Jennifer Warnes

One of the most successful songwriters of her generation, Jennifer Warnes achieved worldwide acclaim with her two best known hits, 'Up Where We Belong' with Joe Cocker and '(I've Had) The Time of My Life' with Bill Medley. The songs both won Grammy Awards for Best Pop Performance By a Duo Or Group With Vocals.

Born in Seattle, Washington but raised in California, Warnes first started singing in church. In her teens she gravitated towards folk music and in 1968 won the lead role in a Los Angeles production of the stage musical 'Hair'. A meeting with Leonard Cohen in 1971 however changed her musical direction as she recorded and toured Europe as a back-up singer with Cohen, eventually getting her own breakthrough with the 1976 hit 'Right Time of the Night'. Her reputation was enhanced by her song 'It Goes Like It Goes', which was included in the 1979 movie N'orma Rae', and she started specialising in movie theme songs, ultimately resulting in 'Up Where We Belong' from 'An Officer And a Gentleman' (1982) and '(I've Had) The Time of My Life' from 'Dirty Dancing' (1987).

Warnes currently has ten successful movie theme songs to her name, though many regard 'Famous Blue Raincoat', her 1986 album of Leonard Cohen songs, as her most defining work. Her seventh studio album, 'The Hunter', was released in 1992 with a co-write between her and Cohen included on the album, 'Way Down Deep'. Her next new music came in 2001 with 'The Well' followed by 'Another Time, Another Place' in 2018.