It's hard to find a more prolific and highly-decorated contemporary Christian music artist than Steven Curtis Chapman. With Grammy Awards and Gospel Music Awards that seem to multiply like disciple-distributed loaves and fish, Chapman continues to entertain and inspire the crowds of not only Christian music fans, but also, more recently, fans of mainstream pop.

Steven Curtis Chapman grew up in western Kentucky. The son of a record store owner, Steven learned to play several instruments by his teenage years, though he was exceedingly proficient at the piano and guitar. For a short while he was a pre-med student, but he wound up dropping out to pursue his real love, music. Chapman's career in gospel music achieved its genesis in the mid-1980s when he began writing songs for some established Christian musicians and groups. It wasn't too long before Chapman's abilities grabbed the attention of talent scouts and execs at Sparrow Records, one of the leading Christian music labels at the time. After he signed with Sparrow in 1987 Chapman began work on his debut solo album, First Hand. For over a decade after that first release, Chapman built a massive fan base among religious music audiences that finally spilled over into mainstream success in the early to mid 1990s.

The musician Steven Curtis Chapman is morally motivating enough, but Steven Curtis Chapman the man has wielded his influence and resources to spur on real-world, concrete positive changes in a practical way as well. Chapman is a vocal advocate for several social causes, including foreign adoption and aid for Hurricane Katrina victims. But it should come as no surprise that, for a musician whose been reaching out to people with the message of the Gospel for so long, turning scripture into lyrics and lyrics into action are natural transitions.