Hello and welcome to restoring the soul, a podcast dedicated to helping you close the gap between what you believe and what you actually experience. I'm your producer Brian Beatty. Thank you for listening. Now the essence of the restoring the soul podcast is to present conversations that cultivate freedom, flourishing, and wholeness of heart through Jesus shaped spirituality. And we found over the past six years, that many of the conversations were just springboards to help our listeners find freedom by getting them connected to their true healer. And today, we hope for the same result, as we welcome Steve Siler to discuss music for the soul, which helps people deal with impactful issues, and find hope and healing through music. Steve is the founder and director of music for the soul. And he's an award winning songwriter who's had over 500 of his songs recorded in the Christian pop in country markets. And as always, we've provided helpful links in the show notes, so don't hesitate to take full advantage of that, as well as share today's podcast with a friend. So Now without any further delay, here's your host, Michael John Cusack.
MICHAEL CUSICK:Welcome to the program. Steve Siler from music for the soul.
Steve Siler:Michael, it is so good to be on with you. Thank you for inviting me. Really appreciate it.
MICHAEL CUSICK:It's always a pleasure. Our friendship goes back to I think 2007 Or somewhere right about there when we met in Colorado. And then of course we were you gave me the honor of being part of the somebody's daughter CD, and then later the somebody's daughter video.
Steve Siler:Yes. And you are to this day, I consider you to be a secret weapon on that piece. Such wisdom.
MICHAEL CUSICK:Well, thank you. And it's interesting to see how DVDs are not quite completely a thing of the past. But a lot of people threw away their DVD player when streaming happened. And I'm surprised by how many people will still download it or watch it in some streaming form. So since we're talking about it, music for the soul.org Is your website. And will you direct people to the somebody's daughter resource,
Steve Siler:will when they go to the website, there's naturally a place to search. And if they type somebody's daughter in there, and you click on it, it will take them to a menu that includes the somebody's daughter DVD that somebody's daughter saw and somebody's daughter Discussion Guide, which you authored. All those resources are easy to find, they just need to know the title of the project.
MICHAEL CUSICK:And the full title is somebody's daughter a journey to freedom from pornography, which was the brainchild of your ministry. And it's a great resource for people that are struggling with pornography, and in particular, a great resource for men's groups, etc.
Steve Siler:You know, Michael, when you mentioned the full title of the project, what's interesting about that is for weeks if not months, I had been trying to come up with the best possible subtitle right, racking my brains, what should it be? What should it be? What should it be? And we had this young intern, working with us part time. And one day she just said, Well, what about a journey to freedom from pornography? And it's like thinking it's like, how is it that you have the answer? Total Force for the trees moment, right? So it was just such a blessing that God would would give her that and that she shared that with us and felt comfortable telling us what the title of our project should be.
MICHAEL CUSICK:I love that. I love that. I want to ask you, Steve to just give an overview, maybe 45 minutes just a brief overview on your
Steve Siler:elevator that's a tall elegant, it was a 200 storey building there that's slow motion
MICHAEL CUSICK:going up the Burj Khalifa. Your background as a as a secular pop song writer to moving to the east coast to Nashville and starting this ministry music for the soul.
Steve Siler:Yeah, I was trying to become as I always joke of the Second Coming of Peter Frampton, and that wasn't working out. So I decided to become you know, the second coming of Carole Bayer Sager. That didn't work out either. I did have a hit song on the radio and it was like the fulfillment of all my dreams. Except for when it happened. I was like, Huh, that's not what I'm supposed to be doing. So it was pretty, pretty awful. Actually, this moment that I'd worked for my whole life happens, I think I'm gonna be overjoyed. And instead I was despondent. Lord, what on earth am I supposed to be doing? Because this isn't it. And I heard this song on the radio, and there was just nothing of me in it, I was just aping the culture, giving them I thought they would buy. So I went into the church middle of the night and said, Okay, God, I, you know, get show me Give me the direction. If it's music, great. If it's something else, great. I just want to do something that matters. And I got a call from a total stranger a couple of weeks later, telling me that he was working on a project stage project for sexually abused children. And he was going to be a musical. And that sounds weird. I know. But he was he was starring in laymen's Rob at the Shubert Theater in LA at the time. And he said, I think you're the guy that's supposed to write songs. And I held the phone out from my ear and looked up at the ceiling and said, God that is really specific, you know, just couldn't believe what a specific answer I got to that prayer. And that that was the beginning. I didn't know that at the time. But that was the beginning of journeying toward music for the soul, because I took that project worked on it for three years. And there was a conference and incest survivor conference in New Jersey, we lived in LA at the time, and he couldn't go and he was the singer. And that's how I wound up sitting in a room of 300 abuse survivors with a grand piano in the middle. And Steve will sing the song innocent child for us now. And I did that felt like I was gonna pass out because the pain in the room was just overwhelming the tears and everything. I've been told all weekend long don't hug anybody because these women hate to be hugged by men who are strangers, which made perfect sense. So at the end of the song, I just burst into this sloppy, goopy tears and buried my face in my hands for several minutes. And when I finally pulled myself together and looked up, there was a line of women waiting to hug me. And one of them said to me, people have been telling me I was an innocent child my whole life. But I never believed it until I heard you sing it today. And in that moment, I thought, Okay, this is important. I'm supposed to do something about that. And I didn't realize it at the time. But that was the moment God planted the seed that would become music for the soul music for the soul is me doing something about the fact that there are people who need to be able to access their pain in a way that's healing. And who are who are going to be able to do that through a song.
