For Natalie Grant, music is a mission. Though she’s been on the path of music since childhood, she never imagined it would take her to the heights she’s at now. “Music was always a part of the fabric of my life,” she tells American Songwriter. “I was always on the path. I just never thought I would do it professionally.” Born and raised in Seattle, Washington, Grant grew up in church and was immersed in a musical family where she often sang with her siblings. Though she initially thought she might want to be a teacher, it wasn’t until she answered a casting call for a local Christian music troupe, Truth, that her path led directly to music.
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“That changed the whole trajectory of my life,” she states. While on tour with the group she met her manager, whom she still works with today, who convinced her to move to Nashville. She arrived in the city in 1996 with $200 in her pocket and stayed in a family’s guest room until she got on her feet. She also gained valuable experience working as a backup singer, including on Chris Rodriguez’s album Lift Him Up. “I’m making it sound easier than it was because it was a long road, but a really beautiful journey of the kindness of people along the way that invested in me and said, ‘We’re going to help you,’” Grant describes. “Some of the most defining moments were all the setbacks.”
Among those setbacks was signing her first record deal, only for the label to fold soon after she released her self-titled debut album in 1999. The same thing happened at her second label, landing her at Curb Records in 2003 where she’s been ever since. “With each setback, I had a choice to make: Is this actually what I’m called to do?” She questioned at the time. “It strengthened not only my resolve in music, but my faith, because the core of who I am is my faith and leaning on that and going, ‘Do you actually believe what you say you believe? If you do, it’s going to be put to the test.’ I think all of those setbacks are the most defining moments because it gave me the resolve to keep going.” For Grant, singing isn’t merely a form of self-expression, but an act of truth-seeking. “My faith is the core of who I am I felt like I was a truth teller about the truth of my life and what I’d experienced and I got to do that through the medium of songs,” she expresses. “So more than being a singer, I feel like I sing to tell the truth.”
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A lifelong fan of Christian and gospel music, Grant gets to explore the genres more deeply on her latest album, Seasons, where she covers several classics like “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” “Make You Feel My Love,” “Step by Step,” and “My Tribute (To God Be the Glory), alongside an elite list of guest stars including icons Dolly Parton, CeCe Winans, Mary Mary, to contemporary Christian artists Cory Asbury, Tauren Wells, Cain, and others. “Sometimes it really is beautiful and empowering to look back and go, ‘Where did I come from? What is something that carried me through? What is something that helps define who I am?’ The songs are that for me,” she professes. “There’s all these different history lessons of my life through all of the songs that I chose and artists that were my heroes growing up to artists that are heroes to me now because they’re doing something fresh and new in our genre.”
Calling the record a “dream come true,” Grant says she selected songs that are the soundtrack to important moments in her life. One example is “Step by Step” sung by Whitney Houston on the album for the film The Preacher’s Wife. The song served as the soundtrack to Grant’s early days in Nashville when she had a job in Medicare to make ends meet. “You feel that power when you hear that song,” she affirms. “I would listen to that song every day on the way to work and go, ‘It’s just step by step, keep moving forward, little steps will turn into giant leaps someday.’” She enlisted none other than Dolly Parton to sing with her on it, a collaboration that came together serendipitously. Grant was invited to perform at the opening of Dollywood in 2023 when Parton made a surprise appearance, asking if she could sing with Grant, the two joining forces on the gospel standard, “Just a Little Talk With Jesus.”
After the show, Grant’s manager reached out to Parton to ask if she’d be interested in singing “Step by Step” on Grant’s album, unbeknownst to Grant. Much to their surprise, Parton agreed, sending a handwritten letter to Grant professing how she couldn’t get the song out of her head. “I may have framed that letter and will be keeping it forever,” the singer laughs. “I had no idea she would give her heart and soul to that song. You could hear how invested she was in that, she gave her creativity to it. It was even more than I could have ever imagined that it would be.”
Another special moment arrives on one of Grant’s favorite songs, “Shackles (Praise You).” She teamed up with the duo Mary Mary to reimagine their signature hit, marking the first time in the song’s 23-year history that “Shackles” has been remade. Then there’s “To God Be the Glory,” a hymnal that Grant frequently sang with her family during childhood that she brought to life alongside one of her heroes, CeCe Winans, who Grant says, “Embodies the lyric. It was a whole full circle. It was personal in so many different ways.”
Grant cites Seasons as her favorite album she’s done thus far not just for the way it honors her past, but for how it provides hope for listeners along the way. She experienced the power of this music firsthand when she visited a women’s prison in Middle Tennessee and the inmates shared how one of the few items they could have in their cell was a radio where they listened to Christian radio. “‘We listen to those songs because those songs build us up, they make us feel hope, they make us feel encouraged,’” Grant recites. “That’s when you realize we are not just a part of making music – I’m a part of making music that actually puts a deposit in people that makes them feel hope, makes them feel like they can take another step when they feel like they can’t keep going. People are really hungry for hope – and that’s what this music is.”
hoto by Rick Diamond/Getty Images for BET
