How to Release Your Own Christian Music with Stephen Brewster

Join us as we sit down with Stephen Brewster, a veteran in the Christian music industry from Franklin, Tennessee. Stephen shares his journey through the industry and shares insider tips on how to help churches across the nation release and distribute their music.
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Check out https://theharmony.group for more information
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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hey guys, frank here with another episode of Modern
Church Leader man.
I'm here talking aboutreleasing Christian music to the
world with my new bud, stephen.
Stephen, welcome to the podcast.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Thanks, man.
I'm so excited to get to bewith you guys today.
It's going to be awesome.

Speaker 1 (00:21):
And you're in Nashville still, or have you
moved?

Speaker 2 (00:23):
Yeah, just outside of Nashville, franklin, franklin,
tennessee, so franklin very cool.
It's kind of like a little bitof a christian bubble where we
live, we so yeah, I've had manya uh franklin nashville guests
on the podcast, like people I'msure you have like that area.

Speaker 1 (00:41):
Uh, I think probably win uh with total number of of
guests and where they're from.

Speaker 2 (00:46):
You would have to If you've talked to anyone in
basically the Christian outputworld.
I think they live here or haveat some point.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:56):
They're Dallas.
It's crazy.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
Yeah, Dallas has a lot too.
Dallas has got a lot.

Speaker 1 (01:02):
Well, man, you've spent quite some time in the
music business, a place that Iknow nothing about.
I literally I listen to music,don't know anything about it
other than songs I like.

Speaker 2 (01:12):
Okay, so what's a song you like?

Speaker 1 (01:14):
Oh my gosh, what's a song.

Speaker 2 (01:18):
It doesn't have to be Christian.

Speaker 1 (01:21):
This is sad.
I'm like this with movies too,like telling you a movie I like
or like yeah, an actor I nevercan remember names of anything,
but I'm gonna tell you one thatmy kids asked me to put on.
I have middle school boys, I'vetripled middle school boys and
uh, they one of my boys like dad, what kind of music did you
listen to growing up?

(01:42):
And I didn't grow up in achristian household, any
christian.
I had a little bit of christianinfluence, not a lot, um.
So I grew up listening to rap,completely like everything, all
rap, all day long exactly thesame like you know, un
unfiltered, like the whole thing.

Speaker 2 (02:02):
That's what I grew up listening to.

Speaker 1 (02:03):
So my kids are asking like dad, would you listen to?
So I'm like telling them, I'mlike, but you know like we don't
go there anymore right it's notour jam, uh, you know, like
there's, there's levels here,right?
So one of my sons is like well,I want to hear some of the og
rap songs that you used tolisten to, and so like I'm like,
okay, what, what are some thatlike, are like somewhat okay and

(02:24):
that have edited versions,right, like?
clean radio versions kind ofthing.
So you know, I'm finding stuff,and so Eminem was definitely
one of my guys right Later on.
That was kind of like tail endof that, and so the song that
was on in the car yesterday wasEminem's brand new release,
houdini Houdini.

(02:44):
One of my sons found the cleanversion on YouTube, like it
hadn't put one like on Spotifyor Apple Music yet we're Apple
Music folks but we found a cleanversion on YouTube and so he
played that.
I'm like, okay, let's listen toit and see what it's like.

Speaker 2 (03:00):
So that was a Props on your parenting.
Okay, like you're doing a greatjob working hard inside.
So I mean but it is hard it ishard as a as a fellow fan of
hip-hop music, that it'sdifficult to find music that you

(03:20):
can play for your kids, thatyou grew up on or that you like
now, if you like hip hop stillso there's some stuff that's
like good, sure, but it's harder, um but there's no, there's
less angst in it.

Speaker 1 (03:34):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
My kids love to say, oh, thisis just some guy, uh, like this,
he's like an angsty teen, orlike he's just, he's just, uh,
venting on his song, like that'sall he's doing.
That's like a common way thatthey describe uh, rap songs
hilarious, who's it?
We just got, we went to aconcert or like a worship

(03:55):
festival thing.
Uh, what's the new?
And then we got tickets becauseshe's performing, um, ann
wilson.
We just went to a show that sheput on and and some other folks
Toby Mac was there and uh, butand Wilson like kills it man.
So she's performing in San Diegoin like September or something
like that.
So we got tickets to that.

(04:16):
So my kids, you know theylisten to a lot of stuff.

Speaker 2 (04:19):
Yeah, she crushes me and she's.
She's really really talented.

Speaker 1 (04:23):
Yeah, incredibly talented, yeah, incredibly
talented, like it was a greatshow.

Speaker 2 (04:28):
That's awesome.

Speaker 1 (04:30):
She doesn't rap a lot , but she is very, very talented
you know I got married and whenI was dating my wife she was a
big country fan so I got superinto country.
So you know I went from rap tocountry to Christian music.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
That was kind of the journey, and now those three are
kind of the same thing.

Speaker 1 (04:47):
They're all blending.
They're all blending together,they all live in the same
jambalaya now.
So tell us your story.
How did you get into music?
Go back to the early days.

Speaker 2 (05:00):
I loved music when I was a kid.
My parents were missionaries,so I kind of grew up around the
world and had exposure to somedifferent stuff.
My first favorite artist wasPrince Nice.
So when I heard Prince, I waslike this is so, like this is
just ridiculously cool.
How how is this so cool?
And so, from that point forward, just love music and hip hop.

(05:23):
Same way Like I grew, lovedmusic and hip-hop, same way I
grew up listening to hip-hopmusic.
And then when I went to collegeI was like man, I'd love to be
around music all the time, but Idon't play or sing, and at that
point there wasn't a lot ofM&Ms in the world.
And so I found out there was abusiness side to music.

(05:44):
And so I found out there was abusiness side to music and so I
started studying it.
I didn't know anything about auniversity degree in music
business or anything like that Idon't even think there was
anything like that back then.
But I got asked to host a radioshow at one of the colleges that
I went to, and it was the onlyurban music radio show on the

(06:05):
channel, and so I got tointerview all the artists that
were of that genre when theycame into town and friends with
this group called out of Edenback in the day and uh ended up
coming to town and lived withtheir road manager and uh, god
was very kind and allowed me tohave a career where I actually
like, had jobs that paid moneyto do music and to be part of

(06:30):
the music business.
So I did that for for a longtime for 10 years and then, um,
really felt God calling me intochurch and vocational ministry
and so uh got hired to be thecreative arts pastor at a church
.
That became an executive roleand then, about seven years ago,
we started doing what we'redoing now, which is helping

(06:51):
churches all over the countryrelease music and help them get
their music as far away fromwhere they are as possible.

Speaker 1 (06:59):
It's pretty cool.
Tell us I think you said youspent somewhere around 10 years
as the you know executive pastorover the creative side of the
church.
Yep, like, tell us about thatrole, like what are all the
things that that kind of roledoes at a church?

Speaker 2 (07:20):
Well, my favorite job ever, you know you're.
You're over production andworship.
Obviously you're overcommunications design, video
marketing, social media,environments, um, sometimes
guest experience, depending onthe organization.
No-transcript.

(21:40):
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