was a great guy.”
In 2003, Gill toldABC Newsthat someone dared him to put on a top hat and dance with Grant during one of her songs at the concert.
“I started dancing with her, and those pretty big eyes,” he recounted. “I started to sing and the words were just nowhere to be found. And the people were laughing at me.”
Grant also noted in the couple’s interview with King that there was “nothing shocking” between them when they first collaborated.
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The duo sang the title track on Grant’s 1994 albumHouse of Love. OnLarry King Live, Grant shared that she asked Gill to be a part of it between their 1993 Christmas shows. “I’d heard his voice live, I said, ‘Would you sing on this record of mine,House of Love?’ " she remembered.
Gill’s ex-wife filed for divorce in 1997 after 17 years of marriage. TheChicago Tribunereported at the time that Oliver had cited irreconcilable differences as the reason for the divorce.
Grant learned of Gill’s divorce in the news. “That’s how I found out. I read it in the paper,” she said during her 2003 interview with King. Initially, Grant wasn’t happy about the announcement. “It wasn’t like I went, ‘Oh good, he’s available to me,’ because I wasn’t,” she added.
Grant and Chapman, who wed in 1982, announced in 1998 thatthey were separating.
“This is easily the saddest thing I’ve encountered in my life,” Chapman told PEOPLE at the time. “I’m an old-fashioned guy who believes marriage should last until one of you quits breathing.”
The former couple’s divorce was later finalized in June 1999.
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She added their friendship had nothing to do with their respective divorces.
“A lot of disparaging things were said about myvery public friendshipwith Vince,” she explained. “One of the reasons that the friendship was so public was because it never occurred to me to hide it.”
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In March 2000, Gill’s spokesperson confirmed that the couple were engaged. “I can confirm that they are getting married,” she said, per theTampa Bay Times. “Other than that, they’d like to protect their privacy.”
Shortly after news of their engagement broke, the couplegot marriedon March 10, 2000. They wed in an outdoor ceremony just outside of Nashville.
During a 2013 appearance onKatie, Grant toldKatie Couricthat she and Vince were “the only excited ones” at their wedding.
“I laugh about our wedding day, because all of our photographs, I refer to my grim-faced children,” Grant shared. “It just takes time, and it’s okay to let it.”
Months after their wedding, Gill’s rep confirmed to theAssociate Pressthat the newlyweds were expecting their first child together. “She’s due at the end of March,” the rep said.
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The couple welcomed their daughterCorrina Grant Gilltwo days after their first wedding anniversary. Gill has called Corrina the “glue” of their family. “She bonded all of us in a blood way that really did connect us,” he later toldAARPThe Magazine.
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The entire blended family was in attendance at Grant’s Hollywood Walk of Fame ceremony, and Gill gave a sweet speech to honor his wife’s accomplishment.
“Amy’s greatest quality is her ability to have a conversation with you as your friend or even a stranger and she will never waver from that conversation,” Gill said in his speech,per AP. “This is the greatest thing I love about my wife is that when she talks to you, she’s not looking over your shoulder to see if a bigger, better deal is coming through the room. She’s engaged in you and you only. … If you’re lucky enough to have spent time with her as a friend or travel the road with her riding a bus, or let her help you kind of cure your own problems, she is a great friend and I applaud her for that.”
Grant’s mother Gloria, who had dementia and whose health was deteriorating, came to their home on Gill’s 54th birthday tolive her final dayswith them.
When Gloria survived longer than anticipated, Grant asked Gill, “What if she’s got another four or six months?” Gill replied, “Then we get to enjoy your mother for four or six more months.” Gloria Grant died on April 30, 2011.
Grant’s father, Burton, was also diagnosed with dementia in 2009. The singer told PEOPLE that her husband had been “so supportive” in taking care of her parents.
“He’s not a man of a whole lot of words, but sometimes he can read it on my face,” she said. “He’ll sit on the sofa and just say, ‘Come here. It looks like you need to be held for a little while.’ "
Grant expressed her gratitude for her husband onInstagrama few days after Thanksgiving in 2019.
Alongside a photo of herself with Gill, she wrote: “I hope you all had a joyful and relaxing Thanksgiving. I am forever grateful for my sweet husband, Vince, and this life we share. Would love to know what you are thankful for this year!”
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Later that month, Grant spoke to PEOPLE about performing with her husband.
“Ifall in lovewith him every night again hearing him play because he is maybe one of the most gifted musicians, singers I’ve ever heard in my life. I meanever,” Grant said. “He just makes everything better. Makes everything sound better. And he’s funny. And he makes fun of himself.”
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At the 63rd AnnualGrammy Awards, Gill took home the award forbest country solo performancefor “When My Amy Prays,” a song he wrote for Grant.
“It’s just a testament to how much I care about her. How dear she is to me in my life,” he toldCMT. “Kindness is how she leads her life and it’s the first thing you ever notice. It’s the first thing you ever experience, and it’s kind of unending.”
In July 2022, Grantgot into a bicycle accidentin Nashville. Grant fell while cycling with a friend and was taken to Vanderbilt Hospital, where she was treated for cuts and abrasions.
Grant later told PEOPLE that Gill “madeevery day of the journey okay.” She recalled, “[Gill] said, ‘Things happen to people every day, and you just have to take one day at a time, and we’re here, and I love you.’ "
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Over a week after Grant’s bike accident, the couple’s daughterCorrina joined her father on stageto perform “When My Amy Prays” at the Ryman in Nashville.
“We’re gonna do this song that I wrote for my wife, Amy,” Gill said. “We haven’t been doing it much, but because of her accident and everything she’s been going through, we’ve been thinking a lot about her and I thought how sweet it would be for her youngest to sing this song I wrote for her. Please welcome my kiddo.”
As Corrina sang, she changed the lyrics to say “when my mama prays.”
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The couple performed their annual show, Christmas at the Ryman, together in Nashville throughout the holiday season. The 12-concert run has been a time honored tradition for the husband-wife duo and city of Nashville, in which they duet classic Christmas songs.
Grant was awarded an honorary degree from the University of Notre Dame. Gill joined her on the trip to Indiana and was in the audience as she received her honorary doctorate of fine arts at the university’s May commencement ceremony. Grant closed the ceremony with a performance of “Breath of Heaven.”
Amy Grant and Vince Gill perform at the Ryman Auditorium on December 13, 2023 in Nashville, Tennessee.Jason Kempin/Getty
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Gill and Grant have hosted Christmas at the Ryman — a holiday concert series in Nashville — every year for the past 13 years. The couple sing Christmas favorites such as “Let It Snow,” “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” and “O Holy Night.”
“[It’s] become one of our favorite holiday traditions,” Grant said in a statement.
Just before celebrating her 25th wedding anniversary to Gill, Grant told PEOPLE that “life orchestrated thatwe kept crossing paths” until the timing was right for them to fall in love.
“Life is full of all kinds of mysteries,” Grant said. “And I’m not saying any of us did it all wrong or all right, but what we’ve experienced is just so much grace and forgiveness for each other and for our first families and our second families, and it is possible to reconcile.”
She continued, “It’s possible to mend fences. It might not be in the context of original relationships, but it’s possible to find your way in life with respect.”
source: people.com