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February 28 Blessed to be backGot back at about 5.30 in the evening on Saturday. As I clicked open the front door I could hear Sandra bathing the children upstairs. I dumped my luggage in the hall (keyboard, case, guitar and rucksack) and crept up as they hadn’t yet heard me come in. I could see Poppy at the top of the stairs in her nightie, hair still damp.
As soon as our eyes met she started shouting ‘Daddy Daddy!’, pulled open the stair gate, jumped on me and wouldn’t let go. I staggered up to the landing floor to find Moo looking on, needing a few moments to take all of this in. Then he started to giggle and ran up to me flinging his arms around my neck. It was all very sweet. I heaved myself up and said hi to Sandra and we all spent the next 10 minutes sitting on the landing floor enjoying the moment of being together again at last.
The children had changed while I was away – Poppy’s grown up conversation makes her sound more like her Mummy. Moo has physically grown and looks even more like a little boy than a baby. We almost cherish the fact that he can’t speak yet. He will soon enough.
Yours feeling blessed to be back,
S. February 26 25 hoursI'm on the train from Gatwick to the south coast. It’s cold and clear. Britain hasn't shaken off winter while I was away. I could smell spring in the air when I left Nashville.
It’s odd coming home after two weeks in a foreign country. It’s familiar and new all at the same time. The trip home was almost good. Door to door it will be 25 hours. US Airways gets points deducted for the 6 and a half hour delay at Charlotte airport. They put us on the plane only to take us off an hour later after deciding it wasn’t fit to fly. So they gave us a 10 dollar food voucher and brought another plane from Philadelphia. Gave me a chance to do some SongTools, which grew about 500 lines over the last two weeks. I could spend a week playing with that and still not get bored.
My podcasts really came into their own. Listened to two talks by Nicky Gumbel from HTB on ‘the poor’ and ‘criminals’. But I managed to sleep for most of the flight over once we got going. I actually feel no jet lag at all at the moment, but from past experience I know it comes in waves. Let’s see how I am at 10 o’clock tonight before declaring victory.
Normally, when I get back to the studio after a trip, I look around and wonder whether I dreamt the whole thing up. This time I have a tangible reminder with me. Ross gave me a gold disk to put up in my writing room. It will go on the wall that I’ve reserved for certificates from Berklee and other stuff. Thanks dude. And on Monday Sue and I will work on the song we started in BBMP by video. Weird how technology can shortcut a 25 hour trip. The world has changed.
Worried I haven’t come home with enough goodies for the family. Trouble is I’ve bought all the trendy Christian books I know Sandra likes on previous trips. I hate arriving with rubbish presents. Don’t mind a little fun but I could fill my case with things that are just not worth bringing over. Maybe next time I’m doing this the family will be with me. That’s almost too wonderful to think about. During the delay I was wondering how we’d cope with a long delay with two little ones. Hopefully they’d sleep. Sandra’s great at thinking about that sort of thing in advance.
Great news – my friend and cowriter Bo Helmich has booked his flights to come to stay with us in England for a while. Less than a month away, really looking forward to it. We’ll write a bit, record a bit, see some castles, eat some scones, drink tea and do some culture. Then he’s off up to Scotland for a course. It will be great to have him over and for Sandra to finally meet him. Last time they spoke was on my cell phone on the veranda of Bo and Anne’s lovely home in Glenwood Springs near Aspen when we were cowriting last August. The weather was a little like it is here today. Writing with Bo is always a pleasure. He comes up with words I’ve never heard of. Hope it takes less than 25 hours for him to get here.
Better dash before my laptop powers off.
Yours aching to see my family now,
S. February 24 HighlightsEarly Friday morning. Well, not so early. Just got myself another hot chocolate.
I fly home later today so I wanted to finish my ‘pack’ for Holly before I go to bed. Just don’t want to leave everything to the last minute.
Been a great couple of weeks. Here are some highlights:
Thank you for having me. It’s been such fun. Esp. to Holly for setting it all up. And Ross for making me laugh. He really should start a video podcast. Literally.
