Let There Be Music

(And yes, I did just steal that title from Andrew Peterson's song)

In case you live under a rock and haven't heard (or you have just been spared my endless rantings on G+) over the past four months, my brother, cousin, and a friend from church have worked on recording an album for the church with original songs written by my cousin. It's been one amazing rollercoaster ride, and definitely an experience we will never forget. Since this has been so new and exciting for us, I wanted to share part of the journey with y'all!

My cousin Jo is an incredible singer and songwriter, and it'd been on her heart and the heart of our pastor to produce an album from our church for a long time. Incredibly, we joined the music team only a year before plans for recording came into view, and we were so blessed to be included in the recording process. Whenever we could all get a free Saturday, afternoon, or evening, Jacob and I would load up our beaten old car with our expensive music equipment and drive round to Curtis' studio, and we would have an extraordinary time working together brainstorming arrangements, riffs, and instrumentals to match the songs Jo could hear in her mind. 

It was SO much fun! We probably had too much fun, really. Getting together and jamming, working with music and all the while learning the ins and outs of the recording process (as much as we were able at least) was engrossingly fascinating. I could find professional recording to be a very addictive pasttime. It was also very exciting coming back to the studio after each recording session to see what magic Curtis had worked with mixing the tracks. Honestly, there's no way we could've sounded a fraction as good as we ended up on our own! He did an incredible and highly professional job of the whole process. 

I was so thrilled to be allowed the honour to design the album artwork and interior booklet with a LOT of input from the team, chiefly Jo, who I spent many hours discussing and designing with over the phone. Deadlines were looming, since the goal was to release the album at the Rise women's conference September 13-14th, and all of us were fraying at the edges and nerves were getting fried with things still not being finished as the date drew nearer. However praise God, it all came together in the end.

The release went so well, and we sold so many copies of the CD. It was so surreal to see it printed so professionally and spread out on tables for people to purchase. I had put together a video of behind the scenes stuff to use for the weeks prior to get people excited, which I shared here if you'd like to see some footage (and bloopers. XD). 

Another very exciting aspect is - the album is now available on iTunes and the Google Play store! I was so super excited about this, because it meant that people all over the world (chiefly my awesome friends overseas) would have the opportunity to buy it and listen to it! 

So here be the last object of this blog post: go check out the album! Though I'm biased, I have to say it's amazing, and I love to listen to my cousin's beautiful voice pouring out of my iPod speakers! I'd love to spread the word about it, so if you would care to, share it around to anyone you know, or to your social media sites if you can! The support you can give for the success of the album and the support of our church would be so very greatly appreciated. ^_^

Thanks for reading about the journey! It was a blast, and one I hope can be repeated someday.

Jacob, Curtis, me, Jo

Find the album at the Google Play Store here!