I stumbled across a Christian music festival on television the other night. The headlining act was Michael W. Smith. If you are not familiar with him, he is one of the founding fathers of modern contemporary Christian music (CCM). He’s first solo record came out in 1983 and he has released a total of 16 solo albums — not to mention various singles, greatest hits collects, and such.

In the CCM world his very name demands respect no matter what you think of his voice or music. As the announcers of the televised concert were introducing him, they threw out a number of how many records he has sold.  They said that he has sold over 12,000,000 records over his musical carrier — very impressive.

Carrie Underwood has already sold over 6,000,000 copies of her first solo album alone.