MICHAEL CUSICK:I had never heard the details of that story before. That's amazing. Yeah. And since then, you've had many situations like that, where you bring your piano and you sit down at the keyboard, and the music on does people. Is that right?
Steve Siler:Yeah, I'm thinking right now, if I did a home, I call my interest in home concert, usually about 20 people, I like to do a very intimate setting where I can look into the eyes of everybody in the room and where I can feel what God's doing in the room. It's harder to do with you know, 1000s in the audience, but we have a song called heavens playground that was written based on a dream a woman had about her stillborn son and how she kept seeing him at a jungle gym and holding Jesus hand holding the nail scarred hand. And she wanted to write a song about that dream. And so he wrote the song called Heaven's playground. And I had this concert coming up and, and I thought, well, I'll just try it out and see what response it gets. And I was about, I guess I was just about starting the second verse of the song, I just finished the first chorus and I could feel the weight. I could feel that somebody in the room was having an experience with this song, and I started to tear up. And you know, it's not my personal story. And yet I felt these tears just spring, my eyes. It's like hold it together Seiler somebody, somebody needs this. Afterwards, one of the women came up to me and she said 30 years ago, my husband and I lost a child to a miscarriage. She said my husband has never cried about it in 30 years, but he cried about it tonight. And she thanked me and said that the song had broken through to him and gave them an opportunity to talk about it.
MICHAEL CUSICK:And since then, you've written how many songs for music for the soul specifically geared toward key issues of the heart and people's life experiences.
Steve Siler:You know, the number keeps changing, so I'm never very accurate on it, but it's more it's way more than 100 it's probably closer to 200 And you know, they're more in process all the time. So it you know, people will say, Have you ever written a song about? And I'll think, Well, surely they're gonna ask about something we've gotten the catalog. And sometimes it is, but just as often it's like, well, if you're going to deal with the issue specifically, no, I don't think we've ever done that one. And so it's a job that that I have passion for. It's a job. I don't think that I'll complete in my lifetime. I'm hopeful that, you know, others will be raised up to continue the work because it's, it's a never ending task.
MICHAEL CUSICK:And how many I know this word is out of date. But how many albums or projects do you have around issues? It's over 20? Now, right? Yeah, it's
Steve Siler:about 20. Yeah, and of course, in the olden days, you know, back in 2008, we released everything pressed on an album format, because there's an arc that takes place in healing that I like to try and honor where people are trapped in the problem. And we want to identify that because I don't believe people will trust you with, with their hope, until you show that you understand their pain. So we always start right in the thick of the problem. We don't try to fix it in the first song, we just say, here it is, we understand what you're going through. And when people go, Oh, my gosh, that's me, right? And then hopefully, then they'll begin to listen as we walk through the steps of healing and journey towards the ultimate freedom in Christ to healing and wholeness. So we've got about 20 projects like that. And the last, let's see the last two, we've done as digital only. So you know, if you come to the website, you can download the album, but you can't, there are no physical copies. And then for the ones that we still have physical copies of we make it available both ways. But as as the album's are going out of print, we're switching them over to digital only.
MICHAEL CUSICK:And of course, now, there's a big demand for final. So maybe some, maybe someday music for the soul retro.
Steve Siler:Yeah, that's going to be somebody else's task right there.
MICHAEL CUSICK:I'm just surprised by like, you can go into a target and they have turntables there.
