Past Internet Articles About Amy Grant

Amy Grant is not your average fairy godmother. But she just could make your wish come true. Last fall, the popular Christian recording artist went on tour; however, this time she wasn�t filling stadiums and concert halls. Instead, she was crisscrossing the United States as TV host, fulfilling the wishes of deserving people across the country.

It was all part of her feel-good primetime TV series, Three Wishes, which debuted last fall on NBC. Amy and her co-hosts�including Clean Sweep�s Eric Stromer and Trading Spaces� Carter Oosterhouse�interviewed thousands of candidates as they spread kindness in small-town America and made dreams a reality.

In a typical episode, the Three Wishes team visited a girl whose skull was badly damaged in a car accident, a leukemia-stricken cheerleading coach who wanted her girls to have a decent football field and a boy who wanted to be adopted by his step-dad.

Amy and her team set about performing random acts of kindness, such as building spacious playhouses in backyards while the unsuspecting families were away and arranging fund-raising events to pay off medical bills. Participants on the show were also treated to impromptu musical performances by Grant.

�To be invited into these powerful situations is life-changing,� admits Grant. �The lessons we learned as we helped these people have surpassed anything I could have imagined.�

Although NBC has not renewed the show, Amy believes that Three Wishes temporarily brought a touch of compassion to primetime TV, a timeslot with few life-affirming offerings. The first 10 episodes of Three Wishes are currently being rebroadcast on CMT, the country music channel.

For her own part, Amy was a charismatic host whose mere presence was enough to lift the spirits of the �wishers��and of the rest of the cast and crew. Perhaps her empathetic nature has something to do with her Christian faith, and the fact that she has weathered many personal storms in her own life.

Born in Augusta, Georgia, in 1960, Amy was just a baby when her family returned to Nashville, Tennessee. As the youngest of four daughters, she grew up in a strong Christian home grounded in faith and family values. �I was taught a lot of Bible at home and had a voracious appetite for reading it,� she recalls.

Music was always a part of her life. One of her first performances, as a teenager, was at a chapel service for her fellow students. It unveiled her musical talent and displayed her gift for connecting with her peers. At 16, Grant released her self-titled first album.

Amy�s big break came while she was working part time, sweeping floors in a Nashville music studio. Dabbling in song writing and performing, she used the studio to duplicate a tape of her original songs that she wanted to give to her family. A Word Records company executive heard the music and she was signed almost immediately.

Amy soon found herself traveling and singing across the country in churches, festivals, camps and schools. In 1979 she met singer-songwriter Gary Chapman whom she married in 1982.

Contemporary Christian music was growing in popularity during the 1980s and Amy was at the forefront. In 1982 she released her signature album Age to Age. It won several awards, and some songs from the album were even inserted into church hymnbooks.

Hardly had Grant established herself as the �Queen of Christian Pop,� when she changed directions to widen her fan base (and hence her musical message). Her goal was to become the first Christian singer-songwriter who was also successful as a contemporary pop singer.

Amy and Gary gave birth to Matthew Garrison in 1987. Two years later she welcomed Gloria Mills (�Millie�) to the family. Gloria was the inspiration for Amy�s breakthrough hit, Baby, Baby, which soared to number one on the Billboard Hot 100 pop chart. The multiplatinum album Heart in Motion made Amy a mainstream pop star.

Shortly after the birth of her second daughter, Sarah Cannon, Amy�s world began to fall apart. News of an impending divorce disappointed many of her fans. The messy divorce proceedings encompassed rumours, speculations and chastisements. The golden girl of Christian music filled the tabloids with the stigma of scandal.

Only Amy knows the crisis of faith that paralleled her relational turmoil. �It�s not that I stopped believing in God, but everything felt like a charade,� she confessed to ABC News. And only Amy knows the pain she endured in the ensuing years. �I know why God hates divorce because it rips you from stem to stern, and children are the total innocent recipients of a torn and shattered life.�

While struggling through the break up, she didn�t enter the studio or hit the road again for two years. As Amy gradually pieced her life back together, she continued to release emotional, honest albums.

�The hard times are behind me now,� she confides. �This is probably the most peaceful stretch of life I�ve known as an adult.

�I can look at the future with anticipation. It�s comforting to know that someday, as Christians, we�ll be able to look back and have a little more clarity on why certain things in life happened.�

In 1999 Amy tapped into her other talents and took a turn at acting. She hosted her own primetime network TV Christmas special and starred in the made-for-TV movie A Song From the Heart.

In March 2000, Amy married country music artist Vince Gill. It was a difficult time in her life as she coped with the shame of her prior divorce and worked hard at blending her new family.

A year later, after the birth of Vince and Amy�s first child, Corinna Grant Gill, another obstacle hit her career. Giving birth had weakened Amy�s abdominal muscles, and for a year she was confined to recording just two days each month.

Today Amy is fully recovered and settled into another round of motherhood. She is approaching 25 years in the music business, and her latest Christian album Rock of Ages was released in May 2005.

Grant has sold over 25 million records worldwide, won five Grammy Awards and numerous Dove awards, including Artist of the Year four times. She has performed everywhere from the White House to the Grand Ole Opry, taking Christian music and her positive message of the love of Jesus Christ to a wide audience.

With Three Wishes now off the air, Amy is taking time to recharge and redirect her talents. One thing is for certain�whatever endeavour Grant chooses next, it�s sure to combine her faith in God and her love for people. Her greatest wish? To see lives changed for the better.