MonteHorton.com

House of Praise

Friends

The Producer

Joe Sicurella is one of the most recognized names in the commercial music industry.   His company, Face the Music, produces television spots for companies like BMW, JC Penney, McDonald's, General Motors, the DeMoss Foundation and a host of other companies.

Joe is definitely the visionary behind the House of Praise recording as well as a major driving force in seeing it completed.  Joe has become like a father to me over the years and I really appreciate his life insights as well as his musical and industry advice.

My art director, Mike Rapp, and I were meeting with Joe one day in his studio going over ideas for the photo shoot which was supposed to take place the following month in Nashville.  Mike and Joe were discussing my "look" which is still a very funny subject to me.  At one point I interrupted the conversation and asked what was wrong with my look.  Joe immediately hit me with one of the funniest lines I've ever heard.  He said, "Monte, you need to look like an artist who happens to be the father of three, not a father of three who happens to be an artist."  Those of you who know me well know how very true that is, and it remains one of my all-time favorite stories.

The Arrangers

Besides Joe Sicurella, there were three arrangers who were involved in the House of Praise recording: Loris Holland, Jukka Palonen and John C. Wineglass.

Loris Holland is a wonderful arranger and composer and is one of the greatest arrangers in Pop, R&B and Gospel music today.  In my wildest dreams, I could never imagine that someone of Loris' immense stature and talents would be working on my first studio project, but God has a way of making miracles happen.  Loris is one of the nicest, most encouraging people you would ever want to meet.   One of my favorite things about Loris, other than talking to him about chord progressions, is a wonderful recipe for a mocha java he taught me one afternoon at Joe's studio.  Loris arranged and did all the programming for Here Am I and Lord, Here Is My Heart.  Loris was also the first person to teach me about the 4 minute rule in recording.

Jukka "Jake" Palonen serves at Times Square Church as the pianist in all the weekend services and accompanies Pastor David Wilkerson on evangelistic trips.  Jukka flys in from Alabama every weekend to play at Times Square Church (yeah, he's THAT good!).  He has been working lately on some Gaither projects and is trying to get a choral resource company going with Chaz Bosarge (remember O Calvary's Lamb?).  Jukka is a fantastic arranger who has a really nice way of packaging the material within each song.  Jukka arranged and played keyboards/piano on All You Want Us To Be, I Love You Jesus, The Goodness of the Lord, Let the Glory of the Lord Arise, House of Praise, Like a River and Draw Me Ever Closer.Oh yeah, if you go to Jukka's homepage, you'll likely need to have your Finnish-English lexicon handy.

John C. Wineglass has his own production company in New York City, but at the time we recorded The Wonder of the Cross and Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing, he was working on his Master's degree at New York University, programming all the music for General Hospital and playing piano at Times Square Church.  John is a wonderfully talented pianist and orchestrator. His work on The Wonder of the Cross is beautiful.  He took my original arrangement of Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing and brought it to life.

The Singers

One of the great things about getting to record in New York was the availability because of Joe's commercial music connections to some of the finest singers and instrumentalists in the world.  Let me introduce you to some of them.

Cindy Mizelle has one of the most beautifully clear voices I have ever heard.  At the time we recorded Here Am I, she was traveling with Luther Vandross and doing session work in New York.  She is currently traveling and singing with The Dave Matthews Band.  My first encounter with Cindy was in Loris' studio when he was walking Cindy and Paulette through the arrangement for Here Am I.  He introduced us and told them I had written the song.  They were both very complimentary and then Loris suddenly seemed to recall dropping the song from the plane as he flew over Oklahoma!  That story has become a running joke with us.  Cindy and Paulette combined with Loris on the backgrounds on Here Am I to produce some truly beautiful vocals.  I still love just listening to the track without any lead vocals just to hear the beauty of their voices.

Paulette McWilliams has literally almost sang with everyone in R&B music.  She's been singing since her early Motown days with people like Marvin Gaye, Diana Ross, Dionne Warwicke and a very long list of others.  Even with all the years of touring and studio experience, she strikes me as someone who still just loves to sing.  She and her husband, Ivan Hampden, were traveling with Luther Vandross when I met them at Joe's studio.  I think I enjoyed talking to Ivan and Paulette as much as anyone I met in New York.  They asked a lot of wonderful questions about my project and ministry.  It never occurred to me that touring musicians rarely have time to go to church when they are on tour until my discussion with Paulette and Ivan.  They gave me a whole new perspective about being "on the road".

Tabitha Fair spent years in Nashville working as a studio singer and doing backgrounds for people like Amy Grant and Faith Hill.  When I met her in December of 2000 at Joe's studio, she was about to introduce her talents in a special show for music industry folks in New York.  Tab has a beautiful lyric quality to her voice even at 2 a.m. which is about the time we were recording the backgrounds for I Love You Jesus and Let the Glory of the Lord Arise.  One of my favorite memories is working through the background parts with Tab and Jason in the studio for Let the Glory of the Lord Arise.   They had such a wonderful vocal blend, almost like they had sang together forever even though it was the first time they had been paired up in the studio.

Jason Paige was really cool!  He's one of those guys who just has a feel for how the music is supposed to be communicated.  He's also one of the nicest, most genuine people I've ever met.  Joe told me his agency called after our first session stating that Jason didn't want to charge us for his time since it was a Christian album which would be used in a ministry context.  Joe, of course, made sure he got paid for his work, but I've always been thankful for the heart Jason displayed in offering that.  Most people have no idea that studio musicians like Jason literally live from session to session and make just enough to keep going between sessions.

Times Square Church Choir/Ensemble
Praise Celebration Singers Times Square Church Children's Choir

The Players

Loris Holland - Keyboards/Programming
Jukka Palonen - Piano/Keyboards/Hammond B3/Programming
John C. Wineglass - Piano/Keyboards
Wayne Pedziwaitr - Bass
Sampsa Löppönen - Bass/Drum Programming
Ivan Hampden - Drums
Shawn Pelton - Drums
Adam Joseph - Drum Programming
Ross Traut - Electric Guitar
Jeff Mironov - Electric Guitar
Bashiri Johnson - Percussion

The Writers

Monte Horton
Linda Blair House
Pastor Carter Conlon

The Art

Mike Rapp - Gear/Nashville David Johnson - Photography