From Reluctant Songwriter to YouTube Success

Shawna Edwards didn't want to share her music publicly. But her dad wouldn't let it go. Now millions of people enjoy her faith-based songs.

"Have You Done Anything With That Song?"

Shawna Edwards never intended to share her music with the general public, but her dad wouldn't stop pushing her to do so. After hearing "Do You Have Room?", a song Shawna had written for a family Christmas gathering, he told her to "do something with that song." Eventually, she printed out a nice set of sheet music to appease him. That wasn't enough. He wanted her to do more. Even after he passed away, she could hear his voice saying, "Have you done anything with that song?"

So she got brave.

She submitted the piece to a songwriting competition for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And won! But when a public performance of the song went awry, Shawna came home defeated, vowing never to be so vulnerable again.

However, the prompting to "do more with the song" wouldn't go away.

This time, with her husband's encouragement, she created a music video for "Do You Have Room?" and published it on YouTube. People loved it. Praise for the video and requests for the sheet music came pouring in, but criticism rained down as well when viewers told Shawna that she couldn't use copyrighted imagery without permission. Embarrassed by her naivete, she removed the music video from YouTube, thus angering people who wanted to show it at their upcoming Christmas events. Again, Shawna felt defeated.

She recalls, "This was not a good start. I made a ton of mistakes like that, but what kept me going was the fact that people liked that song. I had all kinds of people tell me how the song had inspired them to make more room for Jesus that day."

Listen to this interview to hear how Shawna overcame the early pitfalls in her songwriting career, the advice she has for other creators, and how her faith increased as she kept doing the things that made her feel vulnerable--despite those early defeats.

Mentioned in this Interview

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