The best of Amy Grant

The current popularity of Christian songs can be traced to one person, the lovely and talented Amy Grant. She has recorded many albums in the past two decades but this is probably the first time she has compiled her most popular songs in an album. Amy is a versatile artist best known for Christian music and the album Amy Grant: Her Greatest Inspirational Songs shows her at her best.

The Nashville-bred singer and composer could have easily made it to the top as a pop or country music star because she has the looks and the voice. She plays the guitar and has proven herself an excellent songwriter many times over. Best of all, she has the rare gift of being able to interact well with people. Among them were teen-agers like her way back in the ’70s when she was starting out. Nowadays they are women who can relate to the emotions expressed in the praise and worship songs Amy creates.

Although this fourth daughter of a well-off family went to expensive private schools, her big break in the music business had all the makings of a Cinderella story. Amy, who always had a great interest in music, chose to work part-time sweeping floors and demagnetizing tapes in a recording studio. She was only 17 years old and still in high school when a visiting record producer heard her sing songs she had put together as a present for her family in 1980. His reaction was instantaneous and Amy was offered a recording contract with Word Records.

Christian music was then mostly hymns and gospel tunes and energetic spirituals. However, the inevitability that pop inspirationals would soon join the fold was all too obvious and this finally happened with Amy’s arrival. She was young, pretty and singing contemporary Christian songs that sounded just like the music being played in top 40 radio. Along with the release of her self-titled album debut, it also became hip to listen to and enjoy religious music.

More hit albums followed and Amy became the big star who helped Christian music cross over into the world of pop. Sing Your Praise to the Lord, Angels, El Shaddai, Find a Way, Lead Me On, Baby, Baby were among her biggest sellers. It was Amy who performed Angels, the first Christian song included in the program of the Grammy Awards. Her Find a Way was also the first video of a Christian song that made it to MTV. Baby, Baby was the first Christian song to reach number one in Billboard’s Hot 100 list. And there were of course the appearances in TV shows, concert tours and other accoutrements of pop music stardom.

Amy Grant was rightly dubbed a huge crossover success and it would have been easy for her to stay on the other side where the larger market would have resulted in greater popularity. But Amy never wavered from her commitment to Christian music. Now approaching her 25th year as a recording artist, she remains the foremost interpreter of pop praise and music songs in the whole world.

This is what makes Her Greatest Inspirational Songs an important collection. Amy not only sings and writes Christian songs; she is a Christian and she sings about it. She is an artist who truly lives the message she imparts to her listeners. That is what really matters most. I miss the big hit Baby, Baby but that will probably go into a more pop compilation album. I also miss her version of David Foster’s My Grown-up Christmas List but it is only 183 days until Christmas so it will not be such a long wait until they put Amy’s Christmas to Remember back in the store shelves. Meanwhile, I am sure you will not only enjoy but will also feel blessed listening to this one.

Included in Her Greatest Inspirational Songs are Sing Your Praise to the Lord, Doubly Good to You, Never Give You Up, All That I Need is You, In a Little While, I Have Decided, Family, Old Man’s Rubble, Mountain Top, Thy Word, Beautiful Music, The Lord has a Will, Who to Listen to, Brand New Start, Jehovah, All I Ever Have to Be and The Now and the Not Yet.