Better go to sleep now.
Yours allowing myself to think of home at last,
S. February 22 FriendsWednesday morning 8.07.
Woke up worried I’d overslept but I hadn’t.
Can’t believe it’s Wednesday already. Today I have my last planned cowrite (Joel Lindsey). I asked Holly to leave my last day free so I can get my work tapes done, but as it happens, I’m pretty up to date this time. I guess I’m just getting in the swing of it.
Yesterday my morning cowrite wasn’t able to make it but I finished off another song, had lunch with Ross and Jason McArthur, who’s A&R at the label downstairs. Ross was on fine form. When he’s like that (which is often) it’s like watching an episode of ‘Friends’ – every line makes me laugh. And Jason is good at bringing it out of him. Thanks for lunch Jason. And thanks for the ice cream Ross.
On the way home Sandra called and asked if I had eaten any ice cream – weird because at the time one hand was holding my phone and the other hand a tub of ice cream. That happens a lot for Sandra – coincidences. I put my phone on speaker and Ross asked her if she’s wearing her wig (her barrister’s wig) and the thought of her sitting in bed (it was about 8.00 pm in Felpham) with a glass of wine watching TV making a call to me dressed up in her wig made me laugh.
In the afternoon I went over to John Cox’s house and we cowrote for a few hours while his world was happening around us. John has become a good friend here and the writing always comes so easily. We popped out possibly our best song yet and had a simple demo recorded in less than 3 hours. Just love it when it works like that.
This time I’ve started to take my mobile rig into my cowrites and it does make a difference… it’s standard practice to make a simple recording of the song we write in a cowrite but I figure why not make it the best quality possible – not a cuttable track but something that can have the vocals tuned or the piano quantized where it needs it. Maybe it’s just me wanting to get stuff perfect but I much prefer it.
Better dash – today I’m having breakfast with another friend, Guy Zabka, cowriting with Joel before heading downtown to see another friend, Lorna Flowers who now lives here in Nashville and is making waves in the country music scene. I remember going to visit her in Manchester (UK) before she moved over here and it’s wonderful to see how she’s developed since. She's performing her songs tonight at a writers' night so I might go and give her some support.
Yours getting that ‘I’m going to miss this when I go home’ feeling,
S. February 21 It pays to lurkMonday evening, 11.00 p.m. in the corner writing room at BBMP.
Every now and again I get to experience worship that just leaves me speechless. Unable to get a word out of my mouth. That happened yesterday. I arrived at Fellowship Bible Church 5 minutes early and as I made my way from my car to the entrance I could hear singing. As I went inside I found a wall of noise coming from the stage from an expanded worship team… about 200 children, all giving it everything they had, moving to the music, enthusiastic, vibrant, colourful and totally involved in it. Ronnie Freeman was on piano and John Mays (my favourite Nashville bass player) was (unsurprisingly) on bass. Both did a fab job. But the most moving moments were when the whole church was joining together in worship. There’s something about genuine congregational worship that is just wonderful. A kind of multi-level connection to each other and to God that I don’t really understand, as you can tell. Yet again, I was blown away by FBC.
After FBC I promised myself that if I got in an hour’s serious exercise I could do whatever I wanted for lunch. It was too slippery for running, so I had an hour’s brisk walk around Crockett Park (about 5 minutes drive from my suite) and after a monster steak at Logan’s Road House as my reward I had a nice snooze.
In the evening Lyn Row kindly invited me to see Chris Rice, Bebo Norman and others at a concert about 20 minutes away. It was a cool evening, listening to some amazing talent. For me Christopher Williams, an independent artist, totally stole the show with his artistry, guitar playing and a funny foot pedal thing that sounds like a kick drum. I’ve emailed him to find out more about it. I’ll let you know if/when I get a response. Fun evening. Thanks for the Starbucks hot white chocolate on the way home Lyn.
