a musician's thoughts

Ars Gratia Artis

Mon, 10 Jan 2011 20:10:46 -0500

A friend of mine just got that tatooed on his arm, and it really sums up this season of my life. In Latin, it means, “Art, for art’s sake” and that’s exactly what I’m planning on doing. Tomorrow marks day one of recording for an EP I’m hoping to release sometime next month. I’ve always written music, and recorded several demos, but lately I have felt compelled to take some of those songs a little further.

Hopefully, the finished product will be available for free on my website as a download, as I don’t intend to have it available as a cd, nor do I intend to make any profit, but it is solely my endeavor to get the ideas from my head into a finished work of art. The challenges are exciting, and I can’t tell you how freeing it is to feel unburdened by expectation, inside and out. So here is my adventure without ever leaving home. More to come soon, my friends.

"the world does not represent a struggle at all, or a predaceous sequence of chance events, but..."

Sun, 31 Oct 2010 18:20:54 -0400

“the world does not represent a struggle at all, or a predaceous sequence of chance events, but shimmering bliss, beneficent trepidation, a gift bestowed on us and unappreciated.”

- Vladimir Nabokov

Braves On The Bus After The Show. Great Times

Fri, 08 Oct 2010 23:19:09 -0400

Braves On The Bus After The Show. Great Times

Lancaster, PA.

Fri, 08 Oct 2010 00:23:00 -0400

Lancaster, PA.

Can’t Stop Singing of Your Love by my good friend David...

Mon, 04 Oct 2010 15:03:29 -0400

Can’t Stop Singing of Your Love by my good friend David Norris. it’s too good not to share, so I hope you enjoy this as much as I do!

"It’s interesting how you sometimes have to leave home before you can ask difficult questions,..."

Mon, 04 Oct 2010 11:44:27 -0400

“It’s interesting how you sometimes have to leave home before you can ask difficult questions, how the questions never come up in the room you grew up in, in the town in which you were born. It’s funny how you can’t ask difficult questions in a familiar place, how you have to stand back a few feet and see things in a new way before you realize nothing that is happening to you is normal.”

- Donald Miller

So so thankful for a god who would give me the things I need over the things I want, even when I so...

Tue, 21 Sep 2010 12:47:07 -0400

So so thankful for a god who would give me the things I need over the things I want, even when I so desperately fight it.

“Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.”

-Romans 12

Genius is the ability to scrutinize the ordinary

Thu, 16 Sep 2010 15:52:46 -0400

“God’s care for humanity was so great that he sent his unique Son among us, so that those who count on him might not lead a futile and failing existence, but have the undying life of God Himself.”

“Recently a pilot was practicing high-speed maneuvers in a jet fighter. She turned the controls for what she thought was a steep ascent -and flew straight into the ground. She was unaware that she had been flying upside down.

This is a parable of human existence in our times -not exactly that everyone is crashing, though there is enough of that -but most of us as individuals, and world society as a whole, live at high-speed, and often with no clue to whether we are flying upside down or right-side up. Indeed, we are haunted by a strong suspicion that there may be no difference -or at least that it is unknown or irrelevant.”

-Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy

here’s a demo of a song I wrote quite a while back. I was never...

Thu, 16 Sep 2010 15:29:27 -0400

here’s a demo of a song I wrote quite a while back. I was never really comfortable with it because I never really felt like it concluded. shouldn’t every story have an ending before it’s told?

recently I was talking with a good friend of mine about the relationship we each had with our fathers growing up. I came to find out that he had never really met his dad. not because he left, but he died of cancer when this friend of mine was only 5 months old. your heart really has to break for someone like that. I mean, there are just some things in life that will never fully heal. it doesn’t mean they don’t get better, but the pain of remembering will always be there as long as you choose to remember, and if you try to forget, you will inevitably experience the pain of severing off an emotional piece of yourself.

so I opened up about how my father committed suicide when I was 17, and how I never really was sure about how that worked into my testimony. again, shouldn’t every story come to a conclusion before it’s told? I was surprised at how my friend responded. he said, “I think the beauty of your testimony is that you are still going through it.” that struck me as odd, because I had always assumed that a good story was measured by its ending. But the beauty of story is not in the ending, but in the hope of a redeeming one.

so this song became heavy on my heart. I recorded a demo of it and figured it was time to share. it’s not neat, pretty, or perfectly in tune. but neither am I, and I never want to claim otherwise. I hope this song helps some of you the way it helped me give up on the illusion of control, and trust that he really does have it taken care of.

Here’s another song to end on a happy note. Pun!

