|
Swimmer surprised by singing spotlight
By Derek Hodges
Regina Swimmer had no idea one year ago that she would soon be a recording artist with a compact disc on sale.
“I had never performed or anything, I wasn’t looking for that. Music was just something I enjoyed,” Swimmer said.
Swimmer, who grew surrounded by music, says everyone in her family sings and/or plays an instrument. Her mother and several of her siblings also write music, and one sister, Angelena, is in Nashville working toward a recording contract.
The cover of Regina Swimmer’s first CD features her picture in front of a background of Smoky Mountains. Swimmer, who lives in Cherokee, won a contest through a Canadian recording studio that allowed her to produce the CD, which she named for the subtitle of the fourth track. Swimmer’s sisters and mother wrote the song and worked with her to write most of the other music.
The music bug, however, took a little bit less of a bite out of Swimmer.
“Singing was just something we did for fun. I sing in the choir at church and with my family, but it was never a big deal,” she said.
About a year ago, Swimmer saw a notice for a contest a Canadian recording company was having. Sunshine Records Beartraxx Recording was looking for undiscovered Native American talent to put onto the market. Winners of the competition would be given recording time with a producer and engineer and a free CD cut.
Swimmer began encouraging her sisters, whom she thought had the lion’s share of musical talent in the family, to enter the competition. When they dragged their heels, Swimmer decided to take matters into her own hands.
“I told them if they weren’t going to enter, I would. So I did,” she said.
A few months later Swimmer received notification that she was one of the winners. She was invited to Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, to make her recording.
“When we were told we had to go to Canada, we really debated about that,” Swimmer said. “It was like a whole fiasco getting up there. Everything that could have gone wrong did.”
Swimmer made it to Winnipeg and, armed with songs written by several of her family members and herself, recorded her first CD.
“It was great. It was an incredible experience to get to work with a producer and an engineer for free,” she said.
Swimmer cut nine tracks for the CD, eight of which included some kind of work by family members. The ninth is a gospel song that Swimmer particularly likes. The studio required nine tracks to do marketing for the CD, she said.
The CD includes music that Swimmer describes as “country folk.” The title track, “Everybody Said (Life Goes On)” is a mournful ballad about love and lose. Several of the other songs deal with heartbreak, that most ancient of muses, including Swimmer’s favorite track, “Stormchaser.”
“We wrote Stormchaser to be about relationships, but it turned into more. People chasing dreams in all parts of their lives can identify with that song,” Swimmer said.
Swimmer, who works as a benefits specialist at Harrah’s Cherokee, isn’t looking to quit her day job for dreams of stardom in the music world. She really hopes her CD will attract attention to her sisters’ writing abilities more than it will to her voice, she said.
“I didn’t get into this business to get rich and famous, and that’s working out so far. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to make a career out of music. Really I was trying to help my sisters,” Swimmer said.
Swimmer, who is married to well-known Native American hoop dancer Eddie Swimmer, plans performances at upcoming local events to plug her CD.
“I figure I can go around to these festivals and pow-wows with Eddie and sell my CDs,” Swimmer said.
Regina Swimmer’s recording can be purchased at Rez Records in Cherokee.
For more information about Swimmer or her CD, visit www.eddieswimmer.lori-h.com and click on the “Regina Swimmer” link.
|