Today I set up my studio in the green writing room at BBMP. There’s a nice set of monitors and a properly weighted keyboard there so I wired it up to my laptop, interface and mic and together it makes a pretty good project studio. This afternoon Michael Boggs and I finished the song we started on Friday and it really is sounding great. I must admit, so far, I’ve enjoyed the writing on this trip more than ever. Maybe I’m more relaxed about it but part of it is that the songs coming out are getting better and better.
Tomorrow I’m with Belinda Smith in the morning (I think) and John Cox in the afternoon/ evening. It could be a late night.
Yours not taking any of this for granted,
S.
P.S. Just got my first album credit… while I've been lurking here in the (now) project studio room, my friends Ian Eskelin and Barry Weeks have been working on the new Stellar Kart (Rock/punk Word artists) album here at the BBMP demo studios. There was a knock on the door and I was asked to add my voice to the mix. Ian said I’ll be in the liner notes... Isn’t that wild? Just shows it pays to lurk. February 18 Happy Birthday Mum5.15am, sitting in bed, drinking Chocolate Society hot chocolate.
Yum. This is why I need a kitchen where ever I stay.
It’s snowing! Brilliant. And it’s Saturday. Having a late breakfast with Ross this morning. Snowballs might be thrown. Better wear my woolly hat.
Yesterday was fun. A cool thing about jetlag is that I nearly always wake up in time to do a bit of work before my cowrites start. Yesterday I wrote a song and a half before I got to BBMP. First up was Sue C Smith. It’s always such a privilege to work with Sue. We talked, finished off one song and started another. Love the way they are turning out. Especially the one we’re turning in.
My afternoon cowrite had to be moved but I decided to hang out at the writing rooms to work on another idea. Got chatting to another writer, Michael Boggs from FFH, was just hanging at the writing rooms as well so we got together and wrote the best part of another cool song. He’s got a McPherson guitar like the one I have back home I really miss when I come out here. I felt kind of connected.
It’s my Mum’s birthday today. Fortunately I remembered. My brain has moved so far to the right recently that I wouldn’t be surprised if I’d forgotten. I forgot brother’s yesterday. Sorry Dunc. It’s on my Outlook calendar and I’ve even set up reminders a few days in advance. It’s so easy to click ‘dismiss all’ without actually doing anything.
Anyway, I woke up early this morning (very early) and had a long chit chat from my laptop. I’m grateful to be doing this stuff at a time that technology allows me unlimited phone and video calls home. Makes the world of difference. I told Tony Wood this week, high-speed internet is top of my list when I look for accommodation these days. I could live in a box as long as I’ve got access. Well, maybe not when it’s snowing tho.
Yours about to send my brother an Amazon voucher,
S.
February 17 ConfessionsBig dipper, sweet cream, dark chocolate and caramel. 100’s and 1000’s on top. Yeah, I confess, I did Marble Slab Creamery last night.
Writing’s going well. 3 completed songs so far. Few others on the boil. Had a great time with Tony and Daniel on Wednesday morning. Got a cool song which needs a melody on the bridge which we’ll figure out today before Daniel sings a studio version of it next week.
In the afternoon I wrote with Gina – we ended up working on 4 songs (I think), most of which we’ll take away and finish from home. Hopefully via video. My list of video cowriters is growing. Can't tell you how exciting that is.
In the evening it was jingle time, which was fun although I must admit I was trying to work through a big energy low.
Yesterday I was down to write with Don Poythress and Brian White but the wave of jingle tracking meant we had to change our plans. Worked on a song with Brian and we all look forward to doing a thee-way cowrite the next time I’m in town. I made myself a promise tho' – a reward for staying up the night before – if I didn’t make a pratt of myself with Brian and Don I would treat myself with a trip to Marble Slab. Well, I figure I still qualified...
In the afternoon I wrote with Twila LaBar... it's always such a pleasure. I’m in total awe of her grasp of genres I would normally shy away from. Writing with her makes these so much more within reach. So enjoyed it.
Stopped by Ross’s office on the way out. He’s wild. Today he came in as ‘middle management’, moustache trimmed neatly, white shirt and inoffensive brown tie and trousers. If it wasn’t for no socks and trainers he might have had me a little worried.
