MUSIC
“In yourself right now is all the place you’ve got.”
― Flannery O’Connor
FACING EDEN began as an EP but blossomed into an entire full- length work with producer and songwriter Jeremy Casella, along with a voluminous bandwagon of talent. Tracked at the storied Watershed Studio in south Nashville, the result is an album leaning toward café jazz but keeping deep roots in 60s songwriting.
Encompassing expansive sonic territory, the record isn’t afraid to wander into blue cocktail hours (“My Inflatable Heart”), gospel riversides (“Mercy,” “Come Home,” “Let It Rise”), ballad-style acoustic hymnody (“Maria’s Song”), and even the free rubato motion of a musical theatre sound (“Take Them Home”).
Hope’s personal perspective is the lyrical driver. Despite swinging with heavy hitters in the studio, much of her time is spent as caregiver, homemaker, and overseer. The thrust of her lyricism, therefore, is encouragement, down to earth, an encouraging rebuttal against the dominance of creativity by the capitalist and ambitious.
With the various outward reaches into genres, Facing Eden can best be described as Americana in a liberated fashion, touching multiple styles born out of Hope’s NC roots. FACING EDEN, with its emphasis on inward concerns, outward service, and Hope’s lyricism is monastic (in a very jubilant sense), delighting in the local, the personal, and the unsung.
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Credits
Released August 30, 2024
All songs written and performed by Hope Newman Kemp
Session Players:
Piano and Vocals: Hope
Guitars: Chris Rodriguez
Double Bass: Byron House
Drums: Joshua Hunt
Percussion: Eric Darken
Overdubs:
Featuring: Phil Keaggy
BGVs: Hope, Jeremy Casella, Chris Juengel, Robin Revier
Additional Guitars: Jeremy Casella
Hammond B3: Blaire Masters
Slide: Dave Cleveland
Violin and Viola: Avery Bright
Cello: Cara Fox
Engineered & Mixed by Jim Dineen
Mastered by Voyager Mastering
Produced by Jeremy Casella
Recorded October 2023 at Watershed Studios in Nashville, TN.
License - all rights reserved.
Holiday Jazz Single
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Creating & Restoring: I’ve been making something new from something old… (Which is Christmasy in its own way…)
I don’t like throwing things away. I don’t believe anything in God’s commodity is wasted, even things we make we think irredeemable. I believe the act of reconciling and restoration among the highest and most worshipful works of creativity afforded to humankind. And I want what I believe to be evident in my own life.
New: Collaborating with drummer, producer, and sound engineer, Max Dearing; he’s laid some Mediterranean hand percussion on it (sitting in the groove spaces I believe my arrangement has always needed)…
Also New: Collaborating with innovative Inkscape Artist, @kyra_hinton_studio; she found the most perfect visual for the new recording (working with this artist is something I have wanted since our meeting in 2018)…
Old: An arrangement of the nativity hymn ‘What Child is This’ (itself a new lyric written to the ancient tune of Greensleeves), that has been flowing naturally from me for a very long time…
CAROLINA BLUEBIRD JAZZ PROJECT is a live performance collaborative intersection of Hope’s vocals with combo powerhouse UNC-Chapel Hill Jazz Studies professors.
Produced by Hope Kemp Music, and featuring Grammy nominee Stephen Anderson on Piano, Jason Foureman (Branford Marsalis, René Marie) on Bass, and Dan Davis (Paul Jeffrey, Conrad Herwig) on Drums, Hope makes a nod towards Ella Fitzgerald, Rosemary Clooney and brings her dynamic charisma home as the carefree locus of Carolina Bluebird’s trad jazz sound.
The album showcases the band's monstrous chops, in styles ranging from Hard Swing to ECM free syle, including a clever mashup of two well loved Blues ballads. The end result reveals an intelligent and reverent selection of standard songbook tunes to be delivered to Jazz devotees and new enthusiasts alike.
HOPING FOR REAL is a song-cycle exploring the longing of becoming, and the unexpected sacrifice of self for transforming love. Inspired by the well loved book, “The Velveteen Rabbit” (Margery Williams), the album is sensitively produced by Ben Hardesty (The Last Bison) and features his whimsical folkestral style.
Although a beloved children’s book, this series of songs is decidedly grown up in heart and mind, and includes a booklet of quotes to help the listener follow Rabbit’s journey.
Hope also performs a live version supported by her 6 piece band and 2 actors readers called: Hoping for Real: a songwriter’s retelling of “The Velveteen Rabbit” as a Musical Reading.