Our Longest Tour Yet

We are back home from our stint of shows through the midwest!  As a part-time band whose two members retain other part-time jobs, two weeks on the road has been our longest continuous stretch to date.  This was a test on several levels for us, and it was something we prayed would answer some questions about how we move forward as a band. 

First, a quick recap of our travels:

 We began with a Youth for Christ high school conference called Heatwave in Wildwood, NJ with The Remedy [Worship].  These guys are our brothers and some of our best friends.  We met some incredible students and YFC leaders, and even got a second to dip our toes in the sand! (Can you find us way in the back of the group shot??)

We drove straight from NJ to Wisconsin, stopping to sleep near Toledo. We were booked as Artists on the Rise at Under the Radar's Escape to the Lake, a four day music festival/retreat for artists and music lovers.  We met incredible musicians and folks from around the country, witnessed well-crafted songwriting and captivating concerts, and got to enjoy the beauty of Conference Point Center at Lake Geneva.

We explored Milwaukee (including cheese curds and brats) and played a show for youth and families at Grace Lutheran School in the suburbs.  We shared the stage with Donney Wright, a hip hop artist passionate about youth and the Gospel.

We explored Chicago NOT in January like our previous visits (courtesy of our hosts the McGinty's and Dave Trout of Under the Radar!) and played some of our songs and some corporate worship music for the Lincoln Park location of New Life Community Church. We also ate the obligatory Chicago deep dish pizza right before going on stage.  You know, like the pros do.

We played a house concert to a lovely crowd in Cincinnati with the uber-talented Son of Laughter, and our hosts invited us to play at City Gospel Mission for residents and the public the next morning.  We got to sneak in a quick visit to Over-the-Rhine, Graeter's ice cream, and Skyline chili before leaving the city.

We ended the tour with a house show in Louisville with our dear friend and fellow musician Adrian Mathenia.  We enjoyed a reunion with old friends and explored more of Louisville before driving through the night back to Maryland (in time for Jenna to play another gig that night... whew!).

So, those were our whirlwind 2 weeks on the road!  Now that we're home, we've been able to process some things we learned, both from questions we had before we left and things that we didn't anticipate.  Here are 8 of our thoughts.  (Why eight?  I don't know.  Why not?)

-God protects and provides.  This is not new information.  But there were so many little and big things that happened... lest we thought for one instant that we were in control of this tour, God quickly showed us otherwise.  We left a keyboard power cord behind at one location, and the venue where we discovered this just happened to have not only a power cord for our brand of keyboard, but an EXTRA.  We realized one mic stand was missing a mic clip, and the home we were in (note: someone's house. not a typical venue.) just happened to have their own sound system with a mic stand with a mic clip. We got caught in the mountains on our trek home in torrential downpour, the gas tank nearly empty, and very few exits to be seen... and an exit popped up with a gas station that was closed but the pump still worked.  In each of these moments, God provided peace that prevented panic - which I think is also an indication that I'm learning how to trust Him more instead of relying on my own strength and logic.  Each was uncomfortable, but I simply knew that God was going to work it out, and He did each time.

-Extended time on the road seems to work for us.  We love road trips.  We love exploring new places and trying local food specialties.  We also love playing music and and meeting new people.  There were tiring and trying moments for sure, but everything we saw and did was so life-giving that we came back feeling excited and energized rather than worn out.  I'm sure years of it could leave us feeling different, but for now, we wanted to get right back out there when we arrived back in Maryland.

-The kingdom is far-reaching and generous.  This tour was financially sustainable thanks to all of the hosts who provided us places to sleep and a meal.  We felt the healing effects of hospitality through this; we were well cared for and that enabled us to play and care for others well.  We felt a bit spoiled!  Each place we went, we met new friends who invited us to return one day under their roof.  People gave generously at shows.  And the aforementioned power cord?  The sound men cheerfully sent us on our way with their extra so that we could continue the tour.

-Audiobooks are a great way to travel.  Wanting to hear what came next in a book made long multi-hour stretches of driving seem to fade into the background.  We listened to Tina Fey's Bossypants (hysterical and strong) and started A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket.  (If you're interested, the first is kind of like a radio play, books 3 - 5 are terribly mastered and read by the author, but books 2 and 6 - 13 are read by Tim Curry.  He is fantastic.)

