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Rachael
Lampa :
Sixteen-year-old Rachael Lampa loves the pop divas. But this
5’ half Filipina diva-in-the-making had to tape the "Divas"
TV special to watch later; a phone interview with an entertainment
journalist kept her up past her bedtime, and her first period
Spanish class starts at the un-lovely hour of 7:30 a.m. "I
don’t mind it," she insists."I’m
a morning person...after 10 minutes, I’m fine."
A day in the life of Rachael Lampa looks like that of any
given 10th-grader at Monarch High in Louisville, Colorado,
near Boulder. "I get up at 6:30, crawl to the shower,
dry my hair and finish my homework from the night before,"
says Rachael, a typical American suburban teenager who occasionally
peppers her usually articulate conversations with "like,
you know?" and this-or-that "thingy."
Talking with
Rachael is like talking with any other happy, well-adjusted
adolescent girl, for the most part. There’s basketball;
she’s a stand-out point guard on the girls’ jr.
varsity team ("I love playing, but I don’t watch
it on TV--it bugs me"), church ("I love my church...our
youth group leader is so cool...") and school ("My
favorite subject is lunch—it’s very educational.
I taught myself how to peel an orange in one piece with an
aluminum pop-top"). But Rachael Lampa, the Monarch High
point guard and champion orange peeler, and Rachael Lampa,
the budding pop diva, would seem to have very different schedules.
Sports and school lunches had to wait when Rachael went to
London for the recording of the prestigious London Session
Orchestra’s contribution to her much-anticipated Word
Records CD, Live For You. "I had never even heard of
‘Praise in the Rockies,’ but this guy who was lining
up the performers happened to be staying with one of our friends,
down here," says Rachael. "He heard my voice on
a demo tape of our friend’s song, and he wanted to hear
more." Two days later, Marianne Lampa got a phone call
from Estes Park—it was the same fellow, Danny Meeker,
asking if Rachael could come up the next day and perform two
songs. Rachael remembers the moment: "I was, like, getting
my hair cut or something, and Mom called me and said, ‘Oh,
by the way, there will be people from five record companies
there listening to you...and you’ll be singing after
Amy Grant and Michael W. Smith.’" A daunting task
for a 14-year-old, but she handled it like a pro—at least
on the outside (‘I was freaking out!’)—and
the record execs swarmed like flies to honey. "When I
got done singing, I started to walk backstage and the first
person I saw was this guy who said, ‘Hi, I’m Brent
Bourgeois from Word Records.’ I thought, ‘A record
company?’ I’d never met anybody from a record company
before!" She met plenty of them—that week, mother
and daughter made daily trips up to the mountains to meet
with several record representatives, and, shortly thereafter,
the drives became flights to Nashville for more meetings.
At the tender age of 14, Rachael Lampa signed a long-term
artist agreement with Word Records and her new friend Brent
Bourgeois. Looking back just a few short months, the teen
sensation is surprisingly reflective. "I would not have
been prepared for this to happen any earlier," she says.
"When I went to Estes Park, I had just been to a great
youth conference in South Dakota, and my faith was building
fast. It was the right time—I was really ready for this
to happen, and God opened all the doors." Indeed, it’s
her vibrant, personal faith in Jesus Christ that is at the
center of Rachael Lampa’s busy young life. From the parental
discipleship of the senior Lampas ("My parents are from
really strong Christian homes themselves") to her close
relationships with adult role models at St. Louis Church and
her high school’s chapter of Fellowship of Christian
Athletes, Rachael is fully supported and thoroughly grounded
in reality, despite the whirlwind of recording sessions and
media interviews.
In the midst
of juggling all of these priorities, Rachael is quick to count
her greatest blessings. Without pausing for a breath, and
with the unbridled enthusiasm of a teenager in love with life,
Rachael rattles off her list: "An awesome, supportive
family and friends! The ability to keep up a normal life in
a regular high school...people that care about me and pray
for me…the privilege to have grown up with faith and
the knowledge of God. God around me, and God’s presence,
always with me." Though she’s not a songwriter (yet!),
Rachael, A&R vice president Brent Bourgeois and the rest
of the Word Records team have taken great care to make sure
that the songs she sings are close to Rachael’s heart
and mind, reflecting her experiences in the writing talents
of Christian music’s brightest and best songsmiths. To
that end, the multi-talented Bourgeois (who is also an award-winning
producer/singer-songwriter/artist) put together a most unusual
creative conclave. Singer-songwriters Cindy Morgan, Chris
Rodriguez, Chris Eaton, Ginny Owens, David and Nicole C. Mullen,
and Michelle Tumes joined Bourgeois for a few weeks’
songwriting retreat in the Tennessee countryside. The result
of Rachael’s visit was a flood of inspired creativity—too
many songs to choose from, in a fraction of the expected time.
"I loved every one them; it was hard to pick!" From
the up-tempo debut single, "Live For You" (a Chris
Eaton/Chris Rodriguez co-write), to heart-stopping power ballads
like Chris Eaton’s "Always Be My Home" and
a gospel-flavored Morgan/Owens collaboration, "Blessed"
("It’s been my favorite from the beginning"),
Rachael Lampa’s too-mature-to-be-15 vocal prowess is
matched by the passion that comes from a deeply-felt intimacy
with her God. Brown Bannister, the album’s co-producer,
echoes this. "She sings these songs like they are coming
from the depths of her soul." For this pint-sized powerhouse,
this diva without a driver’s license, the pure joy of
singing about her faith surpasses all the fanfare. "I
hope I can help point people—especially kids—straight
to God, to his comfort and to his Word. This has been such
a blessing for me."
 _.:Racahel
Lampa Official Site
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