Past Internet Articles About Amy Grant

With the Midland Theatre and Music Hall out of commission for much of the current season, the Kansas City Symphony has packed up its audience-pleasing pops series and moved south to Leawood�s mega Church of the Resurrection.

It�s hard to think of a more fitting artist to initiate the relocated series than Amy Grant, the gospel and contemporary Christian performer who rocked the rigidly segmented music business a couple of decades ago by crossing over to the more widely accessible�and financially lucrative�world of pop.

The personable singer-songwriter played a thoughtful and wide-ranging two-hour set on Friday night, encompassing all phases of her varied career and engaging the near-sellout crowd with an ongoing dialogue about faith and family.

In making her groundbreaking leap from sacred to secular, Grant raised more than a few eyebrows among the traditional flock, a reaction that intensified following her 1997 divorce and subsequent remarriage to country singer Vince Gill.

But Grant makes no apologies for her life decisions. Her stage persona radiates the genuineness and authenticity of a woman with questions and doubts who nevertheless maintains an abiding faith in a higher power outside herself.

With Grant�s musical director David Hamilton at the podium, the orchestra was in fine form throughout the evening, though the upholstered surfaces of the sanctuary tended to flatten out the sound in spots. Dressed in a beaded purple and black full-length gown, the singer opened the performance squarely in pop territory with the up-tempo �Stay for Awhile.�

Grant strummed an acoustic guitar and was backed by her seven-piece ensemble of vocalists and instrumentalists in addition to frequent full-orchestra charts.

The singer nimbly negotiated the different phases of her career, switching stylistic gears from such faith-based selections as �Saved By Love� to the infectious pop of �House of Love.�

�We all need a little romance in our lives,� Grant told the crowd before launching into �Love Me Tender,� which she dedicated to her husband. �I�ll be thinking about a hillbilly singer back in Tennessee as I�m singing this.�

A joyous, percussive version of Joni Mitchell�s �Big Yellow Taxi� and a lush orchestral arrangement of Gershwin�s �Someone to Watch Over Me� added to the show�s diverse musical textures. The singer closed out the evening�s first half with a folksy medley combining elements of �Jesus Loves Me� and �They Will Know We Are Christians.�

The musical mosaic continued in the concert�s second act, when Grant offered up such vintage pop tunes as �Wonderful World� alongside �Baby, Baby,� her own gently rocking crossover pop hit.

Interspersed throughout were such selections as �The Power,� a testament to the redemptive force of love, and a fully orchestrated �Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee.�

Between songs, the 45-year-old singer talked about her own faith and life journeys, and of the emerging contentment of middle age.

�It feels so good to be right in the middle of life,� Grant said. �I am trying to follow the advice of my minister, who told me to look in the mirror every morning and say, �Woman, you are made in the image of God.� I may be puffy and gray, but I�m the light of the world anyway.