With Arms Wide Open

"With Arms Wide Open" is a song by American rock band Creed. It was released on April 18, 2000, as the third single from their second studio album, Human Clay. The song reached number one on the US Billboard Hot 100 in November 2000, becoming the band's first and only song to top the chart. The song also received honors at the 43rd Annual Grammy Awards in 2001, being nominated for Best Rock Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group, as well as Scott Stapp and Mark Tremonti winning the Grammy Award for Best Rock Song. Writing and recording Scott Stapp began writing the lyrics to the song in early 1998 during the My Own Prison tour, when he found out that his then wife Hillaree Burns was pregnant with his first child, Jagger. According to Stapp the song was written in 15 minutes at soundcheck. Stapp overheard guitarist Mark Tremonti playing and loved what he heard so much that he ran in and told Tremonti to just keep playing as Stapp began singing his lyrics. Music and lyrics Stapp wrote the lyrics when he found out, with great surprise, that he was going to be a father. The original lyrics to the song were written from the perspective of having a daughter, even though his wife was pregnant with a boy, as Stapp used "she" during early live performances. This would eventually be changed when Stapp found out he would be having a son. In later years Stapp would not use "he" or "she" in reference to the child but rather "they" to refer to both his sons and daughter. In a 2013 interview with Songfacts, Stapp said of the song: Musically the song is a power ballad written in the key of C major, with Tremonti playing in drop D tuning and Stapp singing in his signature baritone singing voice. According to Stapp, following the massive crossover success of the single which he felt led to the song being heavily overplayed, so much so that even his then-wife would turn away from it, and upon hearing impersonations of other people mimicking his vocal delivery in a dramatic, over-the-top fashion he purposely began to alter his vocal style which he feels has helped him grow as a vocalist. He states "I don't know where I picked up all the idiosyncrasies of how I enunciate and I've been called out on my vowels ... But it's actually helped me as a singer because I've heard that and I've intentionally enunciated differently on different words and syllables, so thank you world for pointing out a consistent pattern early in my 20s so I could evolve and grow as a singer.