Meet Cindy Hudson

We were lucky to catch up with Cindy Hudson recently and have shared our conversation below.

Cindy , appreciate you making time for us and sharing your wisdom with the community. So many of us go through similar pain points throughout our journeys and so hearing about how others overcame obstacles can be helpful. One of those struggles is keeping creativity alive despite all the stresses, challenges and problems we might be dealing with. How do you keep your creativity alive?

We are inspired by what we are able to do with the songs we love. One of our specialties is taking older songs (and hymns) that people know and love and rearranging them to feel new and innovative! Sometimes this means adding yodeling, and according to the comments that we receive, people love it. This puts a distinctive twist on our songs. Although we don’t create original songs, we do put a unique twist on popular favorites that make our style distinctive. Our most popular song on YouTube, “Church in the Wildwood,” has recently surpassed 1 million views this year and continues to grow, thanks to our listeners and the one-of-a-kind arrangement that we created. We feel encouraged when comments come in from all over the world telling us how much our music has impacted and blessed them. This is a huge motivation for us, and we are grateful that God is working through our songs and testimony. We never cease to be amazed that our music can reach people all around the world!

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

Hudson Harmony Band started in August 2013 with music lessons from Priscilla Harp. Kaitlyn started taking piano lessons when she was 6 years old, and it was such a joy to hear her play and watch her grow in her God-given talent. Then, our son Jacob discovered a youth guitar and began strumming and singing at the top of his lungs—every single day! We knew we had to get him guitar lessons.
 After searching high and low, we found a fantastic teacher from Louisiana who had been displaced by Hurricanes Rita and Katrina and had relocated to our area, and she specialized in family bands! During our first lesson, she brought a cart full of instruments and taught us our very first song, “How Great Is Our God!” Just three months later, we played at our church, and a year after that, we held our first Christmas concert! We are all family, which makes us unique and versatile. Everyone in our group can play at least four or five different instruments.
Our newest project is working on a brand new album that we hope to have done and released by either the end of this year or beginning of next year. When we are not recording in the studio, we are working on new music, honing our skills, and making music videos for our YouTube channel.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

The first thing would be a love of music in general, and specifically, a passion for learning to play an instrument. For example, when Kaitlyn first started taking piano lessons at the age of 6, she was so passionate about learning that her teacher (Andy Fling) had a hard time finding enough music for her. He even planned a special recital just for her.

Second, we found great success with each one learning how to play multiple instruments. One of our teachers, Priscilla Harp, believed that learning more than one instrument at a time was beneficial to learning music. She said that if you were able to take the knowledge of how to play one instrument and apply it to another one, that the learning was that much more complete. We found that when someone was becoming frustrated or bored with one instrument, having a variety of instruments allowed for creativity and new inspiration, and ultimately, that frustration worked itself out in time without a pause in learning.

Third, it was important to have an outlet and be able to share our music with others. We started taking lessons in August of 2013, and in November of that same year, we performed our first song together at the Thanksgiving service at our church. By December of the following year, we performed a Christmas concert. This gave us motivation to improve our skills and practice together, which is more fun than practicing alone! In this way, our music became our ministry because it was a blessing to others.

Before we go, maybe you can tell us a bit about your parents and what you feel was the most impactful thing they did for you?

Andrea: “Our parents started us out with weekly in-home music lessons. Our mom, in particular, set a schedule and made sure that we practiced daily! She even started learning the instruments alongside of us to be sure that we were learning (and practicing) correctly. Both of them were very supportive and made sure that we had quality instruments to learn on.”

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Sadie Such
Striking Media

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