Today I’m writing with Sue in the morning and Barry Weeks in the afternoon. Need to catch Daniel sometime in between for 5 minutes.
Not sure the video’s going to work with the children… it was wonderful to see them but Poppy was really upset after saying goodbye. So we didn't even try Moo. Urghh. Hope to speak to Sa in a mo.
Your feeling like I should do some serious exercise over the weekend,
S.
February 15 UniversalIt’s 5am and I'm wide awake. Not unusual for me here.
Yesterday I met my friend and cowriter James Tealy at the entrance to Universal. He'd booked my favourite writing room down there – the one with the big grand piano and we caught up on life for a few minutes before Michael Puryear came in. Having arrived at my first cowrite of the trip it suddenly struck me what an amazing set of variables had come together to make all this happen. I feel so grateful for that.
It’s always a pleasure to hang out with Michael. I love the passion he has for writing, even though he now also runs one of Christian music’s major publishing houses. James, Michael and I threw a few ideas around. We settled on one and got writing it. The writing came easily, maybe because the process was familiar. We finished a verse and a chorus (except for 1 line) before lunch. The one line we hadn’t finished was the set up line for the hook… so an important one… we just knew there was something better out there. Sure enough it was waiting for us upon our return. For me, it makes the song, which we finished not long after. I’m excited about it… after all, it’s not every day I get to write with a song plugger :). The fact that Michael wants to write with me again the next time I’m in town is another cool result. Thanks guys, I really enjoyed it.
We said our goodbyes and I called home to a sleepy Sandra. My Valentine’s presents had arrived and it was nice to talk. Poppy and Monty got their first Valentine’s cards this year, which I'd posted before I left. Would have loved to have seen them open them. But more importantly the flowers and chocs had arrived for Sa.
I headed up to Brentwood Benson to check in with Holly and arrived to find her office full of chums. It was great to be back. Ross and I met up for supper at a cool Mexican restaurant in Franklin which thankfully had space on Valentine’s night. It was great to have company, although if Ross’s beard was any more ‘Village People’ I might have felt a little uncomfortable. I’m glad I got to see it before he shaves it all off tho.
This morning (Wed) I have my first ever cowrite with Tony Wood and a new artist, Daniel Kirkley. Looking forward to that. Tony’s an awesome lyricist and Daniel has a great voice. I mastered a Christmas track Daniel sung on a couple of months ago so to hear him sing live in one of the BBMP writing rooms will be fun. I will learn a lot today.
Yours thinking it's time for a nice cup of tea,
S. February 14 Creative inadequacyWOOO HOOO, back in Nashville. Can’t tell you how pleased I was to climb into bed last night after a 20 hour journey which, well, could have gone better. I didn’t help myself staying up late the night before I travelled. But the flight from London to Charlotte seemed to take longer than normal (9 hours) and the plane was really cold, so I kept waking up. Then US immigration decided to give me a kicking over why I was coming to the US so often. They picked up on the fact that over the last year I’ve been here more or less every month. Either I’m being a sensitive flower or they were unnecessarily aggressive. Anyway, I’ve put it behind me now, thanks to Tim who I sat next to on the plane from Charlotte to Nashville who reminded me that Americans are generally great people to hang out with.
Picked up the car, checked in to my suite (really great, 2 mins away from Brentwood Benson) and did my shop and Wild Oats. Sandra will be pleased that I’ve been able to stock up on everything organic.
Phoned Holly to find out where I am today (Tues) and she told me a little about the line up for the next couple of weeks. Can’t wait. There are some new writers on the list, people I’ve been wanting to write with for a while. Thanks for making it happen Holly.
Seem to be missing the family more than usual this trip. Maybe it’s time to bring them over. I normally have about three or four days of my ears being finely tuned to any noise a child the age of our two little ones makes. With Sandra working Mon-Wed I’m not sure when we’re going to get to video. Maybe I’ll stay up tonight (Nashville at 1.00am = Felpham at 7am) and get to see them. It makes the world of difference.
