Raluca's story

My name is Raluca, I'm 16, I'm from Romania (somewhere in Eastern Europe....) and I'm a huge EHSS fan!
In 2007 I "discovered" my gift of composing. Well, I was writing songs 10 years ago too, but those were just simple tunes, nothing worth listening to! :P First I started composing instrumental music (piano solo with soundtracks) and then I thought "Nobody listens to this kind of music....I should try writing SONGS (with lyrics)". The lyric part doesn't work for me...sorry, I just CAN'T write lyrics (well, I can write silly poems, stuff like "Silly Songs With Larry" from Veggie Tales, but in my language...since in Romania there are no professional groups like in the USA, I had no chance of writing a song...). My Mom advised me to take a public-domain poem and put music to it. I did...after one week, we sang it in church. I was so thrilled....the first time somebody sings my song!!!

As for my piano-solo pieces, I played them in my school and people were excited about them, but my wish was to write songs WITH LYRICS.

In 2008 I went to Ben Speer's Stamps Baxter School Of Music where I took some piano and songwriting classes. I had the privilege to study with Sue C. Smith who writes songs for EHSS (I was so shocked, I could hardly believe it!) and she taught me a lot of things about merging the music and lyrics. At that school I met a good lyricist and we started working together, but after writing a couple of songs, we didn't keep in touch...and I also gave up the idea of becoming a composer. I started writing my own lyrics, but it took me a lot of time..... and they're not as good as any other lyricist's.
I joined EHSS's Message Board in early 2008 and made a lot of friends! In August-September, a nice girl showed up and joined this big awesome family! I knew her as "giveasmile" until she wrote her name in her signature, "Haley"--and the rest is history :) OK, wait I'll write it :P

Somebody started a thread about sending songs to EHSS and I posted "Oh, I'd love it if EHSS sang my songs" and Haley replied: "And I'd love it if EHSS sang my.........hmm.....poems? *rolleyes*" When I read that I was like: WHAT??? Ta-da! Let's send her a personal message...and request some lyrics...>:) (I meant....POEMS!)She got kinda curious about it......she sent me a poem called Desert Places, and as I read it, I was thinking "Wow, I really feel this way these days! This lyric is great! Thank you, Haley!" I wrote a simple melody, I didn't want it to be very fancy, 'cause the message was so simple, so I had to keep it all simple! :) (as musicians would say...keep it "singable!")

God is good! I think He has a LOT in store for us!