Independence st

Rachel Worley, an audiologist from Hartsville, South Carolina, shares how she expresses herself through music. She has been writing music for over 20 years, starting as a teenager. She uses basic chord families and follows a refrain that sticks in her head for days. Rachel advises aspiring songwriters to work through their thoughts and emotions, either starting with lyrics or letting them build with a tune. She emphasizes knowing the purpose of the song and deciding if it's for oneself or others. Rachel primarily writes worshipful songs for herself and God, but has shared them with others. She mentions a song that helped her through a difficult season and highlights the importance of balancing feelings with truth in her songs. As a busy mom, she enjoyed revisiting her musical journey during the interview. Hello, today I'm going to be interviewing Rachel Worley about how she expresses herself through music. Rachel is an audiologist from Hartsville, South Carolina, who in her free time leads youth worship and writes music. Thank you so much for allowing me to come out and speak with you today. Yeah, love to be here with you. So, tell me, how long have you been writing music? I wrote my first song as a teenager, I think, so this would have been a little over 20 years ago. I found the guitar at a yard sale, and ever since then I've just used a few basic chord families to craft songs for different seasons. Typically, for me, there may be a refrain I think of, and I know it's something I want to keep working with, if it gets stuck in my head over and over, over the course of several days. But yeah, it's been over 20 years of trying to pen down thoughts from my heart or turn my feelings into some kind of musical expression. And what would you say to someone who wants to start writing music? I think that it's always a good idea to try to work through the things that are in your heart and in your mind. Sometimes I've started with the guitar and I let the lyrics build. More often I typically have lyrics with a tune that's in my head that I just sort of have to work out the music for. I would say just kind of write down themes from your heart and whatever's going on at that time. And also I would say to know the purpose of the song that you're trying to write. And then you can choose whether you want to dedicate time and treat this like work, which would probably make you more productive and be able to produce more songs and more music. Or for me, just in different seasons of life, I've had a new song that may come in the midst of life, but I don't pursue it so much as I let it sort of happen. And primarily I write worshipful songs, so it's not necessarily to create for others. So that's another thing to figure out is are you creating music for yourself, for others? And in my case as well, just as worship for God. And I have shared some of those songs and hopefully they've been a blessing to others as they've heard them. But the songwriting for me is primarily just for me really and the Lord and just to get my heart in a healthy place. Are there any songs that have been especially impactful along your journey as a singer-songwriter? The first one that comes to mind for me came around a season where I was kind of in between seasons, if you know what I'm talking about, where I was finishing up something and I really didn't know what I was moving into. And it was just a difficult season. I felt really low, but like I said before, when I make songs, a lot of times it's to sing truth or to tell my heart the things that it needs to hear in that season. And so I wrote a song where the lyrics kind of start out in nature where it's autumn and the leaves are changing color and it's kind of going into this wintry, cold season of life. And then later in the song, the clouds ease and a ray of light comes through. The sun shines and a flower starts to bloom. And basically I say a brighter hour has come. And it just kind of took me on this journey of where my soul was kind of in a darker place to feeling more hopeful. And there's always this balance in songs, or at least my songs, where I want to be truthful with how I'm feeling, but I also want to put in there what actual truth is so that I don't just get stuck if the feelings are not great. Thank you so much again for taking the time to chat with me. I really enjoyed talking to you about how you express yourself through music. Yeah, and thank you for letting me think on this and actually just, yeah, like I said, think about something I really haven't had time to think about. And right now I'm just in a season where I'm a mom to little kids, and this isn't something I get to spend a lot of time doing. So this was fun to kind of revisit my musical journey and the songs that have been on my heart throughout the years. So thank you, Angie.