When my wife and I met (now over 24 years ago) it was music that brought us together. We met in college where I was a vocal music major, and my wife was a piano music major. I needed a pianist to play for my voice lessons, and, well, the rest is history. I’ve had a wonderful pianist now (and much more :)) for well over two decades.
During our years dating, I would have little scraps of paper here and there with lyrics jotted down on them. Jennifer and I would sit at the piano and try out melodies and harmonies as various songs took shape. I loved to shape melodies with lyrics, and she loved to put them on paper, and we both loved to praise the Lord and share truth in music. It was a pretty good combination.
After we married and began raising our family, God led us into church ministry work (where we served for over 20 years) with much of that work being in the ministry of music. We attempted to lead duets, trios, quartets, choirs, children’s music, teen groups, and instrumental groups during church services, holiday services, revivals, musicals, special programs… you name it, we tried our hand at it, with various levels of success, or not, as the case may be.
Jennifer and I also continued to attempt to write and arrange music after our marriage, and about five years in, we decided to produce our own recording. We chose some of our original songs to begin preparing for a recording. A family in our church donated a nice keyboard synthesizer workstation (a Yamaha Motif XS8 to be precise), and using this amazing tool, we set up all of the music tracks for our first recording. Some of my family members and church members agreed to sing on some of the four part arrangements, and we went through the recording process using a small recording studio out in the hills of Singer’s Glen, Virginia, a suitable name for the location of a music studio, we thought. The title song of the recording was Sailin’ On a song born out of some trials we experienced during our first year of marriage. We published this recording under the label of Hall Music Ministries. (Our music ministry has now broadened into our speaking / music ministry called Truth in Time.)
Some years later, God led us to meet up with a pastor (now a dear friend) who introduced us to Evangelist Byron Foxx (also a dear friend) and his music ministry called Bible Truth Music. “Brother Foxx”, as he is affectionately known by many across the country, seemed to appreciate the music he heard on this initial recording of ours. To make a long story short, this opened the door for Jennifer and I to begin fulfilling some of our musical dreams of writing and arranging music for church choirs and musicians, including choir arrangements, Patriotic, Christmas, and Easter musicals, children’s Bible songs, etc. Jennifer has also published a four-part series of piano books for beginner piano students. Another highlight of working with Bible Truth Music during that time was leading and teaching in BTM choir seminars in various churches across the country. Through this unique opportunity we were able to meet some wonderful people.
There is now a new option in the menu of this blog site called “Music.” Here you can listen to some songs from our music ministry.
We pray the music uploaded here will be a blessing. We have a limited number of CDs available for both Sailin’ On (vocals/original songs) and Fairest Lord Jesus (harp and other instruments/hymns), so send us a note if you are interested in getting one of these CDs. Other music projects we have worked on under the BTM label are available at www.bibletruthmusic.com.
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Steve Hall Blog 