YouTube hit helps Wilson get word out on faith, music
“(I) feel like the wheels of creativity are turning in a new fresh way, and there are some things I am really looking forward to share, write and sing.” Steven Curtis Chapman XXX XXXX, xxxxxxxxx
Josh Wilson’s current radio hit is “Fall Apart,” but people may be familiar with him from another broadcast: His impromptu performance of “Hey Jude” at the Newark Airport during a six-hour security lockdown that became a YouTube hit.
Wilson was part of a group heading to Mumbai, India, to do mission work, when everyone in the airport was forced to head into the terminal and to be rescreened.
“There were hundreds and hundreds of people sitting around waiting to get their flights,” Wilson said. “And my friend said, ‘Hey you should stand up and play a song.’ So I played ‘Hey, Jude’ by the Beatles, and people started singing along and clapping and it really was lot of fun. I was nervous cause I had no idea how people were going to respond.
“We put it up on YouTube the next day. ... I think on my page it ended up getting half a million (views),” he said. “I had a lot of people contact me who had never heard my music before because the YouTube video went viral.”
Wilson describes his music as “acoustic-driven pop rock. Singer-songwriter based.”
“My songs usually tell stories, most of the time about things I’ve been through or my friends have been through, dealing about faith and what I believe (and) what it means to follow Christ and be a Christian” he said. “I feel called to do this. I’m so excited to share through my music about my faith and why I believe what I believe.”
Over the past year, radio listeners may have heard Wilson sing “I Refuse,” “Before the Morning” and “Fall Apart.”
“Fall Apart,” Wilson said, “was inspired by a conversation I had with a friend who was on the verge of divorce with his wife. We were talking about how difficult it had been for him, and he brought up a Bible verse in Psalms that says that God is close to the brokenhearted.
“So that song is about how Jesus has promised he will never leave us and sometimes in these difficult moments we are reminded of that,” he said.
Of being apart of Steven Curtis Chapman’s Stories and Songs Tour, which comes to the Baton Rouge area on March 1 with a 7 p.m. concert at Greenwell Springs Baptist Church, Wilson said, “I grew up listening to Steven Curtis Chapman’s music, and to be able to not only be at the same concert as him but to play on his songs is pretty surreal for me.”
Wilson said he adds something “different” to the performance. “I have what is called a loop pedal. ... It’s a little recorder that I use with my feet.”
The pedal allows him to play a part, then record other parts individually on top of it, one at a time. “By the end of a song, it sorta sounds like a band is playing, but I’ve been recording as I go, on the pedal.“
ä ON THE INTERNET
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObyIIFqfOJM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RykAY-ofCCs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQeG1kaddsw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c30JTq7Xmg8
http://www.joshwilsonmusic.com/