His next studio album, 2006's A Thousand Different Ways (Number Two, Top 200), was, through the direction of mega-producer Clive Davis, largely a covers CD. 2004 was also the year Clay made #2 on the New York Times Best Seller List with his "inspirational memoir" titled Learning to Sing: Hearing the Music in Your Life. His first Christmas album, it went platinum, won 2 Billboard Music Awards and spurred a yearly holiday tour and a follow-up EP, All Is Well - Songs for Christmas. In November 2004, Clay released Merry Christmas With Love (Number One, Top 200).
In November 2004, Clay was appointed as a National Ambassador for UNICEF, with a mission to help ensure that children everywhere are afforded a primary education.
The National Inclusion Project (formerly the Bubel/Aiken Foundation) was launched in 2003, supporting the integration of children with disabilities into the life environment of their non-disabled peers. As a young man he was a member of the Raleigh Boy's Choir and was in numerous musical productions in North Carolina Theater. Many fans and some critics recognized and admired the pure pop sound ("so pure it floats") and top-notch production values while others heard only a manufactured sound, noting that the singer hadn't earned his musical chops but "merely" sang his way to the hearts of millions on television, a perceived unjust leap-frogging of "the true path of the true artist."Īiken fronted a country band, Just By Chance, pre-Idol and recorded 3 demo CDs. Billboard Magazine called it the best pop album of 2003. Including singles like "Invisible", "The Way," "I Will Carry You" and the Neil Sedaka cover "Solitaire," it was the subject of conflicting reviews. His first single, "Bridge Over Troubled Water"/ "This Is The Night" debuted at Number One, and became the best-selling single of the year ? and he was just getting started.Ĭlay's first CD, Measure of a Man (Number One, Top 200), went triple platinum selling more than 613,000 copies in its first week. Clay Aiken (born on November 30, 1978) is a popular American singer who rose to fame on the American Idol television program, and who has become the most successful second-place finisher in that show's history, even handily eclipsing that year's "Idol" winner in sales.
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