The name of the album was inspired by Psalm 139:13-15
“For you formed my inward parts, You knitted me together in my mother’s womb
I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made, Wonderful are your works
My soul knows it very well…”
The listener to this CD will be taken on a journey in which they will see the character of God in a way they may have never experienced until now. Through scripture and transparency in her songs, Henta has allowed us to witness the transforming power of God in a fully surrendered life. Listeners, will at first experience the unrelenting and indescribable love of a rescuing Heavenly Father, who alone is able to bring those who are wandering without Him to a place of full surrender. They will experience the complete abandon in worship total commitment to God demands, all the while being cradled in the loving arms of the only Saviour who can bring understanding, contentment, clear direction for life, and complete healing. Finally, throughout the entire CD the listener is reminded of the transcendent majesty that is found only in the Creator of all that has been created; Jesus Christ who is the Lord of Lords and King of Kings.
The Style
So many elements of God’s creation have been hand-knitted into these songs to help you hear, see and feel not only Henta’s story, but also words of revelation breathed to her by God. This album has an organic feel and visual element to the music. It blends rhythmic earthy percussion with double bass, beautiful piano, chimes, rhodes, guitar and multi-layered vocals sprinkled with electronic sounds.
The Songs and featured musicians
01 Rescue Me
featuring Karl Vanden Bossche (percussion), Jacob Grove and Henta (guitar),
02 I Surrender
featuring Karl Vanden Bossche (percussion) and Jacob Grove (banjo),
03 God’s love is enough
featuring Neville Malcolm (double bass), Jessica Papkoff (guitar), Karl Vanden Bossche (percussion)
04 Build your house on the rock
featuring Allen Larsen (drums), Roger Beardsley (bass), Jacob Grove (banjo, jaw harp, vocals) and Anamchara Choir (Jacob & Abigail Grove, Caoimhe & Clint Dunn, Roger Beardsley),
05 Sanctuary
featuring Jessica Papkoff (guitar), Karl Vanden Bossche (percussion)
06 Beautiful Creation
featuring Neville Malcolm (double bass), Karl Vanden Bossche (percussion)
07 People Arise
featuring Allen Larsen (drums), Roger Beardsley (guitar)
08 This Love
featuring Neville Malcolm (double bass), Karl Vanden Bossche (percussion)
09 Our God Promises
featuring Ryan Donnelly (double bass), Jacob Grove (banjo, jaw harp,vocals). Karl Vanden Bossche (percussion)
10 Twelve
11. You found me
featuring Neville Malcolm (double bass), Karl Vanden Bossche (percussion)
12. Lord Have Mercy
Karl Vanden Bossche (percussion),
13. Holy Holy
The Recording Venues
The recording of this album took place in a variety of places listed below but most of the vocals and programming took place at Anamchara Ministries in South Cle Elum, WA where Henta has been living since January 2013.
All songs and lyrics were written recorded, performed and produced by Henta Ellis including vocals, piano, keys and programming, except where detailed.
1. The UK
This began about August 2013 when Henta emailed her piano midi parts to Jonathan Dodd at realpiano.co.uk, where he converted them into real piano parts on his Yamaha DS6 Mk 4 Pro Disklavier Grand Piano (songs 2,6,11,13). You can see a video of the process on Henta’s youtube site. He also introduced Henta to Neville Malcolm (double bass) and Karl Vanden Bossche (percussion), both wonderful and talented musicians, who he produced, engineered recorded at his Bluefield Productions Studio, UK without Henta being present as she didn’t have time to visit him for more than one day during her trip home. During this whole process, Henta gained a new appreciation for double bass and percussion. Karl performed such a wonderful variety of percussion, she was also able to incorporate into other songs on this album.
2. Seattle
When Henta returned to the U.S. after a short trip to the U.K., she recorded some piano on a beautiful Steinway Grand Piano at The Seattle Piano Studio (songs 1,7,8,10,12), which was engineered by Martin Buff.
She then contacted one of her recording academy friends Jessica Papkoff and asked her to play some classical guitar for her on “Sanctuary” and “God’s Love is Enough”, which was then recorded by Robert Meyer at The Crimelab Studio, Seattle. This was a great learning curve for Henta, and a fun collaborative experience.
3. Cle Elum, WA
Henta was very blessed to have been helped by Allen Larsen at Cascade Productions. He performed, recorded and engineered a variety of instrumentation for Build Your House on the Rock, People Arise, and Our God Promises, as detailed below. He then gave her some invaluable advice about mixing, and also mastered the album.
1. Drums – Allen Larsen (Build Your House on the rock, People Arise)
2. Electric Bass & Acoustic Guitar – Roger Beardsley (Build your house on the rock, People arise)
3. Banjo, Jaw Harp, Vocals – Jacob Grove (Build Your House on the rock and Our God Promises)
4. Double Bass – Ryan Donnelly (Our God Promises)
5. Anamchara Choir, featuring Jacob Grove, Abigail Grove, Caoimhe Dunn, Clint Dunn, Roger Beardsley (Build Your House On the Rock)
The mixing of the album
Henta waited a long time to be guided about the mixing of this album, thinking the Lord would guide her to a new mixing engineer. However, in August 2014, through much prayer, Henta realised that the Lord wanted her to mix the album with His guidance. He directed her to Allen Larsen who became her second pair of ears; with the philosophy that if anything detracted from the message of the song, it would need to be edited. Two months later, Henta finished the mixing, which was probably one of the hardest parts of the whole process for her. At times she would hit walls of desperation, and frustration that she did not know how to fix in her own power. However, as she continued to surrender the deep issues that arose, which sometimes were not even directly connected to the album, the Lord gave her extra grace to move forwards, and to do what felt like the impossible.
Important lessons learned during the making of “Beautiful Creation”
1. Death of a vision.
John 12:24
“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit…”.
God gave Henta this vision of “Beautiful Creation” at the beginning of 2013, then a year later, the Lord needed her to humble herself, and repent for her pride connected to this album. Her sense of perfection had been driving its completion rather than truly keeping her focus on building HIs Kingdom, His way. This was an old habit and Henta needed to surrender, release control and allow herself to sink into the true meaning, and practise of worshipping God, putting aside any ego or fear of man.
The Lord also wanted Henta to start playing worship songs at the Monastery and at her local Calvary Chapel Church in Cle Elum. They invited her to play worship songs before Bible Study on a Thursday night, and then asked her to be part of the Worship Team some months later. This has been an amazing experience for Henta, and a huge turning point in moving her toward a Worship Ministry in partnership with Anamchara Ministries.
2. The mixing of the album
Luke 18:27
But he said, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.”
When Henta realised God wanted her to mix the album, she felt she was facing the impossible, as she had always relied upon others to do this for her, and she doubted her own ability in this area. She was of course right! In her own power she could not accomplish what needed to be done to complete this album. However, by being obedient to God and allowing Him to guide her, He gave Henta all the tools she needed to do the mixing,which was a huge growing process for which she is truly grateful.
Website and CD Design
Henta was very grateful to connect again with Tracey Howe in the UK who redesigned her website and helped her create the CD design for “Beautiful Creation”.