One of the great things about coming to Nashville is all the friends I’ve got here now. When I arrived here there must have been about 10 emailsfrom people who knew I was is town and wanted to hook up. How cool is that.
So today I’m down town at Universal writing with James Tealy and Michael Puryear. First time I’ll have written with Michael. Looking forward to that. I’ll let you know how it all goes.
Yours beginning to get used to feeling creatively inadequate,
S. February 12 The truth about hubcapsRecently I’ve been thinking about the boundaries I put around my version of reality. I mean, all of us view life using our own cultural, religious, political, psychological and other references. But I wonder, do I interpret things in such a way that I see things that just aren’t there?
Poppy gave me a cool example of this. Sandra lost a hubcap from one of the wheels on her car during the week. Not sure where it went, the same place as socks in the laundry go I guess. So, on the way to take Poppy to school, she went to the local Ford garage to order a new one.
Poppy overheard the conversation she had with the garage man and when they got back to the car Poppy asked,
“Are we going to get a new knobcat?”
She’d never heard of a hubcap but she had heard the word 'knob' and 'cat' so her imagination put the two things together. I don’t know what she thought a knobcat was but I know it’s definitely not part of her reality. Maybe knobcat = something ordered from a garage?
But do I do that? What knobcats do I see that are really hubcaps? Is this what science is doing? Are we trying to explain God’s incredible creation in terms of knobcats when really we just don’t have the references to make any proper sense of it. Hmmm.
Yours wondering if it’s only my imagination telling me I’m getting on a plane to Nashville tomorrow,
S. February 08 Bilingual blogHi everyone. This blog is in text. See below for a translation into English.
***
sinC IL B awy frm D kin 4 a cpl of wks frm mon. I thort I'd brush ^ on my txtN skilz. D idea S dat I cn T2 Sa qkly yl on D mve. mayB I cUd snd her a Valentines msg on her mob ph lk dis:
@>-->-- @}>----,---- @->-->--- dats a bunch of roses by D wA. altgh 3 wont rly do D trick.
I'm nt sure dis S gunA wrk coz I tnk she 1ly notices 1 outa evry 5 txtz I snd. nt coz she cnt do D teknoloG. She's jst nt as N2 fons as Im I gueS. n fact, B4 we had a nanny I dnt tnk she evn chrgd her cell ph.
yrz thinkN IL prolly jst cll her on D l& line,
S.
*** Since I'll be away from the family for a couple of weeks from Monday I thought I'd brush up on my texting skills. The idea is that I can talk to Sa quickly while on the move. Maybe I could send her a Valentines message on her mobile phone like this:
@>-->--
@}>----,---- @->-->--- That's a bunch of roses by the way. Although three wont really do the trick.
I'm not sure this is going to work because I think she only notices 1 out of every 5 texts I send. Not because she can't do the technology. She's just not as into phones as I am I guess. In fact, before we had a nanny I don't think she even charged her cell phone.
Yours thinking I'll probably just call her on the land line, S.
HOT NEWS
Just got an email from someone who pointed out that anyone who can talk 'text' really shouldn't be old enough to employ a nanny. Think they might have a point. From now on just think of me as a 15 yr old. February 07 What could be stranger?Each week I try to allocate some time to listen to the latest podcast from Fellowship Bible Church. You can pick them up here if you’re interested:
I was so pleased with the idea of being able to walk along the beach listening to the latest Sunday message on my iPod that I emailed Lloyd Shadrach to thank him. For that and for the quality of the message he clearly puts a lot of time and energy in preparing each week. He sent me the kindest reply.