Steve Siler:I know. My son isn't turntable. He wants all my old records. Yeah, that's great. I'm gonna let them happen because I don't want to move them again.
MICHAEL CUSICK:Right? Remember, the old wooden crates that we would put the albums in? They were perfect for that. Steve, what is it about music that penetrates people's heart, soul, mind brain?
Steve Siler:Well, there's actually brain science on this. I didn't know the brain science. When I started the ministry, I had anecdotally seen the power of a song to change lives and save lives. And I had therapists tell me on multiple occasions, I couldn't get through this person for two years, I played him this song, and it opened up their heart. So that was all I needed to know to proceed. But later on, I read a book called this is your brain on music, by Daniel Levitan and started the journey of learning, you know that God created us in such a way to respond to music in a way that we don't respond anything else. I say that when you speak to somebody, your words kind of hit their wall of defense, you know, and then they they fall to the ground. The great thing about music is it seeps through the cracks in our walls of defense, or if you prefer the analogy under the door, whatever, and opens up our heart before we have a chance to say no, I don't want that. I mean, I'm sure that all of your listeners have had the experience of driving down the road, they're listening to something on the radio, or someone comes on over the overhead and supermarket, and bam, they're back in high school, or bam, they remember the relationship with the first time they heard that song or whatever it happens instantaneously. So that's a power of music has to disarm. But as it turns out, we process language primarily in the left hemisphere of our brain. And we process music and melody, primarily in the right hemisphere of our brain. And it just so happens that our trauma is stored primarily in the right hemisphere of our brain. So when I sing to you, now, the message that melody, it's going straight to the heart of the pain, instantaneously, opening up that heart, and then hopefully with the Lyric, we can lay that message in the open heart. And because songs, people remember nine times more of what they hear in song than what they're told, more that day. And remember, remember more than what they read. So we use that brain science, hopefully to tell somebody for example, she's somebody's daughter and sing it to them. Much better chance they won't forget that message if we sing it to them than if we just tell them.
MICHAEL CUSICK:You have countless stories of each of the different projects and I'm curious if you could take a couple of your favorites, or maybe the most recent ones because I want to get Suppose listeners to a couple of the more recent ones, where you feel like something supernatural either brought it together or where you've heard stories of a dramatic response?
Steve Siler:Well, there are a couple stories that really touched my heart that come first to mind. I don't think they're the most recent, necessarily, but one, we did a project called cassava heart for people who had experienced the death of a loved one by suicide. And on that project, we put a song called How could you where the singer actually is angry at the person who committed suicide or died by suicide death. And they're, you know, they're saying, How could you do that? And then then they turn on God, and say, What kind of God would let this happen? And they just are angry at God and they vent. And, you know, I've had some people tell me, Well, you can't you can't do that. You're not allowed to be angry at God. And I'm thinking, well, if it's authentic relationship, he craves us, and he gave us our emotions, why would he not pay me? My anger, right? So we wrote this song, and one day, there was a knock on our office door. And Sue, my chief counselor was with me there. And this woman came in and she said, May I speak with you? And she told us that her 17 year old son had recently taken his own life. And she was a single mom, this was her family. And he was gone. And she said, I lost my faith. I just totally lost my faith. And she said, and then I heard your song, how could you? She said, You gave me back prayer language. She said, I'm only screaming at God. But at least we're talking. And I thought that I didn't even know what to say, I don't know what to say now. I'm grateful that God would would use our songs in that way and have those kinds of breakthroughs for people where, where they feel God's presence and a powerful and healing way, because I think that's the beginning of the healing is her opening back up to God. Another one that I just love another story, I just love. We were doing a radio show on Monday connection, moody Radio Network, and introducing our project hole in the sight of God, that's w h o l e, for families that are loving a special needs child. And I had a call from a lady who was not the parent of a special needs child, but was caring for her husband who was in a vegetative state. And she said, hearing that song was like having a support group in my living room. Which I just thought was such a beautiful analogy. So um, you know, I thanked her, and that was that and went on about my day. Well, a couple of weeks later, an envelope showed up in our peel box. And it was from this woman, and inside, or three crumpled $1 bills. And she was sharing that she didn't have much but that she wanted to, to lend her support to our ministry. And I thought widow's mite. Right, just the power of the intention of her gift. overwhelmed me that day. And to this.
MICHAEL CUSICK:Steve, I want to go back to your mention of the chaos of the heart CD and project. I lost a loved one to suicide about 10 years ago, my older brother. And so that that is a CD that has touched me deeply. And what is the name of Su Foster who was on your staff at music for the soul? What is the name of her book that she wrote about suicide,
Steve Siler:finding your way after the suicide of someone you love
MICHAEL CUSICK:finding your way after the suicide of someone you love by Sue Foster. And you can find that on Amazon. And I recommend that book to anybody. But the the first time I listened to chaos of the heart, it was a different song. And it was the opening track. And it told the story of coming home from work and driving by this particular spot where they used to go together and it just opened me up and also allowed me to access some tears and a part of my heart that I hadn't before. So on so many of your projects I can either personally testify to or for years now I have used a number of the songs almost like three or four tracks that I just kind of keep on deck and a playlist 50 years from now, on the marriage album and in chaos of the heart and others. Can you talk about some of them the most recent projects that you guys have done because if not kept up with what seems to be kind of quickly over the last couple of years new projects emerging.
Steve Siler:Well Let me talk first about what we're working on. Right now we're working on a project about anxiety, which counselors are telling me is the number one issue facing our culture right now. Which leads to depression and fear. And then secondary issues like drug abuse and alcohol abuse. So we're working on that right now. One of our more recent album releases song called a project called life of faith, where we deal with several issues that impact the life of faith, such as prayer, we actually take on social media a little bit on that project and have a song called looked me in the eyes, were looking to my eyes, dealing with what real intimacy, what real personal intimacy looks like. There's a song in there called set sail about overcoming the things we fear and putting our hope and trust in Christ and moving forward. So I really liked that project, Scott copains, sings all the songs on there, and he's such a fabulous tenor vocalist. There's a song on that project called in all things that may be one of my favorite in the catalogue, that talks about how God is with us in all things, good and bad. And to her to help us, the prayer has helped me see what you're doing in me through whatever it is I'm going through. So that's one of the projects that's recent, we recently released a digital CD, that was a collection of a lot of the single songs that we've done through the years. There's a song on there about having a loved one with Alzheimer's, there's a song on there. From the perspective of somebody who has been sexually assaulted, it's a it's all over the place. It's basically a collection of singles. But there's some some really neat stuff, there's a Christmas song on that project. There's a song on that project for veterans who have struggled with post traumatic stress. So lots of things like that. A couple of the later projects were something that I never expected to do. But one of my board members asked, you know, what I was going to record an album as a singer, which I don't really you know, when you're when you have access to the world class singers we work with, I think, my thought is always why would you want to hear me sing. But he said, you know, you're a great storyteller. Don't worry about the singing, just tell your stories. And so I wound up recording two projects, one is called Broken to bless the theme being that it's through the things that have broken us and our vulnerability that we're able to be most like Christ for others. And then the other one is called celebration table, which is, you know, is based on communion. And it's not a table of, of death. It's a table of life and an invitation to fellowship with Christ. So those those two projects, you know, for years, people have come up to our tables at conferences and stuff and said, Where's your album? And I said, Well, these are all my own. These are all my children, right? But they've always meant where's the one you're singing on? And now we actually have a couple. So those are some of the new things from the last few years.
MICHAEL CUSICK:I've really enjoyed broken to bless and I've always considered that your CD your project, because you're on the cover of that. And it's your name. And I have told you this before, but you look a lot like about a 60 year old Johnny Cash on the cover there the way the way that it's shot, your dark coat, and just the way that it shot you. Yeah, well, were you in Nashville when that was shot.
Steve Siler:Yeah, shut that in Nashville. Just wintertime. It's just cold that day. But yeah, inadvertently wound up looking like Johnny Cash.
MICHAEL CUSICK:So you mentioned Scott Kerr pain and a lot of people may not be aware of him because like he was a ccm artist and played on some of the Christian radio stations. Maybe 15 years ago, I remember when a Christian radio station came to town for the first time around 2003. Four somewhere in there that he had several hit singles. But you draw upon some of the the best vocal talent and instrumental talent in Nashville. Talk about that, how you get artists to be a part of this because you don't have the funds in your ministry, you know, to pay people top dollar for what a studio session would charge. Talk about how you get this talent?
