Introducing ...Laura Story
Though best known as the worship leader responsible for "Indescribable," there's more to Story's story, including her husband's medical scare, inspiring many of the songs on her national debut.
by Andree Farias | posted 6/23/2008
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Laura Story
There are lots of people who assume that "Indescribable" was written by Chris Tomlin. How did he get a hold of it?
Laura Story It's been a huge blessing. I was doing a demo with [producer] Ed Cash for a record label that wanted to sign me. Nothing happened with that, but the project stayed on his computer. Along comes Chris Tomlin a year later, recording with Ed [for his 2004 album Arriving] and they needed one more song. So Ed played ["Indescribable"] for him and with little time left in the studio, Chris decided to record it.
They literally used the same track [as my demo], pitch-shifting it [to Chris' voice range]. That was the funniest thing. I knew they had recorded the song, but when I heard "Indescribable" on the radio, I realized that was me playing piano at the end of it from a year earlier. It was really neat to be a small part of that.
What was it like for you, a locally based worship leader, to suddenly gain a national platform?
Story It was great and perfect timing. I remember first coming to GMA Week 8 to 10 years ago as part of the group Silers Bald. We were independent at the time and had this fixation with being on a record label and having a national platform. I'm so glad that God didn't give us that at that time. I'm now 30 years old and it's not like I feel equipped to have a national platform, but I'm definitely more equipped than when I was 20.
After Aaron Shust exploded in popularity, he left his position as a worship leader at Perimeter Church and you took over. Do you like staying local?
Story I think that God knows that I need to put my roots down somewhere. I don't know if that's as a girl or being a 30-year-old or being married, but it helps keeps us home more. When I was with Silers, I was the only girl in the band—we were traveling around and I would go for months without seeing a female that I actually knew! I'd see all these girls at shows, but I was as lonely without having that part of community.
The songs on Great God Who Saves are very intimate, more stripped down than the typical worship album. Has that always been your take on worship, as opposed to the big pop production?
Story I don't play a lot of [big venues]. I perform in churches, and as a solo artist I have a small band, very acoustic-driven. A lot of it comes from growing up playing strings instruments and piano. And with Ed, all of our recording time was different than anything I've ever done before. It was this incredibly worshipful, intimate experience, just like two worship leaders and songwriters getting together. He was incredibly encouraging in that sense: "Laura, don't try to be something you're not. You are this little piano player from South Carolina with these incredibly intimate songs. We're not going to try to blow them up."
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