Carrie Underwood

Carrie Underwood was the winner of the fourth season of American Idol. Since then, she has seen great success in both the pop, gospel, adult contemporary, and country music charts. She has won American Music Awards, Billboard Awards, and Grammy Awards among others.

Carrie was born in 1983 and raised in Checotah, Oklahoma. While still a child, she performed in the Robbing Memorial Talent Show. She also sang in her church choir at the Free Will Baptist Church. She performed at local events such as the Old Settler’s Day and for Lion’s Club events. By the age of 13, her manager tried to get her a recording contract, but was unsuccessful.

After graduating high school in 2001, she attended Northeastern State University where she graduated magna cum laude with a degree in mass communication. During summers, she would perform at the Northeastern Downtown Country Show as well as compete in beauty pageants. She was selected the runner up in the 2004 Miss NSU competition.

She decided to audition for American Idol in the summer of 2004. She was so good at her audition that usually terribly picky Simon not only predicted that she would win the competition, but also sell more records than any other American Idol winner.

How right Simon was! Carrie was named the winner on May 25, 2005, beating out Bo Bice. Her Idol single “Inside Your Heaven” was released shortly after her win and it debuted at #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. She released her debut album titled Some Hearts on November 15, 2005. The first week, 315,000 copies of the album were sold. It made it to #1 on the Billboard Top Country Albums chart. The hit single “Jesus, Take the Wheel” stayed at #1 on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart for six consecutive weeks and even reached #20 on the Billboard Hot 100. For this single, Carrie won the Gospel Music Association’s award for Best Country Single of the Year.

Carrie released “Some Hearts” as a single as well. It reached #15 on the AC (Adult Contemporary) chart. Her second country single “Don’t Forget To Remember Me” reached #2 on the Billboard Hot Country Charts. Her next single “Before He Cheats” stayed at number one on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart for five consecutive weeks. The Some Hearts album has been certified as sextuple Platinum by the RIAA.

Carrie won many other awards for her hit album. She won the CMT Female Video of the Year and Breakthrough Video of the Year awards for “Jesus, Take the Wheel.” At the Academy of Country Music Awards, she won Top New Female Vocalist of the year and Single Record of the Year for “Jesus, Take the Wheel.” She also won the Female Vocalist of the Year and Horizon awards at the Country Music Association Awards. She won the American Music Awards Favorite New Breakthrough Artist award. Finally, she won Best New Artist, Best Female Country Vocal Performance, Best Country Song, and Song of the Year for “Jesus, Take the Wheel.” She also won the People’s Choice award for Favorite Female Singer and Favorite Country Song for “Before He Cheats.”

All in all, Some Hearts produced five number one hits. Her second album is scheduled to be released on October 23. The first single, “So Small” was released on July 31.

You can listen to more of Carrie’s hits including: