Sep
9
2010
Track 52 is the last song on our CD “Body Soul & Truth” It’s an instrumental guitar tune that I play in the open D tuning (DADF#AD). Why is it called “Track 52” you ask? Well before Stefanick, Aimee and I were in a band in college called Serasphere. We put out a 4 song EP that had a bonus 5th track acoustic instrumental. A lot of people liked the song and would refer to it as “number 5” or “song 5”. It may, in fact, have been our most successful song on that project. It has been the background music on the local access channel in Nashville for the last 10 years. As far as I know it still gets played a few times a day. So… I thought I would do the “sequel” on this CD and give it a name related to the original. I played it live at our CD release party last year and finally have put it up on YouTube. Someday I’ll have to make a live video of the original Track 5 and put it up.
Aug
30
2010
Well, it was another great Sunday at Southview. Pastor Mark Rampulla and his wife are about to have their forth child any day now…and so this Sunday, he got to sit out in the congregation and try to “relax” a little. It was a nice Sunday for us to lead because Jimmy Leitsch was on bass and Derek Brooks was on keys…so it was like the old days 🙂 Joy and Sulu sang with us, Andy played sax, and Gary was on drums and did an excellent job.
During pre-service prayer Andy told us to feel free to move where the Spirit lead…and well…that was awesome. It’s one of the things I love most about worshiping at Southview. These people desire the Lord, the want whatever God wants. They foster an atmosphere of freedom and acceptance. Anyway, 5 minutes before we were supposed to start I felt like God was saying to do “We Lift You Up.” We hadn’t practiced the song…and no one had ever heard it before because it is one of our originals. Well, I shouldn’t say “no one” because Derek and Jimmy have played it with us many a time…but the rest of the band and the congregation had no clue. I asked Lynn to pray for me before the service started and she had no idea that I had been contemplating doing “We Lift You Up” but as she prayed, she said she sensed God just wanting us to lift him up. I wouldn’t have thought much of it normally, but she kept repeating the phrase “lift you up.” So I took that as confirmation to do our song. We opened with it and the band and singers jumped right in. Thanks guys! Then we went on with the set as planned and did Our God (tomlin), You Never Let Go (Redman), Hosanna (Fraser), Be Thou My Vision and Hallelujah. There was a beautiful time at the end where Joy lead us in repeating the Hallelujah Our God Reigns chorus while asking us to envision ourselves singing this to Our King in His throne room in Heaven. We lingered there for a while and it was lovely! I pray I can keep that focus this week.
Aug
22
2010
It was great to see a bunch of you at the block party today. The weather was the loveliest middle TN has seen in months, so it was actually fun to have a huge cookout outdoors with hundreds of people. As always it was great playing with Christen Cole. Thanks to Jon Rogers and Craig Woelber for keeping the beat for us. For those of you who didn’t get to come, the special “surprise” guest that played after us was DAVE BARNES. I couldn’t believe it when we first found out. About 10 years ago, we shared the stage with Dave more than a few times while playing with our college band…Very fun to get to catch up with him after such a long time.
Jul
13
2010
Brother Winger - the boy band that was started on this trip
What a weekend! Friday afternoon we met at DSM (behind Kroger in Franklin) and worked feverishly (in the 90 degree heat) to fit – 7 guitars, 3 pedal boards, 3 amps, cymbals, snare, merch and overnight bags for 5 people into our Honda Odyssey. An hour later we were pulling out with Matt in the driver’s seat, Christen Cole riding shotgun, Seth Teegarden and Nathan Seyler in the middle row, and Levi and I in the back seat with a bunch of gear. We headed up I-24 through Kentucky before we went off the beaten path in Illinois and drove some back roads to get us to Cape Girardeau, MO. As the sun was setting we were cruising over rolling hills with farmland on either side and the bright orange sun casting a lovely glow over the whole scene. We crossed the Mississippi River and in no time were pulling into the parking lot at Rock of Cape. Load in and sound check went great and before we had left the building, Christen had already sold her first CD to a complete stranger who heard us practicing.
To get some rest for the evening we were taken to “Grammy Ruth’s” house…to me it was more like a bed and breakfast. It was this wonderful house with tons of bedrooms, eclectic interior and an African granite countertop in the kitchen. The latter I must mention because it was the most amazing countertop I have ever seen…and if God ever saw fit to bless me with one, I would be more than grateful. 🙂 Anyway, some great tasting cantaloupe and watermelon were sliced and waiting on us when we arrived and after the midnight snack we headed to our rooms. We got an excellent night’s sleep had breakfast and left for sound check around 8:00am.
After a video we kicked off the morning with worship, starting with “Shout it Out” – a great song that Christen wrote. We worshiped for about half an hour and then Andrew Mellies the youth pastor for FYM gave the first message about Transformation. The day was full of different speakers all teaching on the theme of transformation – Lucas Cherry ,Greg Strange and Rachel Mellies. As a side note – Greg Strange (Comedian/Musician) is also from the Nashville area and goes to church at The Gate, just down the road from us. We had never met before this weekend, but I’m sure we’ll see more of him in the future.
We loved working with everyone there. Thanks a bunch to Ronnie the sound man and all the others who took such good care of us and showed us such hospitality.
The youth get a big huge SHOUT OUT!!! They were so receptive and willing to participate. We pray that everyone involved, especially the youth, are transformed daily by the renewing of their minds and that they always run after God.
-Aimee
Jul
12
2010
Jul
12
2010
Jul
12
2010
I was the guest songwriter at a Summer Music Camp hosted by Kate Butler. It was so fun talking with kids who are interested in music and songwriting at such a young age. The class worked together and wrote their own song that they would be performing for the parents at the end of the camp. I ended up doing Jesus Song, Let Go, Space, Real Life, and an acapella song I wrote a few years back called “Promise Land.” The kids helped me out by clapping and stomping the soulful beat. They had also been studying music genres that day, and the class decided to classify me as “Chic Pop.” So, I now join the ranks of a long list of chics with guitars 🙂 It was a great fun.
Jul
6
2010
Close your eyes and imagine with me now…a beautiful though swelteringly hot afternoon in late June on an amazingly peaceful farm in middle TN. The US just scored a goal with a penalty kick against Ghana in the World Cup as we pull up behind the stage at FarmFest 2010. Though we were excited to be there, it was difficult to pull ourselves from our air-conditioned van where our children were resting peacefully – even though Matt screamed when the US scored their goal. But we are so glad we braved the heat. The afternoon was full of good music. What fun it was to share the stage with Bria Blessing and many others at FarmFest 2010. Bria was accompanied by Kyle Aaron on mandolin and guitar which added a very cool element to her music. Bria’s voice was amazing as she wove the beautiful melodies that make her uniquely Bria (and that I am admittedly jealous of :). Levi and I even had our “first dance” together as Bria played and sang for us. It was lovely…and hopefully we will get some video of them up here for you to see soon!
Matt and I did an acoustic set with Jeff Boggs (Chaplain of the Maury County Jail) sitting in on drums. We never had a rehearsal, but he did a great job…we were very glad to have him. We opened with Stay Who You Are, followed by Let Go, Fingertips, Wake Up and Dream and “ended” with Real Life. They asked us to do one more so I threw a curve and did Jesus Song – Matt and I hadn’t practiced it in months – and Jeff stayed on the kit, nailing the stop at the end and everything. Way to go, bro!!! 🙂
It was fun for all…even for our kiddos who got to go play games at the Kids Fair Barn and took pony rides. I am sure FarmFest will be talked about for years to come.
Here’s a video of Wake Up and Dream.