I am pleased to introduce a brand-new song that I wrote and recorded with my kids and my father-in-law for my wife for Mother’s Day. The song is entitled Calling You Blessed, and it is inspired Jennifer’s beautiful sacrificial love for her family as framed by the Biblical text of Proverbs 31 where the writer describes “An excellent wife…”
I employed the vocal talents of all of my children ranging in ages from 5-18, and I had my 13-year-old join in for drums and my 15-year-old on bass. NO autotune was used in the production of this song!
The rest of the song was rounded out with Taylor acoustic guitar and Fender American Elite Stratocaster through the Radial Engineering Pro D1 and processed through Native Instruments’ Guitar Rig, plus the NI Kontakt Scarbee electric piano, and a special appearance of the Korg Volca Keys for the synth solo. It was mixed as-is without any EQ or compression added — only reverb to match the rest of the mix. And some special touches from NI Kontakt’s chimes and cymbal rolls.
All vocals and the shaker were tracked with a ribbon microphone, the sE Electronics VR1 through the Cloud Microphones Cloudlifter. Tracking, mixing, and mastering was made a breeze with PreSonus Studio One 3, NI plugins, and iZotope Ozone. I couldn’t be more pleased with the simplicity of use and surprisingly rich toolset available in Studio One!
Without further fanfare, please enjoy the song — and share it with your mother!
Sometimes I go into Joanne’s or Michael’s just for the smells.