Linda Creed

Raised in the Mount Airy section of Philadelphia, Linda Creed's contribution to the Philly Soul Sound of the 1970s through the 1980s is undeniable.

Her talents as a lyricist were teamed with Philadelphia International Records most noted composer-producer-arranger Thom Bell in 1971. The Creed and Bell collaboration produced an impressive array of Top 40 hits. For the vocal group The Stylistics, this songwriting team penned "Stop, Look, Listen (To Your Heart)" (their first collaboration & first Top 40 Hit), "You Are Everything", "Betcha By Golly, Wow", "I'm Stone In Love With You", and "You're As Right As Rain. " For The Spinners, they penned "Ghetto Child", "The Rubberband Man" and "I'm Coming Home. " Creed's sensitive lyrics meshed with Bell's signature classical-cum-soul sound also produced one of Johnny Mathis's signature albums.

Mathis' 1973 LP "I'm Coming Home" included the first recorded versions of "A Baby's Born", "I'd Rather Be Here With You", "Sweet Child" and "Life Is A Song Worth Singing", the latter becoming one of Mathis' most requested songs and a hit single for singer Teddy Pendergrass. Although Creed was diagnosed with breast cancer at the age of 26, she continued to work.

With composer Michael Masser, she wrote the poignant lyrics to "The Greatest Love of All" for the Muhammad Ali biopic The Greatest (1977); this Creed-Masser composition would become a No.

1 hit for singer Whitney Houston in 1986, the same year Creed lost her battle with breast cancer at age 37.

In 1987 her family and friends established The Linda Creed Breast Cancer Foundation in Philadelphia to provided free mammographies to uninsured and underinsured women.