Amy Van Wagenen has lyrics and music playing inside her head. And she's writing them down and singing them.
Van Wagenen, who lives in South Jordan with her husband, Mont, and four children, was voted one of six finalists in MormonTimes.com's "Showcase," an online music video contest.
She started singing as a child — and "I've been singing my whole life," she said in a telephone interview. She tried a lot of things in high school but said they didn't work, so she gave up her serious attempt at music by doing firesides, getting married and starting a family.
"I put my music on hold," she said.
But about six years ago, she thought, "I really want to do this again." So she did.
Later, Dean Kaelin, her vocal coach, asked her, "What do you want to do with this" music?
She told him she wanted to write songs, so he told her to try.
The result was "Rain," and she said Kaelin "didn't hate it … he really liked it."
And the songs kept coming out of her head. The result was her debut CD, "Waiting," which was released in October 2008. She said it took about a year to write the music and get it produced. Of the 11 tracks, she wrote seven of the songs entirely and the lyrics of another.
"Writing music is fascinating," she said. She has a background in piano but took up the guitar when she started writing.
"It helps me to write the music," she said. "The guitar felt like another limb (of my body) — it really fit."
She says her favorite song on "Waiting" is "Tiny Graces."
"I got up early one morning, saw the sunrise and wrote the first verse," she said. The intent of the song is to remind people that it's the tiny things in life that can mean so much.
"Tiny Graces" is the song she entered in the "Showcase" contest. Her husband shot the video in their backyard, and she also had her children, ages 13, 12, 9 and 6, join in the fun.