Brandy Clark Artistfacts

October 9, 1975
Brandy Clark was raised in Morton, Washington, and went to community college in the area before moving to Nashville in 1998, where she studied music-business at Belmont University and honed her skills as a songwriter. Her first hit as a writer was "Mama's Broken Heart" by Miranda Lambert in 2011. Two years later, Clark released her debut album, 12 Stories.
She's earned a bunch of Grammy nominations, most notably Best New Artist in 2015, which she lost to Sam Smith. Her first win came in 2024 when "Dear Insecurity," her duet with Brandi Carlile, won for Best Americana Performance.
Clark is gay, but was a "late bloomer," telling SeattleMet: "I had no idea I was gay. It wasn't something I discovered until I was in Nashville and fell in love for the first time."

She's always been open about it, adding, "The only things that grow in the closet are mushrooms and mold. And I'm not either of those things."
She and Brandi Carlile grew up about 60 miles apart in Washington State. Both are from small towns and often write about those experiences. They first worked together in 2020 when Carlile added vocals to Clark's song "Same Devil"; in 2023, Carlile produced Clark's self-titled album.
She didn't succeed as a songwriter until she stopped listening to the radio, which forced her to write more authentically and stop chasing trends. Because there's a long lag in Nashville between when a song is written and when it's released, Clark found her trend-chasing songs were always behind.
She writes a lot with Shane McAnally, one of the top songwriters in Nashville. Both are gay, and brought a bit of LGBT to the radio when they teamed with Kacey Musgraves to write her 2013 hit "Follow Your Arrow," where Musgraves sings: "Kiss lots of boys, or kiss lots of girls if that's something you're into."
Logging is the big industry in Morton, Washington, where she grew up. Her father, Woody, was a logger and died in a work-related accident in 2001 when Brandy was 25. Her 2016 song "Since You've Gone To Heaven" is about his death.
She and Shane McAnally wrote the music for the musical Shucked, which debuted on Broadway in 2023. They got the job after Robert Horn, who wrote the play, heard Clark's song "Pray To Jesus," which had the rural-comedy vibe he was looking for.

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