Amy Grant | |
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Born | Amy Lee Grant November 25, 1960 Augusta, Georgia, U.S. |
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Children | 4 |
Awards | Full list |
Musical career | |
Origin | Nashville, Tennessee, U.S. |
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Years active | 1976–present |
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Website | amygrant |
Amy Lee Grant (born November 25, 1960) is an American singer-songwriter and musician. She began her music career in contemporary Christian music (CCM) before crossing over to pop music in the mid-1980s. Grant has been referred to as "The Queen of Christian Pop".[1][2]
Grant made her debut as a teenager, gaining fame in Christian music during the 1980s with hits such as "Father's Eyes", "El Shaddai", and "Angels". In the mid-1980s, she began broadening her audience and soon became one of the first CCM artists to cross over into mainstream pop on the heels of her successful albums Unguarded and Lead Me On. In 1986, she scored her first Billboard Hot 100 no. 1 song in a duet with Peter Cetera, "The Next Time I Fall". In 1991, she released the album Heart in Motion, which became her best-selling album, topping the Billboard Christian album chart for 32 weeks. It sold five million copies in the U.S. and produced her second no. 1 pop single "Baby Baby", as well as another three top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100: "That's What Love Is For", "Every Heartbeat" and "Good for Me".
As of 2009,[update] Grant had sold more than 30 million albums worldwide,[3] won six Grammy Awards, 22 Gospel Music Association Dove Awards, and had the first Christian album to go platinum.[4] She was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2006[5] for her contributions to the entertainment industry and in 2022, she was announced as a recipient of the Kennedy Center Honors.[6]
Grant is the author of several books, including a memoir, Mosaic: Pieces of My Life So Far, and a book based on the popular Christmas song "Breath of Heaven (Mary's Song)" that she co-wrote.
When Amy Grant and Vince Gill sang a duet for her 1994 album House of Love, he was the king of country and she was the queen of Christian pop.
In 2000 her world turned upside down when she, the Queen of Christian Pop, and he, the King of Country, got married, leaving behind first spouses and their fans' mountain of expectations.