I love the studio and all the creativity it inspires. We definitely need that inspiration when recording Away in a Manger because we needed to write another half a chorus for the beginning of it.
One day when snow was falling outside our big kitchen windows I sat down and wrote a couple of lines that went well with the lyrics of Away in a Manger.(Kind of like on Natalie Grant’s Medley of Silver Bells and O Holy Night… there’s that little half-song in the middle of the two carols.) I had written a four line chorus, almost like a little tag for the beginning of Away in a Manger but Eric asked if we could make it twice as long.
We had a couple of hours to come up with something. I’m one of those song writers that works strictly on bursts of inspiration. I’ll write a verse for a song in 5 minutes and then two months later the perfect chorus will come to me. It will actually take a total of 20 to 30 minutes to write the song, it just comes over several weeks or months. Being stretched to write a chorus in a couple of hours cold turkey was definitely a challenge. It was even harder since none of the words we used could be more that two syllables long and had to refer to Christmas night right before Jesus became flesh. Thankfully, Lainika and Danika are the type of writters that like to sit down and take it a line at a time. As the four of us bounce ideas off of each other in the hotel room we came up with four more lines that we love. The guys took the song and made it have an earthy organic sound and and feel. I like that it’s unlike any Away in a Manger I’ve ever heard before.