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(Note: This is a duplicate of a previous post. The event is only two days away!) Today's blog post is about the first ever, Dallas Christian Music Festival. I'm excited to be working on this event for the summer. There are more details available at: https://www.facebook.com/DallasChristianMusicFestival If you live in the Willamette Valley of Oregon, please come out and see us. We will be at the Rotary Performing Arts Stage on, Thursday August 16th, 2018 from 4 to 8 pm. The Dallas Area Visitors Center, Dallas Chamber of Commerce, and the City of Dallas, are promoting this event and assisting in facility preparation. We're also working with the Dallas Ministerial Association to facilitate cooperation with the local churches. There will be local food vendors and kids' activities galore. We would love to see you there! #Music #God #festival #community

In 1985 I was going through some very dark and difficult times. I had gone through a very nasty divorce to a woman I had loved and who I thought loved me for who I was. I'd also had severe emotional struggles during and before then and just felt very disconnected from people. It was a very isolating time. We've all felt that way sometime during our lives, but this was amplified by being dissatisfied with my job, my living situation, and just feeling a general loneliness. It would have been easy to turn to drugs or alcohol to medicate the pain, but I knew that wouldn't help what I was going through. It would only make things worse. As I was browsing in a Christian book/music store at the time, I came across an album that looked interesting to me. It was called: 'Benny from here' and was recorded by an artist named: Benny Hester. Eager to hear it, I hurried home and played the tracks on my cassette player. That was when I heard the song: 'When God ran'. It was stunning, and boy did that song resonate with me! The song is about a young man who after turning his back on his Father remembers how much his Father loved him. It mirrors the story of the prodigal son as told by Jesus in Luke, Chapter 15. The young man remembers his Father and heads home with a humble and contrite heart to beg his Father to let him work merely for food since he'd been starving. The Father sees him from a distance and runs to embrace him. What a picture of love! It is amazing how a story, especially when put to music, can change one's whole perspective. After I heard that song, I felt hope and I felt loved. It may seem silly to others, but I did! There is something in our spirit that connects with music at the deepest level. David knew this when he would play music for King Saul as he was tormented by an evil spirit. I also learned how encouraging music can be at that time. I hadn't really known it until I went through such darkness. It's interesting how the music school I went to, Cal State Northridge, was only a few years before this time learning how much of an impact music therapy can have on people. Often music can reach a person's soul and work in their heart when nothing else will. Ask yourself if movies would be the same without music? They touch us at the heart level that most things cannot. All of this is to say what a blessing it is we have a way to reach and touch people with love! I'm not saying that music alone does it, but the message we can share with others is how important they are and how healing can begin through the songs and stories we share with music. I found a beautiful story shared by a site called: Music Therapy, that you can see touches on the power of what this means to people even at the end of their lives. Never let anyone tell you that music is not transformative. It is and can be a very powerful way for people to express what words themselves cannot! #love #Music #inspiration #ministry

