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By Deborah Carl
Songwriter Janice Kapp Perry to get Lifetime Achievement Award
SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH -- "I hope it doesn't mean my life is over,"
Janice Kapp Perry joked, but she is also deeply touched to be
receiving the 2001 Lifetime Achievement Award for her many
contributions to LDS music, which will be presented as part of the
Faith Centered Music Association's Pearl Awards. "To do something you
love and to be recognized by your peers is a sweet feeling."
While Perry grew up in a musical home, and majored in music at
Brigham Young University, she did not pursue those talents while she
devoted her time to her husband Doug, her five children, and her
numerous foster children. She also pitched on a fast-pitch softball
team, played co-ed volleyball, and excelled at racquetball. It wasn't
until she broke her ankle while playing basketball at age 39, that
she slowed down long enough to write music. "My bishop said that
since I was laid up with a cast on my foot, maybe I could write the
ward roadshow." Next came a song for her son to sing in church - and
her musical career took off from there.
She released her first album of original songs in 1978 and has
composed more than 800 songs, recorded 40 albums, written two
full-length musicals, written eight sacred cantatas and recorded
several albums in Spanish, Japanese and Korean. One of her hymns, "As
Sisters In Zion," is in the current LDS hymnbook and 10 songs are in
the Primary songbook. Her works have been performed by the Mormon
Tabernacle Choir (she sang with the choir until 1999), the Mormon
Youth Symphony and Choir and countless other choirs throughout the
world. Her "greatest hits" include such songs as "No Ordinary Man,"
"A Child's Prayer," "In the Hollow of Thy Hand," "Love Is Spoken
Here" and "We'll Bring The World His Truth." In recent years, Perry
has collaborated with Sen. Orrin G. Hatch on five albums of
patriotic, inspirational and Christmas songs. "
Source:
Perry hits homer as a songwriter
Deseret News 8Jul01 A2
By Carma Wadley: Deseret News senior writer
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