Words of Comfort 08/25/02 Amanda Jordan Email this story to a friend Stacey Randall, of El Dorado Springs, and Justin Copeland, of Walker, are the newest faces in the music business. Their joint effort, “I Was There,” was recorded at a studio in Lenexa, Kan., in early July after a strange series of events involving e-mail forwards and Los Angeles radio personality, Bob Holiday. The result, a spoken-word recording about Sept. 11, is being broadcast on radio stations nationwide. The song is an answer to the the question, “Where was God on September 11?” The text, written as God’s voiced response to the tragedy, is an original piece of poetry written by Randall. It all began when Randall, a homemaker and mother of two, wrote the poem in response to Sept. 11. Originally titled “Met in a Stairwell.” Randall wrote it five days after the attacks, and said, “I was trying to get to sleep and had a vision of the Lord comforting people in a stairwell.” She e-mailed that poem to friends and family. The message soon made its way around the Internet, and Randall’s authorship was lost in the process. In fact, she received the poem back on three separate occasions, e-mailed from as far as Australia and the Philippines. By Christmas, the poem fell into the hands of Holiday who, inspired by the anonymous writing, recorded a reading of the poem with the Mannheim Steamroller version of “Silent Night” playing in the background. Holiday’s recording spread around the country, though no royalties were collected as the background music was copyrighted. Meanwhile, Randall and her family were spending the holidays in Michigan. Her husband, Scott, heard the familiar words playing over the speakers while in a Wal-mart. Randall eventually heard it herself since WITL in Lansing, Mich., was playing the song every hour on the hour, she said. She soon found out that the words she wrote were being repeated through radio stations all over the country. Randall said she was happy that people could take comfort in the poem. She said she was just glad to help people realize “He was present” on Sept. 11. Randall said her goal was to help those “who felt abandoned by God,” to reconsider. Eventually, she contacted Holiday to let him that she was the author, and to thank him for how he spread the message of hope. For copyright reasons, the song was immediately pulled from broadcast, and thus began current proceedings and the modification of the song. New music From January to June of 2002, after word got out that Randall intended to re-record the song with original background music, many musicians sent demo versions for the remake, including some top celebrities. Not one of them fit, said Randall. “None of them were pleasing,” she said. She wanted the emphasis to be on the message, not the star-power. “Inside my heart, I didn’t want it to be so-and-so’s next big hit,” she said. Then she met Justin Copeland, a 20-year-old junior at Evangel University in Springfield and an independent musician. Copeland was a visitor to the First Baptist Church in El Dorado Springs, the same church where Randall attends. He was visiting his girlfriend and helping out with the youth group that Sunday when a conversation with Copeland shifted to music. Randall let Copeland hear one of the several demo versions of the song, and Copeland agreed that none sounded right. Then he played some of his original piano music for her. “I actually wrote the music about two years ago,” Copeland said. Randall said she knew immediately that he was the right musician for the job. After a few modifications, “the music just fit perfect,” Copeland said. They decided to keep Bob Holiday’s voice, and used, for the most part, his own master track from his original recording. The music is performed by Copeland on a digital keyboard and violinist, Ashley Harrison of Blue Springs, Mo., was brought in. Produced by Steve Sneed and mixed by Isaac Moreno, “I Was There,” has been as heavily broadcast as the original recording, receiving air play from Los Angeles to Birmingham. KFSH, headquartered in Los Angeles, is a large Christian radio network, and one of the main stations with which Holiday associates. KFSH has hundreds of affiliates across the nation, all of which, apparently, are playing the song. Randall has been writing poetry since she was 13 years old, and said that no other poem had come as easily to her as this one. She said the poem was God’s gift to her, and she knew she had to do something with it. Originally from Michigan, she’s been in El Dorado Springs with her husband and two daughters for just over a year. Copeland has been playing piano for more than 13 years and began writing his own music eight years ago. He said he hopes this endeavor will be a stepping-off point, opening doors into the music business. Randall and Copeland are already working on a second collaboration, a song tentatively titled “The Sweetest Thing.” Randall said that she wouldn’t be singing the lyrics herself, because though she enjoys singing, her talent is with the written word. Copeland is currently talking to several possible vocalists. The CD single of “I Was There” has been picked up by an independent label and distribution company, and should be available in stores anywhere from the week before Sept. 11, 2002, to a week after.