Welcome to my blog postings! If you're a return visitor, you know that I've been writing a weekly blog up to this point. However, after some vacation time and associated inner reflection, I've decided to write more but on a less frequent basis. Perhaps every other week depending on how the ideas flow. This is the start of that new path. Part of my college coursework when I was an undergraduate was to write. It was either writing papers on historical and artistic figures, composing essays on what I was learning, or working on music manuscripts. (That's a whole blog posting in itself someday!) As an artist, you learn to express yourself in many different ways. You can write music or compose poetry, but your very nature demands that you outlet your feelings. Granted, some people don't always express themselves in healthy ways as is also the way for me at times. But, expressing our feelings through pen and paper is one great way to connect with others. It also allows us to become more objective about what we feel and can help make what we feel about something or someone more objective. It's also easy to do. Journals are inexpensive and simple to use. My wife's long-time friend makes journals for people and has even expanded into selling them online. If you're interested in the website where she does this, send an email to me at: Matt@GentleHavenMusic.com, and I will let her know you're interested in the products she creates. A question you may be asking yourself is: 'How do I start writing something that I want to express?' That's actually a very good question and I'm glad you asked it! The best way to start on a journey that one hasn't done before is: Sit down and make some notes. This is where you brainstorm on ideas you have. No idea is dumb, it's just an idea to consider. Next: Throw out the ideas that aren't relevant to what you want to accomplish. Remember, these are your ideas and nothing is dumb about them. You just need to filter through them and discard anything that is either too difficult to express, too painful to talk about, or too embarrassing to be revealed to anyone else. This is your personal journey and you can keep private content you'd rather not share. Finally: Start to write about your feelings. This is where the creative process is best expressed. You can open up about something that may really bother you or discuss something that's very exciting. The sky's the limit. Now that you have a process to work with, you can use it as a template for your creative side. Believe it or not, this is what musicians do all the time! We may lead with our feelings first or with an idea of something we'd like to play, but it's much the same way. I'm just giving you a recipe for how to do it yourself. Now you may be saying or thinking: 'Does he have an example of this that I can follow?' Of course! One of my favorite inspirations is listening to music. That's probably very obvious. When I do, my tastes are pretty eclectic, i.e., diverse. As I'm writing, I'm listening to some Classic Rock on Apple Music. It's fun hearing some of the music I cut my teeth on as a teenager. One of my favorite songs is: School's out by Alice Cooper. This song was very inspirational to me and I still remember sitting in class on the last day of school and thinking about that song. It was kind of the rebellious rock anthem that many of us felt about the school year. It's over and let's get out of here! From what I've read Alice Cooper was inspired to write about the most exciting three minutes of his life so it was either write about Christmas morning before opening presents or the end of school. I'm glad he wrote about the end of school. Think about that for a minute, the end of school... If he can write about that, you can write about something that's inspirational to you. It doesn't have to be set to music but can simply reflect what's important to you. Or it can be something you're struggling with. Again, writing it down can be very healing and inspirational at the same time. I've often joked with my lovely wife that there's a song for everything. I believe that's true. People write about their life experiences no matter how fun, silly or even disturbing they may sound to others. Let's get to it then! What would you like to express today? Join me next time as we journey down the road of music, artistry, and creativity. There's so much to explore! #inspiration #Musicartistry #Creativity

Hello to you! I hope this article finds you enjoying the weekend. We recently went to visit some friends who live in Eastern Washington near Pullman, the home of Washington State University. While I'm not a Cougars fan, I did enjoy seeing the beautiful campus and its surrounding town. What I was really impressed with during our trip is how large our western states really are! We are so blessed to live in this country that has rolling hills, majestic mountains, breathtaking waterfalls, and natural wonders that far exceed our expectations. Many of the early pioneers were overwhelmed by the vistas they witnessed during their travels. Lewis and Clark traveled during the early 1800s to the northwest from a starting point at Camp Dubois, Illinois. Their journey would take them to the Pacific Coast and would require 3 years to complete. Having none of the modern luxuries and conveniences we have today, one can only imagine how challenging of a trip it would have been. I mention this to you because we live in a beautiful, vast country that has something for everyone. It has mountains, deserts, rivers, and lots of agriculture. In fact, we saw much of this during our travels. Seeing this beautiful country inspires me to sing and write music. In fact, we have such gorgeous scenery that I can't help but see God's hand in all of this creation around us. If you want to be inspired, take a road trip this summer and see the gorgeous country that still can be explored. All it takes is some time and motivation. Take some pictures, laugh with loved ones, sleep outside, play guitar and dream just like you did when you were a kid. You may even enjoy something that I used to during road trips when I was young: Paul Harvey! #Holidays #IndependenceDay #God #inspiration

