We were lucky to catch up with Eddy Mann recently and have shared our conversation below.

Eddy, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to hear about the things you feel your parents did right and how those things have impacted your career and life.

My parents brought me up in an amazingly faithful, creative, and secure home. As I grew into a man I had the seeds of faith planted deeply, a well rounded background in the arts, and the confidence in myself to be an independent creative. As an adolescent I was allowed to pursue my faith, to search for my personal path without outside interference, and to find a deeply rooted relationship with my God. Growing up I heard all kinds of music and witnessed many different cultural influences that have enabled me as a writer and performer to draw from an eclectic background of harmony, rhythm, and prose. It’s that varied collection of resources that provide me with the confidence to roam (when writing or recording) wherever a song feels like it needs or wants to go. It was instilled in me at an early age that if I worked hard at anything, I could succeed and accomplish what I wanted to do.

It’s the freedom and diversity of my youth that provides the ease at which I now work. That loving journey is a part of my fabric, it’s who I am as a writer, composer, performer, speaker, and most importantly a man of faith.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My father was a jazz pianist at heart, and my mother was a constant cultural creative in and around our home. I’m the product of their gifts and faith. They went to church regularly, but were never over the top in their faith, That is to say they didn’t force their faith on me, but they did plant the importance of faith well within me. It was with that background that my journey began and was built upon. Inspired creativity!

The house was always buzzing with music, it was always filled with the most pleasant aromas of freshly made food, and the Spirit of God was ever present. My father was also a pretty good woodworker and a career business man with a knack for finances. With all that going on in and around me, I was naturally creating what kids create, drawings, stories, songs, and I loved building things.

At an early age the world of sports awakened a new love in me that has lasted a lifetime. The completive nature of sports did well to teach me how to fiercely attack winning, and also how to lose with dignity and with character. Both of which have served me well as an adult and definitely as an artist..

I picked up a guitar in high school and immediately found a long term friend. I found a confidant, a collaborator, and most of all, a love. I continued to find my way around the instrument and also began writing. My playing and my writing were not very good, but I wasn’t deterred.

In my second year of college (for business) I decided to take a summer off to get the music out of my system, and a lifetime later it still flows as strongly as ever. I was now a full time working musician that discovered that it was the writing that got me out of bed everyday. As a proficient guitarist and singer I now devoted myself to the creative aspect of composing.

It wasn’t until I met my wife and we talked of a family, that I decided to take some time off so I could to be around my kids when they were young. I went back to college so that I could teach school until they started to become independent …and when they did, I once again picked up the guitar that had been back burnered.

One day I wrote a simple song about the joy of knowing Jesus and I had this epiphany of sorts that made me realize that I should have been writing for God my whole life. I released two albums about living in His kingdom, when one day a pastor I didn’t know, from a church I had never attended, asked if I had a few minutes to talk. I said I did and three hours later I was a worship leader. Neither of us knew exactly how to define it at that time, but none the less I was called to lead worship and write for the church.

My life has change drastically from that day. I have had the most blessed journey I could have ever imagined. Twenty plus years later I’m still writing and releasing music to a niche of people that God has chosen to reach through me. I’m completely independent and living without debt. Unless you count the grace of God.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

Being a church leader means you have to manage how to toughen your hide to attacks. You have to be able to absorb a punch, and plenty of backstabbing. I have worship scars you wouldn’t believe after serving twenty plus years, but you have to be resilient. You have to be secure in the source of your strength.

The world in general is changing and it’s changing fast. The music (and worship) landscape is in constant change and we have to find a way to make it work for us. Complaining doesn’t do anyone, anywhere, any good.

I’m a man of faith so the natural path for me is to go to prayer, and then to follow the Spirit’s leading. Discerning the answers isn’t always easy, but then nothing worth doing is easy. See I have a passion for what I do, so it’s my natural response to passionately look for the pivot points, that’s to say the changes that will allow me to achieve my goal, and to survive the ever changing world.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

I’m driven to find a way to get people to be more compassionate, more loving to each other. I want them to be able to disagree and still be friends …good friends.

God made an extremely diverse world and we, the people that inhabit it, we want to categorize it. We want box it all up into what we decide is good and into what we decide is bad. I don’t get that …it’s all the diversity that makes us such a creatively rich and unique world.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.eddymann.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eddy_mann/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/eddymann.musician/
• Twitter: https://x.com/eddy_mann
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/eddymann

Image Credits

Susan Hoffman