Dear friends,

It has been just over 3 years since recording my last album, “You Hem Me In.” The songs written in this past season have been piling up, and it occurred to me a few months ago it was time to start thinking about recording another album. I reflected on where these songs were birthed, what was going on in my space, who was present and who was not. I revisited the moment of the impulse, or maybe even right before the impulse, of the note or melody that was the initial spark for these songs, and considered how those moments might be best captured and represented in a recording. So much of being an artist is about choices. It is my intention here to communicate the process that contributed to the decision I came to around this particular project.

In fall 2020 a friend described the season as a fallow season. I found this description incredibly apt. The image of a fallow field in which the field is strategically in a time of rest, and not producing, became an important image for me not only because it described the season so well, but also because I knew from Leviticus 25 that fields lay fallow during Jubilee. It became evident to me that there was a gift in the fallow season that may not be apparent on the surface but something beneath the surface–an invitation to a hidden flourishing and new beginnings. With this in mind, I took stock of this past season: a pandemic; the loss of my brother Jeff; very few moments apart from my children; uncertainty in employment and finances—the list of constraints and stresses could go on. And yet, I found myself in a quiet place playing and singing old lines from hymns and new songs of simple lines that seemed to emerge from a heart nested in a place of comfort and trust that was not constructed by my own hands. I looked around at the nest and took stock of what material made up this birthing place. The list went something like this: my 5 year-old-daughter composing unfiltered melodies and dances; a stillness or disruption to our schedules; a circuit breaker to my assumptions in so many areas of my heart; small groups of people earnestly displaying their faith and devotion in unusual spaces; the resonance of notes being heard because of the gift of time, space and greater intention to listen to and with others; sheets twisted up tight–strained to the point that one could feel the inevitability of snap and threads tearing followed by the release an unchurned body shedding a cocoon, and tears of both joy and grief, the sensation of the rise and fall of my diaphragm, a return to the place where breath was initiated – and remembering that this breath is conceived in the love-dance of the trinity (perichoresis), the ‘Yes’ to an invitation to move in new and unconstrained ways, crossing into wild, open, uncharted fields.

It is from this place that I made the decision to be at Pyatt Hall on Thursday, May 12th (the day after my 39th birthday) to record a new worship album. I will be sharing some more reflections on the intention behind some of the decisions I have made around this project, so stay tuned for those meanderings in the next couple of weeks. Jeremy and I recorded during the day and then in the evening, we recorded a live-off-the-floor worship set of these songs. There was a live stream on YouTube, which these recordings are remixed from - find that video here: youtu.be/RGpPvJ0_62Y. The completed album will be released later.

My hope is that you have caught some of the heart of this venture. I sense there is an “even closer” drawing in that Jesus is inviting me into and it's such an honour to share that space with you.

With great love and hope,

Erin Arding Stewart