GREG FERRARA
Catholic Worship Leader, Songwriter, Speaker, Man on Camino
ARTISTIC STATEMENT
I am a worshipper and gift bearer that entered into the heavenly song at a young age. I connected with that song, the song of the church singing at full volume the praise of our Creator and Redeemer. The song continues flowing back to the source of life, its origination. Just as a reflection is a mirror of it’s source, so is the song the voice of the creator reverberating off the walls of creation, returning not in a single stream but in an array of delays and choruses. My mission is to unite and call forth our voices to join in that song as our souls journey back to be united again with the Singer.
As a musician, I have a palate of textures, rhythms, timbres and harmonic structures at my disposal. My spirit is most at home with the natural, the organic, the simple. Strings that vibrate against a real wood surface. Air that passes through the biological wonder of a vocal cord. The sound of wood and felt against the suspended tension of a drumhead. Just as there is a truth in the universe, there’s an inarguable truth in tempo. It medicates and soothes my nerves with its unending announcement of time. It loudly proclaims its presence, more so perhaps in its absence. And then there’s silence and space, which cry out with desperation to be heard and fit in with balance to the vibrations and echoes.
My muse is revealing to me the absence of hymns that I am called to write. I am finding my way, and finding my voice in the chorus. I am leading the broken to the Healer, and the lost home. My own bare feet walk this path everyday and are sensitive to the sensations at the edges of the path, where the hazards reveal themselves like the sharp, unground stones that are frequently untouched and unground by constant exposure to passers by. The nerves in my feet are giving constant communication with the senses in my brain that let me know I am moving out of bounds and urging me back towards the center. The songs and sounds I am forming speak gratefulness and encouragement. In these songs is a longing for response or affirmation from the Singer. In these vibrations is a space for us to speak, and for Him to reveal who He is to us.
