Twila Paris

    Twila Paris

    Fayetteville, Arkansas7 reviews across 5 releases

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    Twila Paris is an American Christian singer-songwriter and pianist who grew up in Arkansas in a family involved in church music and evangelistic work. Her early recordings established a contemporary Christian pop style built around piano and clear soprano vocals, with songs intended for congregational use. By the early 1990s, worship writing had become a larger part of her work, while she continued making records outside a strictly corporate-worship format. The 1996 first Sparrow release, Where I Stand, combined intimate piano and guitar with unusual plucked-string accents; its songs moved between personal faith and church-ready praise. Perennial: Songs For The Seasons Of Life shifted toward personal worship, joining hymns to orchestral arrangements. On House of Worship, Paris returned to harder-rocking textures without abandoning the piano-led worship songs that had become her signature.

    After her Sparrow contract ended in 2003, Paris signed with Integrity Music and made He Is Exalted: Live Worship in 2005, her first live album. The record recast older worship songs for a full live setting, with choir and strings around eight new Paris originals; "Messiah" was singled out for an arrangement likened to Michael Card meeting 1980s Kansas. She later released Small Sacrifice in 2007, first sold through her website and LifeWay before wider distribution in 2009. A 2012 patriotic project, God Shed His Grace: Songs of Truth and Freedom, followed, and she joined the Christian Classics Tour in 2011 and 2012.

    5 releases reviewed