Steven Curtis Chapman
All About Love

When Steven Curtis Chapman makes an album, it’s not just a random selection of songs. It is a collection of stories, of chapters from his life. The past few years have brought joy and sorrow. Many times there have been more questions than answers. Chapman has captured these tears and triumphs on Declaration.

The songs chronicle Chapman’s journey in pursuit of a deeper walk with God. He celebrates the joy of life in Christ in “Declaration of Dependence,” “Jesus Is Life” and “Live Out Loud.” He welcomes the trials of life in “Bring It On” and yearns for more faith in “God Follower” and “Magnificent Obsession.”

The difficult days have drawn Chapman closer to his Creator. Chapman says, “The last couple of years the one prayer I’ve prayed more than any is ‘Lord I believe, help my unbelief.’ Even kind of harkening back to the words of Job saying, even if he slays me I’m still going to trust Him. In the last season of life I’ve watched friends and people I love and really care about walk through some painful things and those things have really marked me. They’ve really challenged my faith. Some of these things have left me without responses other than saying I need to go back and just really make this declaration of my faith, of what my faith is in. Is my faith in my faith or is it really in the person of Jesus Christ, in his truth and in His Word.”

Musically, Declaration builds on the signature Chapman sound that is so evident with his Grammy Award-winning, million-selling album Speechless. “It continues some of what I did with that recording in terms of using some electronic elements, using some programming, using some drum loops and samples.” Chapman also plays lots of guitars on the album. “Actually walls of guitars, guitars upon guitars, this is definitely a guitar record.” Steven recorded the basic tracks live in the studio with his own band; Will Denton on drums, Randy Pearce on electric guitar and Chris Mosher on keyboards. Chapman and award winning producer Brown Bannister also enlisted the help of legendary Los Angeles musician Leland Sklar on bass.

Bannister describes the musical direction as “real modern rock, very pop in song form as Steven’s songs always are, uniquely him but a very modern rock kind of approach to pop songs.” The musical influences on Declaration range from current hit makers Creed and Train to the classic styling of The Beatles. The fab four influence on Chapman can be heard on “This Day.” “We kind of did a little return to Abbey Road as it were with some of the string parts and visited some new territory a little bit for me.”

Much of the recording took place at Chapman’s home studio, The Laundry Room. Previously a demo studio, a remodeling project to give his wife a bigger laundry room led to a state of the art studio above the garage. Steven took advantage of working at home. “You’ll hear a lot of involvement from my family on this record. One day we were doing gang vocals on ‘Live Out Loud’ and I ran over to the house and got Emily and the boys to join us.” Even some of the wildlife makes an appearance on the album. “We set up a mic outside of my garage for the parade mix of ‘Live Out Loud’ (found on the pre-sell CD single) and you actually hear one of my pet mockingbirds who live in the tree just outside the garage room singing his song.”

One of the most emotional moments on Declaration comes in the sensitive ballad written for Steven’s adopted daughter. “Probably one of the greatest things that has ever happened in my life of faith and journey has been when my daughter Emily came up with this idea that she needed a little sister.” This desire became a reality when Steven and his family traveled to China in March 2000 to bring home 7-month old Shaohannah. The song “When Loves Takes You In” is a pouring out of Chapman’s heart about this life-changing experience. “I can honestly say I wept as I wrote it.”

“Shaohannah has just done such amazing things to this family. We named her laughter. ‘Shao’ means laughter and ‘Hannah,’ God’s gift of grace. It has been an enormous lesson in faith to see God change even the hearts of my own family, and see us enter into this incredible mystery of what does it mean to embrace a child who didn’t have a family and now we are her family. Now we are a part of her and she’s part of us and that’s what God has done with us and that’s what the Gospel is.”

Another powerful moment comes in “No Greater Love.” The song was inspired by the book Through Gates Of Splendor by Elisabeth Elliot. The well-known story of the martyrdom of five American missionaries in the jungle of Ecuador in 1956 deeply impacted Chapman. He turned to the internet to find out what has happened since missionaries Jim Elliot, Ed McCully, Pete Fleming, Roger Youderian and Nate Saint lost their lives. He remembered that pilot Nate Saint had a little boy, named Steve Saint, and Steven found him carrying on the work of his late father. “I found Steve on the internet and began to talk back and forth with him and found out that he was currently traveling in America with Mincay (pronounced men-kai), one of the six men who killed his father. And now Mincay was here in America speaking in his native tongue about the redeeming power of forgiveness and God’s love and God’s grace.”

Steven learned that one of his early songs had been an inspiration to Mincay and the believers in Ecuador. “I actually heard a recording of him singing, chanting along with the man who is singing this song of mine, ‘My Redeemer Is Faithful and True.’ I was so impacted by the book and now I’m finding out I have a tiny part in this story and I’m getting to have a front row seat on what God’s doing in all this.” Steve Saint and Mincay came to Nashville and Steven spent some time with them. “I had this idea and dream of actually having Mincay sing with me on the album. That dream became reality. God let that happen.” The sound of Mincay chanting at the end of “No Greater Love” is bound to impact many listeners.

Declaration is Steven Curtis Chapman’s 12th album for Sparrow Records. Since his debut release, First Hand in 1987, Chapman has sold 6 million albums including five gold and two platinum discs. He has received 4 NARAS Grammy Awards in the Best Pop/Contemporary Gospel Album category. He is the most honored artist in the history of the Gospel Music Association with 44 Dove Awards, including his 7th Male Vocalist of the Year award in 2001. His 1999 Grammy Award winning Speechless album made radio history with 7 singles going to number 1. That brings his total number of chart toppers to 36. Declaration is sure to add to the count.

Steven’s ultimate goal with the album is that it will bring the listeners closer to Christ. “This is my declaration, I’m staking all on this, that Jesus, You are my life and I just need to see Your face. And to say with Paul, I want to know Christ. I want to know Christ in the midst of all this; I really want to know Jesus.” Chapman continues, “I hope that when people have heard all of these songs and danced at the appropriate moments and cried at the appropriate moments and all of those things, they can really walk away saying, ‘you know, I have a clearer picture of the face of Christ.’ Then, it’s been worth every bit of the work that’s gone into it.”

 
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