Steve Siler:Well, I'll tell you, I'm not going to name the person because I wouldn't want to steal their blessing. But we were working on a project called Mercy great enough, which is for people who have remorse over an abortion in their past. And that's a fairly recent project as well. And there was only one thing I had in mind for this particular song, and it's a well known recording artist. And I asked him if he would come and do do the song for the project. And he met me at the studio and absolutely you You know, Jesus was fantastic as I knew he would be captured the heart and soul of the song. And afterward when I pulled out my checkbook, he was like, no, no, you don't have to pay me. He said, Just allow me to use the song in my own ministry when I go to prisons, and that'll be my payment. And that's not the first time that kind of thing has happened that that sort of thing happens a lot. What I found is a lot of the musicians in town in particular, like to play on our stuff, because they plan a lot of stuff that just put it this way that maybe later, it's in the depth of the content. And we really go to the real places, we go to the hard places, and I think I've had people tell me, this, this really feels like ministry, you know, people who predominantly work in the Christian music industry feel like they're really doing ministry when they're on our projects. And that's a great compliment. I'm grateful for that. And I'm grateful that what winds up happening is we have some of the best talent in the world. You know, eager to play on our projects, I always offer to pay, I never asked anybody to work for free, because I think you know, the workman is worthy of his hire, or her hire. And so we always offer to pay. But, you know, quite often we get that response of people who just feel like their payment was being a part of the project.
MICHAEL CUSICK:So you had alluded to this earlier that if somebody goes to the website and types in a word or a phrase, and when I was at your website last time, you had just redone it, so that people could go and type in the word abortion, suicide, sexual abuse, and that will take them to talk about that. So whatever issue somebody, there's a pretty good chance that the people may find a project or a song related to that issue, right.
Steve Siler:And one of the things we actually say, on the website is find your song, that's one of the first things we say on the site now, you know, give us five minutes because a song can change your life. And, and I don't know if you've been since we've done this, but we have a menu on the homepage, where we list the topics by name, which makes it much easier if somebody's coming, because of a specific topic, like Alzheimer's, or abortion or suicide, grief or what have you. If they just check the box on the menu and hit submit the songs that cover that topic will load up, and then they can just click on the one they want to listen to. I want to also mention that everything on our site streams free of charge, I got a lot of pushback from my board, when I said that that card has to come off of our homepage. This is not a store, this is a place for ministering, if somebody finds us at three o'clock in the morning and is on the verge of hurting themselves are in desperate pain and needs help. I want them to be able to hear what they need right now. So the songs can be downloaded, but they don't have to be. And you know, people also always ask Well, are you on Spotify? Are you on Amazon? Are you on Apple and and, you know, most of our catalog now is on the other streaming services frustrates me a little bit because as you alluded to earlier with our albums we do, we do take care to produce these things and put them into context. And the streaming services obliterate the context. So but we finally came to the decision decision that there'll be some people who never listen, if they have to go to our website to listen. So I prefer they go there. But certainly want them to be able to find whatever they need, you know, anywhere they get their music. And same for our podcast, you know, wherever they get it, then that's where I want them to go.
MICHAEL CUSICK:And at the website, there's certain projects like somebody's daughter, where there's additional resources. So whether it's a downloadable document or study guide, or a link to another resource, talk a little bit about those other resources.
Steve Siler:Yes, we always want to give people additional resources, because if the sun opens them up, that's just the beginning of the journey. They may need a counseling center, they may need a discussion guide or a book or devotional. They may want to see the documentary we have more than one of those. So there's there are lots of additional healing resources. And we also provide links to other ministries and websites that deal with that issue. So that hopefully what they're getting is a bottomless source of resources to help them through what they're what they're experiencing.
MICHAEL CUSICK:Steve, I want to thank you for coming on the program.
Steve Siler:Thank you, Michael. It's always a blessing to be with you. As we end
MICHAEL CUSICK:today. I want to direct people to the music for the soul.org website and make special note that you guys have just finished or are wrapping up Season One of the music for the soul podcast where you feature songs and have interviews about the various songs. I also want to let people know that you can stream any one of the songs for free and for a minimal cost. It can be downloaded As we fade out I want to play one of the most powerful songs from your catalogue and that is the song an innocent child thanks for listening today to restoring the soul
Unknown:know you've been sad for so film didn't do attention every child needs the same you as pure love in the sea it's your it's your show you show tunes didn't do anything to prove perfect treat it's your fault huge and essential it's not you? You
Brian Beatty:so we've wrapped up another episode of restoring the soul. We want you to know that restoring the soul is so much more than a podcast. In fact, the heart of what we have done for nearly 20 years is intensive counseling. When you can't wait months or years to get out of the rut you're in our intensive counseling programs in Colorado allow you to experience deep change and half day blocks over two weeks. To learn more visit restoring the soul.com That's restoring the soul.com