Hello to you friend! As you probably know, last weekend was Father's Day and I would like to say how thankful I am for my Dad, for being a Dad, and for my heavenly Father who is good all the time! It seems that whenever there's a celebration of some kind there's a difference of opinion as to whether it's right, wrong, or just plain crazy. While my blog here is not meant to be one that offers more than musician tips, I feel that it's important and necessary to outline a couple of biblical events that happened long ago to see why we love celebrations. Let's first look at the word 'festival'. According to dictionary.com, the word festival means: "A day or time of religious or other celebration, marked by feasting, ceremonies, or other observances." The first mention of a festival in the bible is in the book of Exodus Chapter 5, verse 1: "After this presentation to Israel’s leaders, Moses and Aaron went and spoke to Pharaoh. They told him, This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: 'Let my people go so they may hold a festival in my honor in the wilderness.'” If you believe like I do that each of us was created by a God who loves us, then you know deep in your heart that there's an innate need to worship. There's also an innate need for community. We love to be social! Even if you don't believe in a God who loves us you can still agree that we love to be social. Just look online for a few minutes and you can see the results of our desire to connect. One of the ways that God created for us to connect is through music. And what better way to connect than to have a party celebrating God's love through music! I can of course hear the opposing opinion that says: "festivals are bad and only pagans have them." This kind of attitude is negating what God has created and ordained as good. We are to celebrate God's love and worship Him through song. Jesus addressed the naysayer attitude when in Luke 19:40 He said: "He replied, 'If they kept quiet, the stones along the road would burst into cheers!'" My final thoughts about this are: We were made to worship God. We were made to love and glorify Him. One of the best ways to worship and love our God is to celebrate Him through a community event, a festival that brings people together for encouragement and unity. If you're in the Dallas, Oregon area in the middle of August, please join us for the first ever, Dallas Christian Music Festival. We would love to have you be a part of our community to celebrate God's love! #community #festival #worship

Welcome to my weekly blog posting! I've got a new digital release recording that I would like to share with everybody. Admittedly, I work on these songs with writing, arranging, recording, and mastering for the band I play with: Wrecknciled. It was a lot of work but well worth it as it made me focus on how to do all of these aspects so that our band knew how to play it well. And since we're playing it at the Dallas Christian Music Festival in August, I'd like to perform it the best we can. Is it a perfect recording? No, but it worked well and I now know how to do a good job with the recording setup I have. And it was all done digitally. In fact, while doing the writing I was looking for notation software that I could use for the music for our keyboard player. I found a free product called: MuseScore that I would recommend to anyone who likes to do more formalized notation work. It takes time to get to know it, but it's well worth the investment of time and energy to put music into something that everyone can read. I also used Studio One software to record and master the final track. Studio One is made by a company called Presonus and is made by musicians for musicians. Here's where the rubber meets the road though: Studio One software is very complex and I probably haven't even gotten more than 10% out of what it can do yet, but that doesn't mean it wasn't worth the investment. I've spent three years working with Studio One and have recorded at least 15 different recordings. Every time I do another I learn something I hadn't before. My suggestion is if you don't have something you use already, download a trial copy at: https://www.presonus.com/products/Studio-One. You can try it out and see what you think. You may also need to get an inexpensive USB recording unit to patch instruments, vocals, or midi units into. If you need more technical information, you can visit my blogs at: https://www.gentlehavenmusic.com/blog. So what's this new song about? I thought you'd never ask! Its purpose was really to declare what Christ did for us on the cross. That is, according to 2nd Corinthians 5: 17-19 those who know Christ have become a new creation and we've been reconciled to Him! What great news this is! We are declaring this to others through our music. As you may know, song writers are telling a story through their compositions. My writing is to convey the message of the gospel that Jesus loves everyone and came to this world to give His life so that we could be reconciled to God. That's awesome news to me! #love #Music #Musicrecordingsoftware #God

There's a funny joke about drummers that goes something like this: "How do you get a drummer off of your doorstep? Pay for the pizza." Now in all fairness, the drummer for our band 'Wrecknciled' spent many years working as a dispatcher for the State Police. He has some very interesting stories and insights to share. Drummers are a very different type of musician. I say that as a compliment not as a diss. They're one of the most important members of the band, providing the foundation for everything that's done. Singers often conflict with drummers because they get blamed for tempo increases and decreases. But, they are the guitarist, bassist, and keyboard players best friends. Or at least they should be. Without them the rest of us would sound very hollow and forlorn. In fact, they are usually multi-talented and can be very humble about it. (There are notable exceptions!) It's with all of this preface that I'd like to introduce: Dabblings from a Drummer. This is my tongue-in-cheek name of the stories our drummer has written through the years and the insights that God has given him. And if you've never met Animal from Sesame street, well without further ado! #Musicians #God

