Mary Chapin Carpenter (born February 21, 1958) is an American folk and country music artist. Carpenter spent several years singing in Washington, D.C. clubs before signing in the late 1980s with Columbia Records, who marketed her as a country singer. Carpenters first album, 1987s Hometown Girl, did not produce any singles, although 1989s State of the Heart (State of the Heart (Mary Chapin Carpenter album)) and 1990s Shooting Straight in the Dark each produced four Top 20 hits on the Billboard country singles charts.

Carpenters most successful album to date remains 1992s Come On Come On, which yielded seven charting country singles and was certified quadruple platinum (Music recording sales certification) in the U.S. for sales exceeding four million copies. She followed it with Stones in the Road (1994) and A Place in the World (A Place in the World (album)) (1996), which both featured hit singles. In the 2000s, Carpenters albums departed both thematically and musically from her early work, becoming less radio-friendly and more focused on societal and political issues. Her most acclaimed and most topical album to date, The Calling (The Calling (Mary Chapin Carpenter album)), was released in March 2007. She followed that with The Age of Miracles in April 2010.

Carpenter has won five Grammy Awards, and is the only artist to have won four consecutive Grammy Award for Best Female Country Vocal Performance, which she received from 1992 to 1995. As of 2005, she had sold more than 12 million records.

Carpenter has performed on television shows such as Late Night with David Letterman and Austin City Limits, radio shows such as The Diane Rehm Show and tours frequently, returning to Washington almost every summer to perform at the popular outdoor venue Wolftrap.