Recording an Album Part 1

In the midst of our Easter craziness, have I mentioned we're also recording an album?? I know, we're crazy! The timing isn't what we would have chosen, but we are confident that this is God's timing. We are sooo busy right now. Between this and The Thorn we are busy 13 out of 15 nights and I am also planning for Easter (baskets, dinner, etc), trying to work on Laurel Haven, and be a good mom! Oh, and our washer and dryer broke yesterday. Never a dull moment around here, folks.

To give you an idea of what we're doing, I thought I would have my hubby guest blog. Unfortunately, he is short on time these days (imagine that), so I put together an interview. Here goes!


Q: What is this album that we're working on?

A: The New Life Worship Choir album.


Q: Who is the New Life Worship Choir?

A: Around 100 people from our church who love God and love to worship.


Q: Why record an album?

A: Because there are songs that people need to hear, that can be encouraging to them. It is a way of communicating God's love and connecting people to Him.


Q: How long has this been in the making?

A: Six years!


Q: How did it come to be?

A: Our friends at Integrity (who have recorded New Life albums in the past) opened the door for us to begin talking about it. I had wanted to do it for a long time and started writing songs for it. But the timing wasn't right. So in the spring of 2009 we started talking about the possibility. It just continued from there. We finalized the plans in January (budget, time line, etc).


Q: What have you done up to this point?

A: We made the song list and worked on the arrangements. The arrangements are a bit different than what we usually do because they are specifically for choir. Then we went to Nashville and cut all the rhythm and orchestra tracks.


Q: What are we working on currently?

A: Currently we are tracking the choir vocals on 6 different evenings at New Life Church.


Q: What's the next step?

A: After the choir vocals are finished, we send it to Hal Leonard, the publishing company. They work on all the printed music. We will work with them on graphics for the cd and book covers. The project will be complete and release in November 2010.


Q: What would you like to see happen with this project?

A: I'd like for churches to utilize it for their choirs. I would like it to spark the worship of God in people's hearts. I want it to help people connect with God.

It's been awesome to see a dream come to pass and the goal is for God to use it to help people. We named it "God Be Praised" because that's the point. If it doesn't bring praise to God then it's just words and music.


A little sampling (this is from the "scratch trax" from last spring)...