In 1998, Winifred Adams went to Canada to film a fitness video. She came back a singer.
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A fortunate turn of events happened to Winifred Adams who went to Canada to make a fitness video and embarked on a singing career.
A fortunate turn of events happened to Winifred Adams who went to Canada to make a fitness video and embarked on a singing career.
Adams, of Auburn, had worked in wellness since graduating from the University of Colorado in 1994. Holistic practices like herbology, Reiki and tuning fork healing were her trades.
But her trip north to shoot an exercise video brought her into contact with Jack Lenz, a notable Canadian composer who helped create the score for “The Passion of the Christ.” After Adams sang for him on something of a whim, Lenz replied with words that marked a major turning point in her life.
“He told me I need to do this,” Adams said. “That one sentence was all I needed to hear.”
Before that meeting, singing had been a casual interest for Adams. As a child in Auburn, she would commonly sing along to music with a concern that may not have signaled a life's aspiration to the people around her. But Adams was always practicing - always wanting to sound her best.
“Music seemed ‘over there' to me,” she said.
Adams has ridden Lenz's encouragement to remarkable feats in the world of music. Her song “Where Will This Love Go” has received radio play in the United States, the Netherlands, Greece and Hong Kong. She also won a 2008 American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers award (ASCAPlus), and her track “You Are My Rose” was nominated for the society's best country song that year.
Finding success wasn't as simple for Adams as the words from Lenz that sparked her to pursue it.
“When I started taking voice lessons, I could barely open my mouth,” she said. “I was paralyzed.”
Adding to the difficulty of her first recordings was Adams' braces, which compounded the discomfort of singing in a 6-by-5-foot bathroom in Burbank, Calif.
Always mindful of her goals as a musician, Adams overcame these challenges through sheer conviction. She was also guided through them, in part, by pennies.
“I've found pennies along the way every time there's something involving music,” she said.
Shortly after Adams unsuccessfully submitted a song to Andrea Bocelli that she would have sung with him at the 2006 Winter Olympics, she heard another track by the Italian singer four times in the same day. Hearing it in so happenstance a fashion - and finding a penny each time - cleared up the uncertainty Adams felt about her music career when her song wasn't selected.
Adams' thoughts and feelings fuel her songwriting, which flips the traditional model followed by most musicians on its head. Whereas they start with the music and mold the lyrics to it, Adams must craft compelling words before anything else.
“It's very organic,” she said. “I see the story in my head; it's like writing a book or poetry. If it resonates with me and I know I can sing it with conviction, we add the music.”
The subjects of Adams' songs are often personal and slightly spiritual. With the strength of conviction a personal connection affords her, Adams aims to send universal messages with her music. “Only a Thought Away” conveys the closeness thoughts provide between people separated geographically - such as the U.S. soldiers in Iraq, who inspired the song, and their families at home.
“When I sing it to people, the responses tell me they mean something to them,” Adams said.
As her music career gains momentum, Adams continues her wellness practice, for which she harbors as much passion as she does singing. Though holistic medicine provides her a more stable lifestyle, Adams' commitment to music is not likely to be shaken soon. A conversation with former Warner Brothers Nashville president Jim Ed Norman affirmed that commitment when, after more than two hours of speaking, he told Adams that some well-known artists have been passed over several times as a test of stamina.
Norman then asked Adams why she persists after her own rejections and doesn't resign herself to lounge singing. She said it was because Norman took so much of his time to talk to her.
“If your songs are great, it doesn't matter what you look like or anything,” Adams said. “I just hope my music touches people in a certain way. I hope it gets out and touches hearts - or in my case, opens hearts.”
But her trip north to shoot an exercise video brought her into contact with Jack Lenz, a notable Canadian composer who helped create the score for “The Passion of the Christ.” After Adams sang for him on something of a whim, Lenz replied with words that marked a major turning point in her life.
“He told me I need to do this,” Adams said. “That one sentence was all I needed to hear.”
Before that meeting, singing had been a casual interest for Adams. As a child in Auburn, she would commonly sing along to music with a concern that may not have signaled a life's aspiration to the people around her. But Adams was always practicing - always wanting to sound her best.
“Music seemed ‘over there' to me,” she said.
Adams has ridden Lenz's encouragement to remarkable feats in the world of music. Her song “Where Will This Love Go” has received radio play in the United States, the Netherlands, Greece and Hong Kong. She also won a 2008 American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers award (ASCAPlus), and her track “You Are My Rose” was nominated for the society's best country song that year.
Finding success wasn't as simple for Adams as the words from Lenz that sparked her to pursue it.
“When I started taking voice lessons, I could barely open my mouth,” she said. “I was paralyzed.”
Adding to the difficulty of her first recordings was Adams' braces, which compounded the discomfort of singing in a 6-by-5-foot bathroom in Burbank, Calif.
Always mindful of her goals as a musician, Adams overcame these challenges through sheer conviction. She was also guided through them, in part, by pennies.
“I've found pennies along the way every time there's something involving music,” she said.
Shortly after Adams unsuccessfully submitted a song to Andrea Bocelli that she would have sung with him at the 2006 Winter Olympics, she heard another track by the Italian singer four times in the same day. Hearing it in so happenstance a fashion - and finding a penny each time - cleared up the uncertainty Adams felt about her music career when her song wasn't selected.
Adams' thoughts and feelings fuel her songwriting, which flips the traditional model followed by most musicians on its head. Whereas they start with the music and mold the lyrics to it, Adams must craft compelling words before anything else.
“It's very organic,” she said. “I see the story in my head; it's like writing a book or poetry. If it resonates with me and I know I can sing it with conviction, we add the music.”
The subjects of Adams' songs are often personal and slightly spiritual. With the strength of conviction a personal connection affords her, Adams aims to send universal messages with her music. “Only a Thought Away” conveys the closeness thoughts provide between people separated geographically - such as the U.S. soldiers in Iraq, who inspired the song, and their families at home.
“When I sing it to people, the responses tell me they mean something to them,” Adams said.
As her music career gains momentum, Adams continues her wellness practice, for which she harbors as much passion as she does singing. Though holistic medicine provides her a more stable lifestyle, Adams' commitment to music is not likely to be shaken soon. A conversation with former Warner Brothers Nashville president Jim Ed Norman affirmed that commitment when, after more than two hours of speaking, he told Adams that some well-known artists have been passed over several times as a test of stamina.
Norman then asked Adams why she persists after her own rejections and doesn't resign herself to lounge singing. She said it was because Norman took so much of his time to talk to her.
“If your songs are great, it doesn't matter what you look like or anything,” Adams said. “I just hope my music touches people in a certain way. I hope it gets out and touches hearts - or in my case, opens hearts.”
