SUMMARY:With nine Grammy nominations and a GMA Dove Award for Songwriter of the Year, Matt Maher is one of the leading songwriters in contemporary Christian music. He joins us for a wide-ranging conversation about creativity, collaboration, and and his evolving career. PART ONE:Paul and Scott talk about the recent Ed Sheeran copyright infringement trial.PART TWO:Our in-depth conversation with Matt MaherABOUT MATT MAHER:Matt Maher is one of the leading songwriters in contemporary Christian music. Raised in Canada, he studied jazz at Arizona State University before launching an artist career and releasing his major label debut, Empty & Beautiful, in 2008. The album spawned the Top 5 single “Your Grace is Enough.” He went on to find further success as an artist with self-penned songs such as “Alive Again,” “Hold Us Together,” “All the People Said Amen,” and the double platinum single “Lord, I Need You.” He has been nominated for nine Grammy awards and was named the GMA Dove Award Songwriter of the Year in 2015. Finding great success with parenthetical titles, Matt has written four songs that have hit #1 on Billboard’s Christian Airplay chart for him as an artist: “Because He Lives (Amen),” “Glory (Let There Be Peace),” “Alive & Breathing” (no parentheses), and “The Lord’s Prayer (It’s Yours),” Additionally, he’s hit #1 by writing for other artists, including “I Lift My Hands” (with Chris Tomlin) and “Come As You” (with David Crowder). Further successes writing for other artists includes Chris Tomlin’s “I Will Rise,” “Third Day’s “Soul on Fire,” and Cody Carnes’s “Run to the Father,” among many others. Matt’s most recent album as a songwriting artist is called The Stories I Tell Myself.