[4] Said was born in Cleveland, Ohio to Mohammad Said, a Muslim Iraqi physicist and Monika Smith, a Christian pianist and women's rights organizer from Vienna, Austria.

The summer of his junior year, he attended the Governor's School for the Gifted and received an invitation for early entry into the Jazz Program at Virginia Commonwealth University, where he briefly joined a quintet under the direction of Ellis Marsalis at age 17.

In 1993 at the invitation of The Fugs, Stephan performed several Appalachian folk songs at the Naropa Institute in Boulder, Colorado where he came to the notice of beat poet Allen Ginsberg and producer Hal Wilner.

Said moved to New York City's Lower East Side where he built singing-songs of social change and helped start several old-time, bluegrass and Irish traditional music sessions.

Allen Ginsberg and folk legend Pete Seeger became Stephan's mentors and The Village Voice called him "the heir apparent to Woody Guthrie".

In a New York Times full-length feature article[7] folk legend Pete Seeger compared the rapid spread of Stephan's song, accomplished without the backing of any label, to that of the civil rights anthem "We shall overcome."

Stephan toured extensively in support of "Now's the Time", opening for Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, and fellow Virginian Dave Matthews.

In response, on April 16, 2000, the date of the Washington A16 protests against the IMF and World Bank, Stephan released A16, a 2 -song EP from the album with artwork by friend, award-winning graphic artist Eric Drooker, as free mp3's on his web site and on the Independent Media Center; the label responded by dropping his contract.

[13] Following a performance at Joe's Pub in New York City, Billboard Magazine wrote "With his rough-hewn good looks and mythic songwriting, Smith is the closest thing to this generation's Woody Guthrie.

But, in the context of the war on terror and following the infamous radio ban and CD burning of the Dixie Chicks surrounding their anti-war stance[citation needed] artists and managers could not afford the risk of having Stephan, outspoken Iraqi/Arab American with the biggest antiwar hit, open for them.

His first album backed by a full band, Slash and Burn (2004) merged pop, rock, country, and rap, combining love songs with political poetry, which garnered critical acclaim.

[18] During this time, Said earned his Masters in International Affairs at The New School and began publishing opinion articles in the media on globalization, social change, protest music, and censorship.

Produced by Grammy winner Hal Willner, the album brings together an all-star cast of musicians in support of Stephan's message of global equality and peace, including jazz horn legends Lenny Pickett, Howard Johnson, Art Baron and Earl Gardner as well as Cindy Blackman, Rob Clores, Jane Scarpantoni, Kevin Hunter, George Mitchell, and Yousif Sheronick.