-Artistic community is invaluable when it's healthy.  The Escape to the Lake event we played was full of talented songwriters and musicians, as were shows that we played afterward.  Community centered around common interest and skill can sometimes entertain dangerous elements of comparison, competition, and pride, especially when creativity and performance are involved.  We have both been in such communities in the past, leaving us drained and anything but motivated to work on our craft.  ETTL, though, was full of community who simply desires good art to be made and celebrated.  The songs and skills of the artists present were awe-inspiring and encouraging, as were the artists themselves and the attendees.  We could not wait to get home and write again!  We've been touring and playing on our latest album over the past year, so this was a true page-turn for our artistic focus.  We would not have come upon such inspiration and motivation without this event.

-We need to stay connected to community back home.  In our road tripping pattern, we often didn't make or take phone calls that weren't related to the tour.  But the combination of preparations for departure, the actual two weeks on the road, and another week away soon after we returned put us in a place of not connecting with some people we love for over a month.  Whether they're physically from our town or close friends and family elsewhere, we quickly recognized that if extended road time becomes a normal part of our routine, we will need to take time away to pour into these relationships to ease the strain of absence.

-We're continuing on, one step at a time.  For years, I struggled with comparison and being a planner.  I would lament that other people were further along, more disciplined, more skilled, more driven, or at a magical successful point for which there was no road map.  I could not see how Chris & Jenna could be a full-time thing (or even whether it was supposed to be) with no linear path or numbered list of things to accomplish.  However, God does not typically hand out sets of 15 steps to people.  He gives ONE. at. a. time. And He invites us to trust him by following Him and obeying, even though we can't see the step after it, let alone the end game.  For now, that step looks like me eliminating some hours of another job that I've had in order to work more on the ministry that's been entrusted to us.  It seems that our story has been baby-stepping in some ways, and I'm now grateful for that.

-We are always learning to work better together.  This is hopefully true for any good marriage or business partnership.  In our case, we have both.  We are learning how to have grace with each other when we fail, to communicate through the mechanics and specifics of playing shows and packing up gear and traveling, to resolve conflict efficiently and lovingly, to divvy up responsibilities and tasks so that we can take care of business and still take care of the people around us, and to more selflessly serve one another.  We want to still love doing this together years down the road, so we want to be intentional about forming foundations and walls we can build upon.

Thank you to all who supported us in any way on this adventure.  We hope to revisit the Midwest (and/or a town near you) soon!

-Jenna

Come to Me.

I (Jenna) am keeping this one relatively short.  This is a feat where my verbose writing mind is concerned.  But it is important this time.  I am simultaneously inspired to write and to heed the words laid upon my heart.

We are preparing for a conference this weekend - we're returning to lead worship for a group of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship students in the middle of nowhere, Pennsylvania.  Just the two of us, no extra musicians along for the jam this time.  And it will be so good when we get there.  The week leading up to such things, though, is always a looming mountain to me.  I look upon each hour as a fractional piece, placing expectations upon us of practice in every spare moment to try to get even remotely close to the whole of "Prepared," because that is what we should always be and never are and we are SO behind and when will it happen if not now and how can we be professionals and what is wrong with us.

This inner monologue guilt trip is never once what God has said to me.  But heavens, I've recited it over and over again maniacally and tried to beat Chris over the head with it, too, in moments of desperation.  I will let you take about two seconds to surmise how effective this is.

So tonight, we cackled through the downhill spiral of Once Upon a Time over Mexican pie (unrelated: new obsession = savory pie), wrote to this precious face (the Compassion child we sponsor), watched the new Avengers movie trailer (and after he sopped up his drool, Chris explained all of it to me so I can pretend I know what's going on and be just as pumped), and at last sat down to practice.

I mean, LOOK AT HIM.  His future hopes include

becoming an evangelist and meeting us. *dies*

And as we sat down, Chris said, "Is it too late to add another song?"

I stared silently back and willed the giant YES back down and the eye-daggers back into their sheaths.  In my head, I looked quite receptive.  I won't ask him, just in case.

