Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
My dad has sacrificed so much for me and my family, so for me to be getting the star treatment is insane.
Each child you have, you love them, but it's a different feeling. That's how it is with songs on the radio.
I naturally gravitated first to R&B and pop: Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Aretha Franklin, Patti LaBelle.
I Hope' is the fourth song that I'd ever written in Nashville. I didn't know that it was as special as it was.
Being a female, I know what it's like to go through a bad break up and not get to say what you really want to.
I wasn't in any super duper serious relationships growing up, but yeah, I know what that heartbreak feels like.
Country is and always will be my heart, but I don't have a problem with it spilling over into pop if it wants to.
I think you get a lot of influence from what your parents play around you. So I always loved country, R&B and rock.
I am very close with the whole cast; the Top 5 of us from 'Idol' are still super close, especially Cade and me. Wink wink.
If you're going to compare me to somebody and it's going to be Carrie Underwood, I will absolutely take that as a compliment.
I wasn't born with nerves. You have to take yourself out of the equation and think about everyone else - you're the entertainer.
I know it's cliche, but after the first show, I knew I liked singing, being on stage, making people happy. It just felt natural.
To be given a chance to be in the finals was a dream come true, and I will forever be thankful to the whole 'American Idol' crew.
Music is just something I find very fun, the way other people find going to the mall is fun - which I do, too, trust me. I love shopping.
When people ask me about Cade, how he's doing or how we're doing, I always end up saying, 'Oh he's great, he's a keeper, he's a good one.'
I completely understand why labels would be a little bit hesitant to sign somebody coming off of a television show, in their first glance.
I think being married and in love and all of that changed how I write songs and what I want to sing about and the type of songs that I like.
Country radio has been extremely good to me, which I am extremely grateful for and and means a bunch. But there is room for many other people.
There were a lot of challenges I had to face on 'American Idol' that helped me grow in a few different ways that I'll take forever with my career.
There's a happy medium to everything, even with powerhouse singers. You don't have to belt it out all the time. You don't have to overuse something.
Nobody has done Mariah Carey whistle-tone notes in country music that I've heard of, and if you're capable of doing it, you might as well add it in.
I'm getting to put my music out into the world the way that I envisioned and hoped it would be when I was little, and that is a total dream come true.
I'm not somebody who can tell if the song is good enough to be pushed until I hear what it sounds like after all the bells and whistles are put on it.
The first time I ever had a song play on a legit radio station, I think I was about 13. It was a song of mine that I had written called 'Young Blood.'
I am so unbelievably excited to share 'I Hope' with the world. After my 'Idol' chapter closed, I knew this song was the one I wanted to frame myself with.
I'm not the kind of person who walks in a room and is just like, 'Hi everybody!' I'm more somebody who is quiet and who isn't good at starting conversations.
I really respected women that could sing their tails off and entertain really well, so I wanted to get that across before I brought any of my own music into it.
There are other artists out there, in which some like to write and others like to perform and others like to talk, but I really just love to perform and entertain.
For marriage, yes, people always had their opinions of, 'Oh, you're too young,' because it's become a stereotype, for some reason, for people to get married later in their 20s.
The Lord always comes first in our lives, and then everything else comes second. And so with my music and with my platform, I have places to talk about the Lord and His goodness.
I'm very fortunate that R&B was where I first kind of learned my root in singing. I was able to do more with my voice and find it at an early age and then transform that into country as well.
There's a lot to learn in Nashville. This town is just filled with amazing, talented, smart people, so it's been an honor to be part of that community and to have everyone open their arms wide to me.
Of course, growing up, you listen to your favorite people on the radio and you want to have an album of your own and you want to have number one songs that people know and can sing back to you when you have shows.
I like to be on most of my songs. I think being on your songs makes it all the more special in a way. Especially for me, just knowing that I'm releasing something that I was really a part of and dug in the dirt with.
I value the Lord more than I value my career, because at the end of the day, when we die, we face him. We're going to wish that we did more on this earth for him. And so I want to make sure that I'm doing everything to glorify him.
Full live performances are always my favorites, and I think a lot of people's favorites too, just because you can feel the energy off the crowd and there's so much more interaction, and just everything overall is just like very hype.
I've always loved R&B. That love seemed to start in church. But then I saw Carrie Underwood on American Idol, and I fell in love with country. Heck, I loved the hair bands of the '80s too, so I have always loved country and rock 'n' roll.
Sometimes you don't really know what you're going to write about. I mean, there's times where you get into a writing room and it's a complete flop. And then there's times where you get to a writing room and you're like, 'Oh, I'm just on a roll.'
When I got into the Nashville scene, with the Ross Coppermans and Zach Kales and Jon Nites and Nicolle Galyons, all these people who have No. 1 hits with huge celebrities, they were able to show me creative ways and right ways of formulating songs.
Actually, zero labels were jumping toward me, and I couldn't get to anybody. Nobody was paying any attention. And I was like, 'OK, I'm going to put my nose to the ground and really work on writing and creating some good songs that people could gravitate to.'
A few people have asked me about the women agenda on country radio. I can only speak for myself on this, and all I have to say is that I'm very grateful, and thankful, that country radio has been so automatically accepting, and supportive, of me and my music.
I think 'Idol' has been such a wonderful platform for me to step onto, and be a part of, and they've always treated me very kindly, and have been very supportive of my music and myself. I will always keep that as a highlight in my career for the rest of my life.
From 11 to 17, I just toured my butt off with my dad and my sister. We hit the road and I was singing all kinds of different songs and different types of genres. But I knew from an early age what I wanted my sound to be, which was country on bass, and I wanted to be a country artist.
Something a lot of people don't know about me is I sucked my thumb until I was in like eighth grade. It's cause, when I was a baby, I sucked my thumb and I guess my mom and dad never weaned me off of that, because they thought it was cute. And then it's like an addiction. That's your security blanket.
I would definitely say I'm a country girl at heart; I wanted to make sure that I established my music first at Country just because that is the artist that I am. But it wanted to spill over into pop too, which I don't have a problem with at all and I think is awesome because it spreads it to a broader audience of people.