Faith Hill
Audrey Faith Perry McGraw, best known as
Faith Hill (born
September 21,
1967 in
Jackson, Mississippi), is an
American country singer, known for her commercial success as well as her marriage to country singer
Tim McGraw.
Hill was born in
Jackson, Mississippi, but raised in the nearby town of
Star. She began singing at a very early age and, after briefly attending college, moved to
Nashville in an attempt at singing career. In her early days in Nashville, Hill worked as a secretary and sold merchandise for famous country stars.
Hill is
adopted and met her biological mother in the early 1990s. She was married to a music executive named Dan Hill from 1988 to 1994. Hill's voice caught the attention of
Warner Brothers Records executives, who eagerly gave her a record deal.
Shortly after being signed to
Warner, Hill was given the opportunity to open for fellow country superstar
Tim McGraw. They married in 1996 and currently have three daughters together.
Hill's debut album was
Take Me As I Am (
1993); sales were strong, buoyed by the chart success of "Wild One". A version of
Janis Joplin's "
Piece of My Heart", also went to the top of the country charts in
1994. She was delayed in the recording of her second album by surgery on her
vocal cords.
It Matters to Me finally appeared in
1995 and was another success, with the title track becoming her fourth #1 country single. Hill began the Spontaneous Combustion Tour with country singer
Tim McGraw and later started seeing him, breaking off engagement to her former producer, Scott Hendricks. When he proposed marriage to her in one of his tour trailers, he had to go perform right then, so she took a permanent marker and wrote her answer on the mirror. Hill after touring with McGraw married him on
October 6,
1996. They have three daughters together: Gracie Katherine (b. 1997), Maggie Elizabeth (b. 1998) and Audrey Caroline (b. 2001).
Hill's
1998 album,
Faith, moved her closer towards a mainstream, pop-oriented sound. "This Kiss" became a #1 country hit, and went to #7 on the pop charts.
Hill's fame grew rapidly as she signed an endorsement deal with
CoverGirl makeup and released
Breathe, an even more successful pop hit that became one of the biggest albums of
2000. The title track "
Breathe" was the #1 pop airplay song that year and has become Hill's
signature song; especially notable is the power and control she shows in her lower
register during the song. "The Way You Love Me" hit the top ten as well (#6), and becoming one of the longest running singles in the history of the
Billboard Hot 100 (57 weeks). The album won Hill three
Grammy Awards including
Best Country Album.
The year 2000 was also very successful in a concert setting as Hill and Tim McGraw staged the joint
Soul2Soul Tour, one of the best-grossing concert tours of 2000. By the holidays she had contributed "Where Are You Christmas?" to the movie
How the Grinch Stole Christmas; this
gospel-flavored song became very popular on the all-Christmas-all-the-time holiday formats that American radio stations adopted in the 2000s.
The following summer she recorded the
Diane Warren penned "
There You'll Be" for the
Pearl Harbor soundtrack. After the
September 11, 2001 attacks, Hill showed her gospel colorings again when she performed "There Will Come a Day" on the
America: A Tribute to Heroes benefit telethon. At the end of 2001, Faith released her first collection called "There You'll Be" which reached top 30 of the Italian album chart and #6 on the UK album chart selling nearly 1 million copies worldwide.
|
Faith Hill's Album Cry (2002) |
In
2002, Hill released
Cry. Though the album debuted at #1 on
Billboard magazine's pop and country album charts, its singles (including the title track, written and originally performed by
Angie Aparo) received much less radio airplay than her previous smashes. In fact, country radio pretty much ignored the songs, considering them "too pop". The album did win one Grammy Award and has sold nearly 3 million copies worldwide.
In the summer of
2004, Hill co-starred with
Nicole Kidman and
Matthew Broderick in director
Frank Oz's remake of the 1975 thriller
The Stepford Wives.
She references this sojourn in Hollywood as well as the chilly reception of
Cry in the 2005 country release "Mississippi Girl", the first single from her back-to-roots album
Fireflies. It worked, as the song restored her to the top of the country charts. "Mississippi Girl" is her 8th song to have reached #1. She performed this song along with "Breathe" and "Piece of My Heart" at the
Live 8 concert in Rome on
July 2,
2005, where McGraw also performed. The second single, "Like We Never Loved At All", featured a duet with McGraw and reached the top five of the country chart, as well as winning the duo a
Grammy Award for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals. The third single from the album was the song "The Lucky One". The song was released to country radio in February 2006 and peaked at #5 on the Billboard Country Singles chart. The fourth single was originally expected to be "Stealing Kissses", however "Sunshine & Summertime" ended up becoming the fourth single released from the album as the song was sent to radio in early June. Currently, the song is #13 on the Billboard Country Singles Chart and Hill includes it in her set during her and husband Tim McGraw's current
Soul2Soul II Tour 2006. It is expected that "Stealing Kisses" will be the next single off of the album as a video for the song was shot in Spring 2006 and is shown each night at the Soul2Soul II Tour when Hill performs the song. The album
Fireflies has sold more than 2 million copies in the U.S. and was certified
double platinum on January 2006.