He said he just felt like it was a really appropriate response song, and it would be simple, and we didn't have to, but it was really poignant and maybe we could try it?  "Okay.  Try it."  Which translates to "Of course, my dearest love," and not "Sure. Go. I dare you," if you were wondering.

So then he sat down at the piano and played and sang the song.  

Come to me

Walk with me

Learn the rhythms of my grace

And I thought, well, maybe, harumph, okay.

Come to me

I have all you need

Learn to rest even while you are awake 

And then we pulled it up on Bandcamp to listen through to get it correct. 

Are you tired?

Are you worried?

Worn out from the day?

Have you been in a hurry?

I will slow the pace.

Hmm.  Umm.  Well.  Let's try it.  Key of Bb.  Jenna sings.

Come to-

And I was done.

I could sing no more words.

In a child's lullaby, the Voice of ages cut through my noise.
The floodgate was shattered.

One tear turned to three.

A trickle down my cheek turned to a river.

And I was small.  frail.  present.  listening.  

And He was Great.  Strong.  Present.  Speaking.

Come to me.  Come to me.  Come to me.

"Yeah, me too," said Chris.

Here I am.

And there I go.

The end.

Lyrics from "Come to Me" featuring Sandra McCracken from the Rain for Roots project album The Kingdom of Heaven is Like This. listen and purchase.  it will be worth it.

Mess.

Here's a little insight to my [Jenna's] past month or so.

I am now 30.  And with that has come an ever-increasing desire to live well.  In the physical realm, this looks like integrating main ideas of healthy eating into our grocery shopping and diet.  Like starting to run (read: jog/power walk/wheeze) in the mornings before work.  Like gradually exchanging chemical products in our home for natural solutions.  Like learning cleaning techniques our mothers and grandmothers knew like the backs of their hands, but for some reason didn't quite bridge the generation gap.  Like trying to get a handle on a schedule of keeping our apartment less of a wreck despite our crazy days.

This is a great image to illustrate my recent cleaning efforts, and also how I look and feel never.

The more I am trying to do these things, the more I am foiled in my efforts.  Shocking, right?

Specifically, I'm looking at you, cleanliness.  In the past couple of weeks, we have:

• knocked an entire container of bright yellow mustard barbecue sauce onto the carpet
• kicked a full glass of red wine over onto the carpet (beside the mustard stain)
• gotten home to discover a gallon of milk leaked into the backseat of my car (a mere week after DIY-shampooing the seats, because Pinterest! and cleanliness!)
• discovered the health benefits of turmeric and its part in creating delicious Indian-style food like lamb sloppy joes... as well as its apparent dying properties of counters, clothes, and anything ever
• had coconut oil-laden bulletproof coffee (healthy! let's do it!) leak into the depths of our Magic Bullet and all over the counter (incidentally, when you google 'hot liquid in M.B.,' disregard the half of people who say they've been doing it for years and heed the other half who say the pressure will make it shoot through the blade)
• discovered my old sneakers are now tracking black footprints everywhere, notably on freshly mopped floors
• and probably at least 29 other things.

 Thank you, universe.  Thank you, klutziness.  Thank you, thank you, irony.  (This would be my current version of that Alanis Morisette song.  Which, really, I could just say 'that Alanis song.'  Because who else is named that?!  I digress.)

And it INFURIATES ME.  To NO END.

 
It feels like such a waste of time.  I could be doing Big Things and Important Things and instead I am locked into a distasteful thing I hate for the next 25 minutes as I blot, scrub, press, shake. 

In a fit of rage and drama normalcy, I finally cried out, "I am DONE.  Get rid of it.  All of it.  Hire a dumpster.  Have a yard sale.  I don't care.  I am done owning things if all I am going to do is spend my time trying to fix them.  I don't want to own anything anymore."

Chris basically did a bell-kick in the air and gleefully asked when we can buy the RV and hit the road.

This would be fun for .4 days for me. 
Chris would be happy as a pup with two tails for life.

We have not sold all the things yet.  But truly, I have struggled.  I am attempting to become more responsible and care for what God has given us.  And it just feels like it keeps blowing up in my face.  I have not understood it.  And my frustration has grown.