Welcome to my blog if you're new here or welcome back if you're not! This blog is meant to encourage and inspire you whether you're a novice, amateur or professional musician. I recently finished playing, recording and engineering a song that I wrote for our band last year. Our band has played it at a couple of gigs already too. But like all artists, I'm having some second thoughts about releasing it. Nobody likes to feel rejection about their work or themselves so I'm hesitant. Which begs the question: How do you deal with vulnerability? This fear can present itself in many forms. It may be the apprehension to do something because of what others 'might' think. It can also be a fear of rejection because of being hurt in a world that can be very unforgiving. All of us can relate to this fear. It may have been a critical parent, an unkind classmate, or just an unfriendly passerby. In fact, this is something that all artists and people feel throughout the day. To address this, I'd like to point out a song that one Christian artist named Zach Williams has on the air these days. It's called: Fear is a liar! Yes, our fears are lies! Should you not feel fear in some situations? Of course you should! But, to be paralyzed by fear of rejection or what others 'might' think is just not healthy. That's why I want to encourage you to use your talents. Your talents are God given and you may just be the person to encourage someone else going through difficult times. Not everyone is meant to be on a large stage in front of thousands of people, but, there are so many opportunities that we can take to use our talents. There are lonely people in convalescent homes, hurting people in shelters, veterans and family members who may be sick or ill, school kids who've never heard an instrument being played and all kinds of opportunities. You could be just what they need to start or continue their journey of healing. And music is such good therapy! My encouragement to you today is to use your talents and abilities to help others. You would be very surprised as to how good it feels to do something for someone else. It will make your heart smile! #love #community #inspiration #Music

Today I'm taking a different tack than usual since we in the United States are honoring all of those who made the ultimate sacrifice to keep our country free - Memorial Day. Last year my wife and I had the privilege of visiting Washington D.C. and were able to take a tour of Arlington National Cemetery. We were awestruck at the sacrifices and lines of grave markers that were there. I also discovered that my Uncle was buried there. I knew that he had been a part of the Bataan Death March in 1942, but didn't know that he had been laid to rest at Arlington. The time he spent as a prisoner of war drove him crazy as he witnessed many things that most of us will never see, thankfully. Since many in my family have served in the armed forces, there is a special place in my heart for all of the men and women who have so courageously given of their lives to make sure that we can enjoy the freedom we have. It's very humbling. My sincerest wish for this Memorial Day is to honor all of those who've made the ultimate sacrifice and to also thank the families of those brave men and women. We know that your sacrifices were not in vain. To honor the dead, I took the following video at the tomb of the unknown soldier. May god bless our military and our country. #MemorialDay #Holidays

Welcome to another installment of my weekly blog. This blog will address one of a performer's most daunting fears: performance. If you are at least 10 or older, you've no doubt dealt with being in front of other people. You may have played on a sports team, done public speaking, given a presentation, or led a meeting. Nothing about being in front of people is easy at first. Notice that I said: At first. Yes, there are some people who are naturals but the large majority of us would rather have a root canal than be up in front of a group of people. Why is that? It's probably because we all have an innate self-preservation trait that says: I don't want ANYBODY seeing what I'm really like! Let's dispel a couple of the reasons why we have this crippling fear before we talk about performing in front of others. The first fear to deal with is the one that says: What if I screw-up? This may make you feel better: Everyone screws-up! You will not be the first and you won't be the last. Let me tell you a little story. Several years ago a band that I had played in was in front of a large group of people for a time of city-wide worship. This was no small event. In fact, we had practiced for quite a while getting the music down well so as NOT to screw-up. I went to start one of the first songs only to be in the wrong key. Oh no! Heaven and earth must be crumbling down because I did that. No one would ever want to hear me play again, right? Nope. I just stopped and started over in the right key. No damage done except to my ego. The second fear to dispel and I believe the biggest one is: What will people think of me? Here's the answer to that: Who cares! Yes, who cares! Are you playing for all of them or for yourself and like me, for a God who loves me? Then what does it matter? Here's the great thing about the God who loves you and I, He's tone deaf when it comes to music! He hears us through His ears of love and just appreciates the talents He's given us. What a freeing feeling! Now that those two great fears have been deflated, let's move onto performance in front of others. If you've read any of my previous blogs then you may already know what I'm going to say. The only way to play well in front of others is to yes, practice! The old saying: 'Practice makes perfect', really does apply here. You need to build your confidence to play well and the only way to do that is to go to the proverbial woodshed and work it out. There is NO other way. In fact, I knew musicians in music school who would spend up to six hours a day practicing. That really isn't necessary for most of us, but whatever works for you is good. Don't be bashful about getting in front of others and using your instrument. You might be surprised how well it goes! #Music #performance #artistry #Practice