Music has always been a part of my life.
Some of my earliest memories involve sitting cross-legged in front of a record player, usually one belonging to my mom or one of my older siblings, and getting lost in whatever records they owned.
My mom loved Johnny Cash, so his music became familiar early. My older brother leaned toward rock. My sisters preferred pop. Somewhere in that mix, my own eclectic taste began to form.
When the Music Has a Face
Music did not truly become personal until I started working in broadcasting as a young adult. The songs had always been there. But everything changed once the voices and melodies began to have faces and personalities behind them.
I still remember the first time I interviewed one of the artists whose records I played on the radio. It was Holly Dunn, then riding high with the hit “Daddy’s Hands.”
Backstage before her show, we talked like two ordinary people. After that conversation, something shifted. Whenever one of her songs played, a new thought appeared:
I know her.
The music carried a connection that had not been there before.
As time passed, I had the privilege of interviewing many of the performers whose music filled my playlists. Each conversation deepened that sense of connection.
When I interviewed George Strait, it was shortly after his daughter had died in a tragic car accident.
As we talked, I felt the weight of what he was going through. Yet he still made time for a young radio host who simply loved his music. That moment earned my lasting respect, and whenever one of his songs played afterward, it carried a little more meaning.
And with each artist I met, I noticed something else.
All of the music started feeling personal
The people behind the music we love are not distant icons. They are storytellers working through joy, loss, doubt, and hope in real time.
Once you recognize that, something changes.
You don’t need to meet the person behind a song for music to feel personal. Sometimes it only takes sitting with it a little longer. Reading the lyrics. Hearing a voice crack. Wondering what moment pushed those words into existence.
Music becomes personal when we stop treating it as background noise and start listening for the human being inside it.
And once you hear that, it becomes hard to listen the same way again. That idea sits at the heart of Sonic Pulse Reviews: listening closely, remembering that every record begins with a human story.