And now, finally tonight, God has spoken.

I was at a prayer gathering - part of IF : Pray - and women were offering up sweet, honest prayers of hope, confession, desperation, life.  And one woman uttered, "I need You every moment, Lord.  Your mercies are new every morning because I need them."

And I heard: "This is why."

Clarity.  Undone. 

"Abide.  Need me.  Come to me."

Do I need God to get a stain out of a rug?  Well, working in my own strength sure isn't working out great, for me or for Chris.  Some of the messes have been cleaned up (praise the Lord - the spoiled-milk-dead-animal-soul-sucking-dementor smell in the car lingered for a good week, and I was getting ready to hitchhike to work); others stubbornly remain and I'm still fighting them.  I sourly, bitterly, selfishly fight.  Maybe the stain lifts, maybe it doesn't, but my mood is terrible and Chris wants to be nowhere near me.  I am anything but lovely.

Each new spill and drop and waste is an opportunity to lean on God.  Each is a tiny picture of the Mess I create in my life when I try to do it apart from Him.  That as I try to wrestle for control of my days, the Mess just gets bigger.  That as I push and scrub harder and harder through my gritted teeth, I grind the stains of my life in deeper and deeper and solidify the evidence of my mistakes and my foolishness.  But oh, how I try.

"I know You are there, catching, carrying this beautiful mess." - Sixpence NTR

So.  Deep breath.

When the next thing spills, I will pause and breathe and thank God for his presence and his reminder that I. need. Him.  I need him every hour.  Every moment.  Every second.  That trying to do life without him is futile and just messier and messier.  I was a Mess before he got a hold of me, and I revert to Mess each time I act in my own strength and not his.

I need You, God.  Thanks for putting me - literally - on my hands and knees.  This was an unusual lesson for me.  But I got it, eventually.  I need You.

"I need Thee, oh I need Thee, every hour I need Thee."

Album Progress: the things we must learn to love.

"More frequent summer blogging," I wrote in our last blog post.  In June.  So much for that.  I suppose it's still technically summer, but my school year has started, so it's hard to feel that way!  But I thought about blogging, with warm fuzzy feelings and all, a whole bunch of times.  So, there's that. 

We have returned from a week of recording vocals in Florida!  We tracked at The Prayer Closet Studios with Geoff Douglas of Equilateral Services (and a musician in his own right).  Our good friend JD Lenick is triple-threat-ing our album with drums, percussion, and some killer backing tracks to fill out the depth and sounds on these tunes.  We arrived in Port St. Lucie on a Sunday and got to catch the tail end of the drum tracks being recorded.  Beginning Monday afternoon, we traded off the vocal booth all week long, fighting to complete a long list of things in one tiny week.

 

 VICTORY!  Major AND minor vocal parts finished = brief Sabbath rest on the beach!

 

We have musician friends who seem to record all the time.  Every time we talk to them, they're making a new EP or a new single.  Most of them also have connections that help them do this... but regardless, recording this album, for us, just does not feel like whistling and skipping into a studio to gaily throw down our song as rainbows and butterflies appear.  It feels like hard labor.  It is a labor of love, but definitely labor.  We love to play together, and we love connecting with people at our shows.  We do not always love getting really particular about our craft. 

A while back, I saw this Proverb posted by a fellow musician (Mathai - she was on The Voice a few seasons ago, and I've enjoyed learning more about her) on Twitter:

Boyyyyyyyyyyyy it stopped me in my tracks.  She said it was "God slapping me in the face - no better wake up call."  Me too.  The road to recording this album has felt like one big training course in this very thing. 