Wed, 25 Aug 2010 00:44:00 -0400

Here’s another song to end on a happy note. Pun!

There is nothing I need that my God won’t provide, and I can’t believe I ever thought...

Thu, 29 Jul 2010 12:03:23 -0400

There is nothing I need that my God won’t provide, and I can’t believe I ever thought otherwise.

Cowboy Kenley.

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 19:21:25 -0400

Cowboy Kenley.

what my family thinks I do for a living:

Sat, 10 Jul 2010 20:02:38 -0400

Relative: So what have you been up to in Nashville for the past year?
Me: Just playing music mostly
Relative: That's fun. I wish I would have goofed off in college.
Me: (speechless)

Going home

Fri, 02 Jul 2010 03:33:00 -0400

I’ve been gone for three weeks now, two of which were spent away from my wife, and I’m ready to be home! I love traveling, but if it’s not a cool city, I can’t spend more than a few days there without getting anxious to be back in Atlanta. Right now, I’m in the car on my way to Nashville from east Texas, and when I get there, it’s on to ATL. Quite a long drive for one night/morning. Times like this make me question what home really is supposed to be, and I’m reminded of Jon Foreman’s Southbound Train. To quote,

“I’m heading home, but I’m not so sure that home is a place you can still get to by train”

I often find myself thinking that one of the greatest things to ever happen to me was leaving my hometown at the age of 18. Not only because it put me in the deep end of the music pool in Nashville Tennessee, but mainly because it uprooted my idea of home. And I certainly don’t want to sound ungrateful for the people and places I grew up with. I think Donald Miller said it best in one of my favorite books of his, Through Painted Deserts,

“everybody has to leave their home and come back so they can love it again for all new reasons,” {Author’s Note, p. x}

In fact, while we’re on the subject, go ahead and do yourself a favor and drive down to your nearest bookstore and read the entire Author’s Note in that book. You’ll end up reading the whole thing. But I digress…

Sometimes I think if I had never moved, home might still only be a place to me. A little patch of dirt on a little speck of dust tumbling through space. What a tragedy that would be. The older I get, the more I (think I) understand that this is just a temporary housing, where the lease is almost up, and I am ever more thankful for my friends and family, as they are the only home on this earth that I ever want to know. And to Christ, in whom our eternal home rests.

Some better shots of the new Mono case to give you a better idea...

Sun, 20 Jun 2010 15:43:00 -0400

Guitar 1

Guitar 2

Top pocket

Bottom pocket. my macbook fits nicely

straps

straps tucked away

very heavy w/ 2 guitars but solid handle

both sides open

Some better shots of the new Mono case to give you a better idea of what it does.

"Praise the god who has not dealt with us according to our ways. Praise the king who has delivered us..."

Sun, 20 Jun 2010 11:48:00 -0400

“Praise the god who has not dealt with us according to our ways. Praise the king who has delivered us while we were far away”

- David Norris

I got this bad boy in the mail today. It’s a hybrid dual...

Sun, 20 Jun 2010 00:26:00 -0400

I got this bad boy in the mail today. It’s a hybrid dual soft/hard case for my Les Paul and Telecaster. I’m very excited to wear it out around town, throw it in the backseat, maybe even take it to the airport for a one off. Basically anything short of putting it under a bus or gate checking.

I was a little concerned about how the Les Paul would fit, but after spending some time with it, my mind is a little more at ease. Of course, it won’t protect your guitars like a road case, but the level of comfort this thing provides while toting two guitars on your back is awesome. Not to mention its waterproof. Well, I wouldn’t throw it in a pool, but I wouldn’t be the least bit worried if I got caught in a downpour with it on my back. I’m starting to sound like a commercial, so I’ll stop. But if you’re in the market, definitely give Mono Cases a glance.

Conversation on the road

Fri, 18 Jun 2010 14:50:29 -0400

Me: you ever been to little rock before?
Kenley: no, but there are bullet holes in that stop sign

Here’s a random collection of pictures from traveling. I...

Fri, 11 Jun 2010 13:53:00 -0400

Paul, faking his birthday for free cake.

Nockels rehearsal @Tomlin's Cabin

sleep deprived, backstage in Illinois

Jay Desai TCB. airlines lost our bags...

we called a cab, and this is what came

day off in OKC with my wife.

Christy/Nathan's youngest took my phone

Playing in KY

Mr. Chris Brink on bass

@Third Day's studio. ridiculous.

Here’s a random collection of pictures from traveling. I love what I do, and I love the people I get to work with. If you don’t look back every once in a while, you’ll forget how good God has been.