Chris Kirkpatrick

Christopher Alan Kirkpatrick (born October 17, 1971) is an American singer, songwriter, dancer, music producer, podcaster, and actor.

He founded the pop group NSYNC, in which he sang countertenor.

The band has sold over 70 million records, becoming one of the best-selling boy bands of all time.

Kirkpatrick was the lead singer in various songs including "Thinking of You (I Drive Myself Crazy)", "Together Again", "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", "I Thought She Knew", "Just Got Paid", and many songs from their Christmas album, Home for Christmas.

He has also regularly worked as a voice actor, most notably as the character Chip Skylark on the Nickelodeon series The Fairly OddParents, and participant in numerous reality TV shows, including Celebrity Big Brother, The Masked Singer, and Gone Country.

Kirkpatrick was born on October 17, 1971, in Clarion, Pennsylvania to single mother, Beverly Eustice, when she was 16 years old.

She raised him on her own along with his four younger half-sisters (Molly, Kate, Emily, and Taylor).

He is of Irish, Scottish, Native American, and Hispanic ancestry.

Kirkpatrick and his family grew up in poverty and on welfare, sometimes homeless and living out of a car, and had to move around a lot.

As a result, he attended many different schools and lived in several states, including Pennsylvania, Ohio, South Carolina, and California.

At one point, his family lived in a trailer during the winter with no electricity and a hole in the side of it, and his mother had to pile dirty laundry in front of it to keep the snow from coming in.

Since his family could not afford to wash their clothes, he rarely had clean clothes to wear and had to sleep in the piles of dirty laundry at night to keep warm.

Kirkpatrick recalls frequently going without food and not always knowing where their next meal would come from, often relying on food stamps, free school lunches, and donated items to survive.

Due to his family's financial problems, Kirkpatrick struggled in school and began working on a farm while still in grade school to help his mom.

Despite their financial struggles, Kirkpatrick's family had a musical background: his mother was a vocal coach, his grandmother trained in opera, his grandfather was a country-western singer, and his aunts and uncles were all in bands.

Kirkpatrick also showed a keen talent for music from a young age.

In 6th grade, while living in Oil City, Pennsylvania, Kirkpatrick won the lead role as Oliver Twist in the city's high school musical production of Oliver!.

From then on, he began to study music more seriously, enrolling in gifted classes for music and learning to play a number of different instruments.

In 7th grade, he moved to Dalton, Ohio and attended Dalton High School where he continued his involvement in music, starring as Lieutenant Joseph Cable in his school's production of South Pacific and appearing in many other musical productions throughout high school.

In addition to musicals, Kirkpatrick participated in his school's choir, and made the All-Ohio State Fair Youth Choir, which opened for New Kids On The Block at the Ohio State Fair.

Besides music, Kirkpatrick also participated heavily in sports, including football, basketball, baseball, and track.

After graduating from high school in 1990, he moved to Orlando, Florida to get to know his biological father, who offered to help him pay for college.

He attended Valencia College, where he originally intended to pursue an acting career in theatre.

However, he changed his major to music after receiving scholarships for his involvement in Valencia's choir.

While at Valencia, Kirkpatrick began forming various a cappella groups and arranging music to practice and perform at local coffee shops.

Later, he auditioned and became involved as a caroler for the Caroling Company, which eventually led him to a job as a doo-wop singer at Universal Studios.

Kirkpatrick took the opportunity, and after over a year of searching and trying out different people he eventually recruited Justin Timberlake and JC Chasez (members of the 1990s Mickey Mouse Club revival), and the three formed the nucleus of NSYNC.

Later, Chris recruited Joey Fatone who was also working at Universal Studios at the time.

With NSYNC, Kirkpatrick sold over seventy million records throughout the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Kirkpatrick received his associate degree in music in 1993.

Afterwards, Chris received another scholarship to attend Rollins College where he studied music and psychology full time while holding three jobs: 1) performing at Universal Studios Florida as a member of a doo-wop group called The Hollywood Hi-Tones, 2) working as a photographer at Sea World, and 3) waiting tables at a local Outback Steakhouse. In addition to working and attending college, he also played gigs as a local DJ.

In 1994, while working at Universal Studios and singing in The Hollywood Hi-Tones (a throwback doo-wop group of aspiring singers and actors) Chris Kirkpatrick was introduced to Lou Pearlman through a mutual friend that he had met in choir (Charlie Edwards).

Edwards had briefly been a part of the Backstreet Boys before quitting, and had heard that Pearlman was interested in financing another vocal group, so he passed the information to Kirkpatrick.

Originally, when the Backstreet Boys were forming Kirkpatrick was unaware about their auditions so he never tried out.

However, after hearing about what Lou Pearlman was doing with the Backstreet Boys (he was acquainted with Howie Dorough), Kirkpatrick became interested in doing more than just a cappella.

When Pearlman finally met Chris Kirkpatrick and saw him perform in his doo-wop group, Lou immediately took an interest in him, so they discussed the idea for Kirkpatrick to form a vocal group, which Pearlman promised to finance if Kirkpatrick could find other young singers to join him.

After some difficulty finding a consistent bass singer, the group eventually found Lance Bass through Justin's vocal coach, and the group collectively came together in September 1995.

The group moved into a house together and began practicing their singing and choreography in a warehouse in Orlando for hours to help train their vocals and stamina.

Shortly after Lance joined the group, they recorded their first performance at Pleasure Island in Orlando as their demo for record companies.

Afterwards, Chris dropped out of Rollins College to pursue a music career with NSYNC in Germany.