I grew up as, so I was told, a really smart kid.  They tested me in third grade and put me in the gifted and talented program at my school.  I remained in it all the way through high school.  I experienced a lot of literature, projects, and problem-based learning that I would not have otherwise.  It gave me a bit of an identity, and gave me some peers I could commiserate with (or compete with, depending on the day).  So, then I went to college and was in the honors program there.  Again, I was made to think and use my brain.  All of these were valuable experiences, and I would not go back and undo any of them.  But at the end of the day, here are some things I think I really learned in those 12-ish, formative years:

::enter the voices inside Jenna's head, circa 2006, some known, most subconscious and unrealized...::

-Things come easily to me for the most part.  This is how people recognize me.  This is where my identity lies.
-If something doesn't come easily, it doesn't feel natural or fit with my identity.  People will look at me strangely.  I will avoid those things when possible.
-Criticizing me suggests that my smart kid, capable, quick to learn identity is no longer true.  Which means I don't know who I am.  So I crumble.  (it also all sounds like yelling to me, which terrifies me, but that's another story...)
-My dad, and many of my peers, define my intelligence by my grades. Anything below a 97 is going to raise an eyebrow.  Gifted kids aren't supposed to get less than that.   (this was helpfully dismantled a bit in college)
-...luckily, I can get really good grades by cramming the night before a test/paper/evaluation.  I probably won't remember the information later or be able to use or apply what I learned, but I got my grade.  No questions asked.
-I am labeled as "gifted," so I can get special privileges, like leaving other classes to work on projects and extensions on papers because I "need them."  So I can make up excuses when I procrastinate and people will generally make an exception for me.  I usually make 'last minute' work out pretty well.

::end the parade of half-truths::

Now... apply all of that to being an adult musician.  People tell me I am good at singing.  I have been singing forever, so I can do it - to a point - without thinking.  So, focused, technical practice is not first thing on my mind.  My mom does not live with me, and so does not force me to practice like she did with my clarinet.  I do not have tests to pass.  So, there are not deadlines for me to achieve certain levels of mastery with my craft.  I have a limited amount of piano, glockenspiel, and ukulele skill.  Trying to do certain things with them does not feel natural to me.  So, when they get hard, I push them away and do something else. 

What's missing is a healthy dose of work ethic.  Weird, since I worked my butt off to make sure I kept the grades and the appearances I felt I needed to...  but somewhere at the end of college, I crashed, and all desire to work at things was gone.  (Maybe it was that being good at things was what my whole identity was based on and I couldn't keep up anymore?  ..nah.....)

Somewhere in the sifting of education and cultivation, I missed the boat of intrinsic motivation and the constant pursuit of excellence.  Instead of seeing whatever abilities I had as a tool to be used, I saw them as the point of it all.  So being smart was the end goal, not being able to use my mind to accomplish great things.  So, here I sit, a closer-to-30-than-seems-possible adult, who loves music and feels a convicting calling to pursue it and use it for God's glory, who also instinctually runs away the second it gets hard.  Who bristles when her husband bandmate corrects her.  Who balls up on the couch and shuts down when she feels incompetent.  Who avoids even starting practicing because she has a sneaking suspicion she might actually be bad at it, and she never learned how to deal with being bad at things.

"To learn, you must love discipline.  It is stupid to hate correction." 

Ouch. 

This grown-up is having to slowly, painfully learn what many of her elementary students have already grasped - that learning is not always about a brief pat on the back, but about the development itself.  That it's supposed to feel awkward and uncomfortable for a while.  That having your inefficiencies pointed out is desirable, because it gives you a chance to seize them with determined joy and grow.  That doing something well "effortlessly" is a facade, because true skill is backed by a ton of discipline.  And learning to love that discipline can result in art that is beautiful and solid, not threatened by a lack of work or too much criticism.

To read more about the history of whom this quote is attributed to, go here.

To read the disturbing but memorable cartoon of what made me remember to say "whom" instead of "who," go here.

The original version of this quote, when I first read it, said "...miss two days, my friends know it."  Which, to me, is much more accountability-inspiring than thinking about critics.  The point is the same - and this is a kind of personal drive I have not known in my past, but I see it in friends of mine, and I aspire to honor the gifts God has given me with the same kind of zeal. 

...I started this post meaning to tell you specific details of what recording has been like so far.  I didn't quite know it would go this direction.  But, here it is.  The good news is I am writing to you in a reflective place: not the first realization of my faults, but standing in the middle of a massive project that has SO much potential, looking at the growth in these past months of willingness to listen, to refine, to practice, to struggle.  This album is indeed a labor of love, and I am so grateful for it.  I am grateful for the chance to learn to be a laborer, who puts the kind of work in that will make the harvest worth it. 

Much love,
Jenna