"For this week's assignment, I want you to write a song."
That's what my dear piano teacher, Rachel Giles, told me when I was probably 13 or 14 years old. She had been teaching me chords for a long time. I have always appreciated how she noticed that I was more interested in playing by ear and with chords versus sheet music. I still learned how to play sheet music, but she directed most of my lessons towards chording. I remember assignments where she would give me sheet music to learn and tell me to replace the left hand notes with my own chording ideas. It was such good practice for me! But this song writing assignment...I was so overwhelmed! I had to write the lyrics, come up with the tune, piano, everything.
But thanks to God, I did it! I still have that song (somewhere?), and sure, a lot of it is super rough to me now, but this was such a turning point for me. I could actually compose music! This was the beginning of a whole new stage for me!
Over time, I kept writing songs. I heard once that someone has to write around 50 songs until they get a good one. This was so discouraging to me. I remember just hammering out the songs so I could reach that 51st song! I think it was at this point that I reached major writer's block. My piano teacher still continued to encourage me though and said that this is normal, no worries.
I'm not sure at what point the dream to record came to be. I have always loved singing, so it might've been even before I wrote music or played piano. I'm pretty sure I wanted to be a singer when I was a little girl. When I started writing music, people would tell me that I should record, and though that was a huge compliment, I felt so stuck at the same time. WHERE WAS I EVEN SUPPOSED TO START? It was also sad to think that someday my music could totally be forgotten just because it hadn't been recorded.
In January of 2014, Dustin and I made the move here to California. We stayed with our pastor, Ernest Witmer's, family for about two and a half weeks while we house hunted. Andrew Miller, a VS worker for Choice Books, also lived at the Witmer's house. We had lots of jam sessions in those two and half weeks! There were a lot of people in the Witmer's household that thoroughly enjoyed music.
It was during this time that we found out that Andrew was part of a band in his home area in Kansas called Saints Alive. They had just recorded an album themselves actually! THEN. The best thing happened. Andrew said, "Hey! I would love to record for you guys!" He said that he would love more practice with recording music and would we be interested in this?
YES!
It's amazing how you think or assume that a dream will never come true (Tsss :) How flowery does that sound?), or that it'll be so much work to make it come true. And then God just drops a beautiful opportunity in your lap and you don't even have to search anymore how to fulfill that dream!
But disclaimer: Recording is SO. MUCH. WORK. I am so excited that it's actually happening and we're actually getting this done, but don't be fooled. So much work. Haha!
So anyways, we started a few months later (May of 2014) and decided to try to work on it every Saturday. That's a lot of free Saturdays to give up (Thank you, Andrew!).
A lot has happened with this project! Some fun facts:
-This whole project has been recorded in our home or the Witmer's. We just turn off the fridge, turn off the AC, wait for the airplanes or helicopters to fly away, wait for neighbors to stop leaf-blowing, etc. Haha! Recording in-city is interesting.
-Dustin's sister, Amy, flew out to record some background vocals!
-My brother, Austin, sang some background vocals, too!
-Probably around 90% of my vocals were recorded when I was pregnant with Bryce.
-These are all songs that I wrote.
-We didn't reach our first projected release date, but that's okay. :)
-It's so fun to me to be able to record with my husband! He's singing background vocals, playing guitars, and giving lots of great input. Just when I think we're done with something he gets this certain look in his eyes, pauses, and says, "What if we would do this...". Which, in a moment of being really REALLY ready to be done with something, can make it frustrating. BUT in the long run, his ideas make for some great, quality music! He has a super ear for tiny details in music. Thanks, Babe. :)
-Bryce is quite the little trooper! He takes naps on recording days and somehow sleeps through all the music, thank You, God. When he's awake and we need to record, one of us will take him out back or on a walk for a little just in case he decides to scream or something. :)
-Our projected release date is January of 2016!! Right around the corner!
I know this is asking a lot of myself, considering I blog so rarely, but I would like to try to post a little update every week. Maybe I'll post some short video clips of upcoming songs, tell you what we worked on that day, etc.
For example, today the guys were working on recording acoustic guitar for the song "I Will Choose". Bryce is on his second nap. I was even able to get a nap in (The one good thing of not knowing how to play guitar, ha!)! I'm sitting on our back porch steps typing this up, because my computer was humming too loudly. Andrew said he could hear it through the mic while he was recording, so here I sit. :) We started at 10ish today and are starting to wind down now, at 3:30. Somedays we get a few songs done and someday, like today, just one! Either way, it makes for a good day. :)
So that's that. I'm so excited to present this album to you all!!
