But of course, I’m just trying to recall what I heard him say on the Gospel Greats several years ago. I’m not proclaiming it as “gospel truth.”

Barbara’s comment reminds me of hearing the Kingdom Heirs describe how Rodney pitches his songs to them. Numerous times, I heard them on the Gospel Greats telling how Rodney “sang it as if a whole crowd were listening,” or something like that. You can tell it really makes them want to sing it! Perhaps the exception would be “I Know I’m Going There,” which he recorded as a demo tape with Gerald playing piano and singing the bass solos.

#2 – I know that wasn’t the actual story/events of his father’s passing, but I believe I did hear him say he wanted for a long time to record a song like this one as a tribute to his father, and I guess he felt that it “poetically conveyed” … the truth about his passing.

Most writers I know who do not professionally sing would tell you that we’d much rather hear the pros sing our songs. On the flip side, I’ve had many artists say that they would rather hear us writers on the demos we send to them, for the very fact that we’re talking about. Songwriters do tend to sing their songs with passion and that’s what a lot of artists want to hear and what they’re looking for when they listen to a demo. They want to hear our emotion in the song, as a writer.

So, to keep on topic, I certainly think the artists do a great job of putting their interpretation on a song, because most artists don’t pick songs to sing that they aren’t personally connected to in some way. That makes a difference. I think most singers try their best to only pick those songs that really speak to their heart in the first place. From personal experience, when you get an artist who is a great performer and awesome vocalist to begin with, and then they lock into your song because they really feel it and it speaks to them, the result is incredibly overwhelming as a writer.