Anyway, I had it on this morning while I was doing some filing and stuff in my writing room and I got a real treat. Last Sunday, as part of the message, one of my favourite Nashville artists, Ronnie Freeman, who’s a member at FBC got to sing a song on the podcast. Ronnie writes at BBMP sometimes but so far I’ve not bumped into him. Maybe next time? But I did get to meet him when I was at WAJ a couple of years ago and was struck by:
a) What a great guy he is and
b) What an incredible writer AND artist he is After changing labels I think he’s in the process of writing/recording a new album. Can’t wait. Needless to say, the song he sang on Sunday was another great one, filled with sweet melodic riffs and cool lines. Lines like ‘What could be stranger, God in a manger’. Nice.
I'll let you know if I hear more about his project.
Yours wondering why I only got ‘dog in a manger’ out of SongTools,
S. February 06 Russian EnglishWe just got back from a brilliant weekend in London. Just the two of us, thanks to K&A for looking after Poppy and Moo for the night.
We were staying at Le Meridian, in Piccadilly. Couldn’t get over how WIDE AWAKE London is at 3.00am on a Sunday morning. Seemed like midday - people milling around, police sirens, cars and busses honking their horns, shouting, screaming. Just wild.
While we were there we did a load of London things including tea at Fortnum & Mason which was a real highlight.
Another highlight was dinner on at a cool new Japanese restaurant, Matsuri, which was like being transported to Tokyo. We had tepanyaki which is when you sit in front of the chef who cooks the food in front of you. A bit like an exotic food show on TV. But he made it almost look like the ballet. I loved it when he cooked the ‘Fireball Ice Cream’, pouring brandy all over it and sent flames about three feet into the air.
One really cool thing about staying right in the centre of London was to try to take in just a little of the millions of things bombarding the senses. Sunday afternoon I wandered out into the centre of Piccadilly Circus and sat and watched life go by for half an hour or so. I listened to the different languages, watched the advertising slogans, looked at the buildings and just felt the whole vibe of the place. It was really cool to breathe that in for a while before heading back to the sanctuary of our room.
I actually found myself speaking Russian English at one point… a Russian girl came up to me and asked if I knew the way to Harrods. What came out of my mouth in reply was “well, it would take about 10 minutes by bus or half an hour by walk”. BY WALK? What sort English is that? I smiled at her hoping that she hadn’t noticed. Guess I was just trying to be helpful. But squashed up lyrical came out. She thanked me anyway. Yours looking forward to a week of getting my stuff together for Nashville,
S. February 03 I've been tardyHey, I've been tardy.
Congrats to all my Dove nominated friends: Here's a list of some:
Thanks for inspiring me and a whole load of others and for being great people to be around. S. TechnologyCan’t get over how technology rocks. Sue puts it perfectly here:
Thanks Sue for bearing with me while we got it all to work. I knew it would one day.
But the weird thing is that I got to read about seeing Sue in Nashville from my studio in Felpham while I’m sitting here in Starbucks in London. Victoria to be precise. I came up early to renew my passport. Should have a new one by lunch time. The fact that they are turning around my passport in four hours is in itself a wonder of modern technology. Especially seeing the calibre of person handling it. Not wanting to sound rude or anything but if they weren’t so categorical about me getting it back when they say I would have expected it to take about six months. Let’s see if that little burgundy booklet with a gold coat of arms arrives on time.
While I’m waiting I’m updating SongTools. I’ve got 12,000 new phrases - euphemisms, idioms, similes, metaphors and other stuff to add in. It will be cool to have them in before my next trip to Nashville (just over a week to go). You just never know what might come in handy during a cowrite. Inevitably, there’s a bunch of new words that I’ve never come across before (and strike me as being of questionable use). But they all need coding up. Every single one of them.
On the train I got about a third of my way through 879 new words. But the task is still pretty daunting. So, I’m going to set myself some treats:
100 words coded = a Grande Latté
300 words = and extra granola bar 600 words = lunch Let’s see if we can get through all 586 before I have to collect my passport. That would give me a new set of phrases to play with on the way home. I’ll let you know. The longer I spend writing this (more fun) the more likely it is that I go home hungry.
Yours wondering why I can’t write songs like any normal human being,
S.
LATER THAT NIGHT
Here's what happened:
Nitey nite! (oh... maybe I should code that?) |
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