On the same month, Faith Hill and Tim McGraw decided to reprise their Soul2Soul Tour. The co-headlining arena tour, dubbed
Soul2Soul II Tour 2006, began on April 21 and will run through Labor Day, with a total of 75 dates, however 2 shows were cancelled. [
1]
In June 2006 a reader poll released by
Country Weekly magazine voted Hill "the most beautiful woman in country music". [
2]
Studio albums
Take Me As I Am (1993) #59 US (3X Platinum)
It Matters to Me (1995) #29 US (4X Platinum)
Faith (1998) #7 US (6X Platinum)
Breathe (1999) #1 US (8X Platinum), #19 UK
Cry (2002) #1 US (2X Platinum), #29 UK
Fireflies (2005) #1 US (2X Platinum)
Compilation albums
There You'll Be (2001) #6 UK
Singles
| Year | Title | Chart Positions | Album |
! width="66">|US Hot 100US Country | US AC | UK |
|---|
| 1993 | "Wild One" | - | 1 | - | - | Take Me As I Am |
| 1994 | "Piece of My Heart" | - | 1 | - | - | Take Me As I Am |
| 1994 | "Take Me As I Am" | - | 2 | - | - | Take Me As I Am |
| 1994 | "But I Will" | - | 35 | - | - | Take Me As I Am |
| 1995 | "It Matters to Me" | 74 | 1 | - | - | It Matters to Me |
| 1995 | "Let's Go To Vegas" | - | 5 | - | - | It Matters To Me |
| 1996 | "Someone Else's Dream" | - | 3 | - | - | It Matters To Me |
| 1996 | "You Can't Lose Me" | - | 6 | - | - | It Matters to Me |
| 1996 | "I Can't Do That Anymore" | - | 8 | - | - | It Matters to Me |
| 1997 | "It's Your Love" (with Tim McGraw) | 7 | 1 | - | - | Everywhere [Tim McGraw] |
| 1998 | "This Kiss" | 7 | 1 | 3 | 13 | Faith |
| 1998 | "Just To Hear You Say That You Love Me" (feat. Tim McGraw) | - | 3 | - | - | Faith |
| 1998 | "Let Me Let Go" | 33 | 1 | 10 | - | Faith |
| 1999 | "Love Ain't Like That" | 68 | 12 | - | - | Faith |
| 1999 | "The Secret of Life" | 46 | 4 | - | - | Faith |
| 1999 | "Breathe" | 2 | 1 | 1 | 33 | Breathe |
| 2000 | "The Way You Love Me" | 6 | 1 | 3 | 15 | Breathe |
| 2000 | "Let's Make Love" (feat. Tim McGraw) | 54 | 6 | - | - | Breathe |
| 2001 | "If My Heart Had Wings" | 39 | 3 | - | - | Breathe |
| 2001 | "There You'll Be" | 10 | 11 | 1 | 3 | Pearl Harbor [Soundtrack] |
| 2001 | "Where Are You Christmas?" | 65 | 26 | 10 | - | Dr. Seuss' How The Grinch Stole Christmas [Soundtrack] |
| 2002 | "Cry" | 33 | 12 | 1 | 25 | Cry |
| 2003 | "When The Lights Go Down" | - | 26 | - | - | Cry |
| 2003 | "One" | - | - | 7 | - | Cry |
| 2003 | "You're Still Here" | - | 28 | - | - | Cry |
| 2005 | "Mississippi Girl" | 29 | 1 | - | - | Fireflies |
| 2005 | "Like We Never Loved at All" (feat. Tim McGraw) | 45 | 5 | 9 | - | Fireflies |
| 2006 | "The Lucky One" | 69 | 5 | - | - | Fireflies |
| 2006 | "Sunshine and Summertime" | 78 | 13 | - | - | Fireflies |
| 2006 | "Stealing Kisses" | - | - | - | - | Fireflies |
|
* "Breathe" topped Billboard's Hot 100 Year-end list in 2000 without topping the weekly chart, becoming the second single to do so.
* "There You'll Be" went to number one in Canada.
*
Best selling music artists*
Billboard Year-End *
Official website*
Faith Hill at
Country Music Television*
Tim McGraw and Faith Hill Marriage Profile*
An record review about Faith Hill â€" Fireflies*
Liberal Country Fan Covers Faith's music and liberal political activism.
*
Faith Hill Fanz Only UK 2006 Group Has news, images, album and singles informations, polls, wallpapers, msn icons, videos to watch, videos download and audio download and much more.
