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Jordin Brianna Sparks (born December 22, 1989) is an American pop singer. On May 23, 2007, she was declared the winner of the sixth season of the reality television show American Idol. Sparks won at the age of 17, making her the youngest winner in American Idol history.

Sparks was born in Glendale, Arizona, to a white mother Jodi Wiedmann and Phillippi Sparks, a black former football player for the New York Giants and Dallas Cowboys who at the time was playing in college for the Arizona State Sun Devils. She has a younger brother PJ (Phillippi Sparks, Jr). She lived briefly in Ridgewood, New Jersey, and attended Orchard Elementary School. After living in New Jersey, Jordin attended Northwest Community Christian School in Phoenix, Arizona through the eighth grade. Sparks attended Sandra Day O'Connor High School until 2006, then she was homeschooled to better concentrate on her singing.

Sparks is a committed Christian and attends Calvary Community Church in Phoenix, Arizona. On her "American Idol" biography, she thanks her parents and God for her win. She also appeared on the cover of World, an Evangelical Christian news magazine. She endorsed Michelle Buckman's Christian novels for teens: Maggie Come Lately and My Beautiful Disaster. On her MySpace page, she displayed a picture of herself posing next to a sign that read "Stop Abortion Now", creating some controversy.

Sparks finished second overall in 2004 at the Music in the Rockies national competition for aspiring Contemporary Christian Music artists, and won the talent portion of the event. In 2004, Sparks appeared in America's Most Talented Kids twice, winning in her first appearance. She was one of seven to appear in a special championship edition of the show. This appearance followed two noted auditions in 2003, one with American Juniors and the other, Star Search. Sparks has performed the national anthem at various sporting events, notably for the Phoenix Suns, the Arizona Cardinals, and the Arizona Diamondbacks. She has also sung in such events as Country Thunder, a country music venue. She has appeared with Alice Cooper (in his 2004 Christmas show) and has twice toured with Grammy-winning Christian contemporary singer Michael W. Smith. Smith has shown support of Sparks by encouraging Idol viewers to vote for her on his website. In 2003, at the age of thirteen, Sparks recorded a five-song EP which is titled For Now, working with Matthew Ward, a legendary Christian music artist, and Gary Leach, an engineer who has worked on several of LeAnn Rimes' albums. She appeared in a compilation album titled Live at Mr. Lucky's in 2004. As an actress, Sparks has appeared in several plays, recently starring in a dual role as characters Deborah and Bea in Magdalene at the Plumbline Theater in Franklin, Tennessee. She's also performed several times with Vaudeville Youth Theatre Company and Valley Youth Theatre in Phoenix. Her first appearance was in March 2002 as an Emerald City dancer and as a poppy in The Wiz. She also appeared in Viet's production of Cinderella in June 2002 and another production of The Wiz in August 2002.

Sparks appeared on the January 17, 2007 broadcast of American Idol, earning a "gold ticket" and the right to appear in the Hollywood Round. American Idol judge Randy Jackson made the offhand prediction that "Curly hair will win this year," which he admitted was Sparks. Before going on to American Idol, she had won Arizona Idol. In 2006, Sparks was one of two winners who won the Phoenix Torrid search for the "Next Plus Size Model." She was flown to California where she was used in a number of Torrid ads and promotional pieces. A full-page ad for Torrid featuring Sparks ran in the December 2006 issue of Seventeen magazine.

Sparks first auditioned in Los Angeles, California. She was not invited to Hollywood. She returned home to compete in the Fox affiliate-sponsored Arizona Idol, which she won. The winner of Arizona Idol was guaranteed an audition with the producers of American Idol at the Seattle, Washington auditions. Sparks was featured in the audition episode that aired on January 17, 2007. She sang "Because You Loved Me" by Celine Dion. The judges were overall impressed with her vocals, though Simon criticized her for "being too cute", but Sparks was sent on to the Hollywood rounds of the show.

Sparks was never in danger of elimination. Sparks is the fourth contestant to have won without ever being in the bottom 2 or 3, joining Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, and Taylor Hicks. (Season 2 winner Ruben Studdard was in the bottom 2 once, and season 3 winner Fantasia Barrino landed in there twice).

Sparks' songs from the American Idol have been on sale at the iTunes Store and the American Idol official website as Jordin Sparks - EP (called a "bundle" on Idol official website) shortly after the finale of Idol, along with other songs that did not make the EP's cut that are being sold as individual singles. According to SoundScan figures posted in USA Today, Blake Lewis sold more digital singles than Sparks, but her mini album sold more than Lewis'.

After the finale of Idol, Sparks has made several appearances on television shows. She performed the finale song, "This Is My Now" on The Morning Show with Mike and Juliet, The Today Show, Live with Regis and Kelly, The Early Show and The View. Sparks had also appeared on Total Request Live, The Morning Show with Mike and Juliet with the runner-up of Idol, Blake Lewis, Larry King Live with contestants who made into the top ten of American Idol. and 106 & Park. On July 4, 2007, Sparks performed "God Bless America" and "America the Beautiful" on Macy's Fourth of July Fireworks Spectacular with Lewis and Melinda Doolittle.

Along with television and radio appearances,Sparks has been on the cover of Entertainment Weekly and World and featured in VIBE, TV Guide, Glamour and other publications.

Sparks took part in the "American Idols LIVE! Tour 2007" from July 6 to September 23, 2007, along with other contestants in the top ten. She revealed in an AOL interview that the concert will be more group collaborations and duets as well as bringing along her acoustic guitar.

Sparks sang the National Anthem at Super Bowl XLII (the song was then made available on iTunes the next day) as well as performed for Diana Ross for the 30th Annual Kennedy Center Honors. She performed on New Years Eve Live on FOX alongside Blake Lewis. She also performed "Tattoo" at the NBA Rookie game during NBA All-Star Weekend.

Jordin will be the opening act for Alicia Keys on the US leg of her As I Am tour. Before going on tour, she is expected to perform on Idol Gives Back in April.

On a recent episode of the Tyra Banks Show, Tyra Banks told Jordin that she was producing a scripted television series and had Jordin in mind for a part on the show.

On August 17, 2007, it was announced Sparks had signed to 19 Recordings/Jive Records/Zomba Label Group, becoming the first Idol winner to join the label group - all past Idol winners and runners-up have signed with the RCA Label Group's J (Fantasia, Ruben Studdard), Arista (Carrie Underwood, Taylor Hicks) or RCA (Kelly Clarkson, Chris Daughtry, Clay Aiken, Katharine McPhee) labels. Sparks has stated that she recorded some songs for the album but the bulk of the recording would be done in Los Angeles after the tour is over. She said the album would be "Top 40, radio-friendly, uplifting stuff" hopefully mixing "the pop rock sound of inaugural Idol Kelly Clarkson with the R&B edge of Beyonce". Her debut album came out on November 20 and November 27, 2007. On The Morning Show with Mike and Juliet, it was mentioned that the album had gone gold.

The album came out to generally favorable reviews. Some critics felt Sparks' vocals were not suited for modern pop music while others thought the album's atypical American Idol material helped Jordin to find a secure future in today's ever-changing music landscape.

Along with the label announcement, the first single was revealed to be "Tattoo", which was released to U.S. radio on August 27, 2007. The song became the album's first top ten single. The next single is slated to be "No Air" a duet with Chris Brown, but Jordin's official website is polling fans to decided whether "No Air", "Freeze", "One Step at a Time," or "Shy Boy" should be the next single. Sunday, February 3rd announced that "No Air" had won the bid, and the song was already being added to radio stations. The song became a hit before it was officially released as a single, and it has so far reached #6 on the Billboard Hot 100.