Nala Photography – the blog

Since I work with children and their families, I thought I’d share one of my favorite things to do with my family: listen to music (and sing to it). My two-and-a-half year old loves music and has natural rhythm and dance moves. He frequently requests for me to play “SONG, MAMA!” whenever we hop in the car. Over the past two years I’ve found some great kids music in my effort to keep up with his insatiable appetite for songs, and I’m here today to give you an opportunity to win a free full-album download* of my newest favorites from Rain for Roots (Sandra McCracken, Ellie Holcomb, Flo Paris, and Katy Bowser) on their newly-released first album, Big Stories for Little Ones.

Big Stories for Little Ones is a collection of classic Bible stories put to catchy folk music that is ideal for families with small children.  The lyrics, based on poems of Sally Lloyd-Jones, are easy to learn and sing. My son and I have memorized many of them without even trying!

My family loves this album and I think you will too! Since I have the privilege of being friends with some of the lovely musicians, here is an exclusive interview with FLO PARIS, from Rain for Roots:

So to begin with, tell me a little bit about your journey as a musician.

My parents were traveling musicians originally based in southern California who eventually found their way up to Santa Cruz and then down to a little town called Paso Robles.  By the time I was born they had stopped touring but there was always music in our house.  My mom writes music and sings, my dad played guitar (specifically, jazz guitar), both of my older brothers play guitar, and my sister played the flute and now sings in her church choir.  I was always drawn to the jazz songs my parents played–Summertime was the favorite my mother sang, and that history inspired me to study vocal jazz once I graduated high school.  After 2 years of college, I married my husband, we started our family, and I released my first album soon after. Shortly after our 2nd daughter Amelie was born, I recorded a 2nd album and we started thinking about cities that had a bit of a better music market to offer.  We moved to Nashville in 2008 and from the minute the airplane landed I felt like I was at home. I just finished recording my 3rd album set to release next month. Katy’s husband Kenny produced it and Katy sings on it with me–I have been so blessed by such a rich musical community!

How did you come up with the name for your group (Rain for Roots)?

I’m pretty sure it was Sandra’s idea! I think it’s genius, and really symbolizes what we are about. It actually took quite a few group emails and meetings (and SO MANY NAMES) before we finally settled on it. We just kept ruminating and talking about how whatever name we chose would have to really represent us and what we do without being cheesy. So many names were already taken or already domain names, so we just made lists and went through them. The one thing I remember from the process is one of us saying it felt much like naming our children–and just like a child grows to fit their name, we probably needn’t worry so much about it, that whatever we choose will wind up being perfect for us. This was so true. Right after we bit the bullet and went for Rain for Roots it felt right and like it had existed forever. I’m really happy with it.

What brought you together with the three other musicians? Where did the idea of Bible stories put to folk music come from?

Alice, Katy, Sandra and I have been friends almost since I first moved to town.  Alice (who manages us and is part of the RfR crew) was the first friend I met when we moved to Nashville.  Sandra was in our same small group, and the night we met we found out that some her family had just moved to the tiny town we had just moved from–it was such a “small world” moment. Katy and I met on Easter Sunday –I remember it so well!  They were all long time friends from college, and really welcomed me in.

One evening (nearly a year ago) we got together to celebrate our birthdays and we were sitting around my dining table (all of our best gatherings involve tea and good food) talking about ways to help our children memorize scripture. We talked about how we wished there was scripture music that was more our style: folksy, a little like the Elizabeth Mitchell albums we all loved, and in general, something we would want to listen to.  I think Alice just sort of laughed and looked at the 3 of us like, “Well, you are all mamas and musicians, why don’t you do it?” It turns out each of us had been sort of thinking about it, but the thought of doing something like this together was so inspiring, we were all sort of stunned by the possibilities and really excited.

It turns out Katy had been having conversations with Ellie Holcomb about the very same thing, and the same desire had been on Ellie’s heart as well. Ellie and I were church acquaintances, but she and her husband Drew had let us stay in their house (while they were on tour) when we were first visiting to see if Nashville was the right fit for us–I feel like even that small connection was God’s way of weaving our journey together from before we even moved here!

It is my understanding that the lyrics are taken from Sally Lloyd-Jones’ Baby’s Hug-a-Bible. What did the creative process look like for writing the music?

Katy had a copy of the Hug-A-Bible and suggested maybe starting there for our first project.  Sally’s poems are simple and sweet, but incredibly powerful.  There were already 10 poems – perfect for an album, and they were all written in a similar pattern and rhythm, which really helped the album gain cohesion while still allowing for each of our individual styles to be present in the music.

Katy heard that Sally would be in town and arranged for us all to meet to see if she would be open to us writing music to her poems.  Once again, we sat around the table at a lovely local lunch spot and feasted on God’s goodness by way of delicious food, new friendships, and a shared passion to bring the Word to little ones. We felt like Sally was one of us before lunch was even over, and we were delighted to receive her blessing on the project. We each picked 2 or 3 (one from the Old Testament, one from the New) and we wrote music to the poems and emailed the rough recordings to each other. I think most of the songs were written within the first week of our initial meeting with Sally.

I have never been a part of anything so inspired! In a way, it was easier to write melodies for children because the pressure to impress an ever evolving fan base, or to be cool enough, or obscure enough was completely off the table. It was just a joy to write these songs and to dig for timeless melodies that would be easy for the little ones to remember.  Not that we didn’t take it seriously–I think going into it all of us felt that a lot of children’s music out there actually doesn’t take kids seriously.  As far as I’m concerned, it is possible to make the same music for both adults and children–there is no need to dumb things down through the equivalent of carnival music. We need to give kids more credit than that and believe that they can appreciate quality music. That is one of the reasons I am so excited for little ones to hear this and to grow up with these melodies.

I love the album and can’t wait for what is next. Are there any plans for future kids albums?

YES! This is a long-term project. We hope to release subsequent albums centered in scripture and most likely will do a completely scripture based album next–possibly from the Psalms.  The exciting thing is that the word of God is so vast, there is SO much to hide in our hearts, and so much nourishment, that we could probably write and sing forever and only scratch the surface. We are privileged to carry this word–this rain water–to the littlest of roots and to the grown up ones as well!

image: Wendy Twit

*Rain for Roots is generously offering one free full album download of Big Stories for Little Ones. To enter giveaway, just leave a comment in today’s post (one entry per person, please) with your email address or a link back to your blog/website so that I can contact you. Giveaway ends Friday, May 18th at midnight CST. The winner will be announced Monday, May 21st.

In addition, they are giving a 10% discount to all Nala Photography readers! Enter code, “nala”, when placing your online album order. Click here to purchase.