Today we’d like to introduce you to Terah Lynn.
Hi Terah, so excited to have you on the platform. So, before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
Settle in, this is a long one. Thing is, I’ve always loved music. It was always a form of therapy for me and the only thing that helped me feel peace so it was always a staple in my life. From worship at church to the oldies I grew up on in the Appalachian Mountains, I found solace in it all. And there were a lot of things in my life that I needed to find solace from.
When I was 17 years old, someone I loved very much died in my arms and I found myself going from an honor roll student who had never been in trouble to being kicked out of high school a couple of months before graduation. While other kids my age were having fun and going to prom, I was finding a full-time job and going to night school to get my diploma. The school I wasn’t allowed in during the day, I was attending at night after work to try and salvage my education. I was sitting in the same seat in the evening with people older than me that I would have been sitting in with my friends during the day. I was comfortless, and my friends didn’t know what to do with that, nor should they have. It was heavier than young hearts had the capacity to carry, so I lost most of them.
I worked full-time and went to college, all the while struggling with drugs and bad choices. I overdosed on cocaine when I was 18 years old and needed to do something before I destroyed myself completely. I ended up moving to Pittsburgh to get away from my small town and went to school for photography. It was there I had a bit of a “come to Jesus” moment when for some reason I did the “K-Love 30-day challenge” on the radio. Those 30 days of positive music helped get my heart in the right direction or as much as it could be at that point.
After college, I returned home and got engaged to a really nice guy, but when that didn’t work out, I found myself lost again so I packed a backpack, got my guitar, and headed to Nashville for a 3-day trip to sing for some producers. I did that and on the 3rd day decided I couldn’t go back so I called my job and quit, bought some extra nights at the hotel, and figured out what to do next. A couple of days later I found myself driving to Texas where I ended up working all over, doing whatever jobs I could to get by. I ended up going to seminary in Dallas and from there, I made my way to Houston and around different parts of the South working at landfills, in construction and landscaping, and at times digging drainage ditches to get by.
Music was the only thing that got me through the grueling work in the hot sun. It was hard on my mind and my body, and I’ve had to have alot of surgery because of those years. So, I would write songs in my head and dream about doing music one day. Fast forward to 2019, I was connected with Grammy award-winning producer Billy Dorsey, who believed in me more than I did myself. We began working on a five-song EP and released the 1st single a couple of days before the world shut down in March of 2020. (I guess you could say I have great timing.) The first song hit #5 on the iTunes blues charts and the second, #4, but momentum was hard during a quarantine. I ended up getting laid off and heading to Dallas for work and, it was there that I started Bridge Music Magazine to help promote other artists like myself who struggle to make it in an industry that cares more about how much money you have than how much talent.
At that time, in 2021, I was in a bad living situation and started dreaming of Nashville again so I applied for a job at Gibson guitar out here on a whim. I got the job and 3 days later, packed up my stuff and my dog and headed that way. It was a full-circle moment for me. I became the first female supervisor of Gibson’s lumber mill and continue to grow the magazine and work on my own music, writing songs while I work. This year, the magazine entered into a strategic partnership with Universal Music Group and their 1824 division. We have continued to grow ever since. We have the honor of covering some of the most amazing artists.
I’m still hustling with my own music, with a new release coming out in a couple weeks and I’m now running Gibson’s Pickup Shop where their famous pickups are made. It’s all alot of work, but it’s all for one thing: music. I’m putting in the work and planting the seeds that I know one day will break this whole thing wide open, and I’m having a lot of fun doing it. It’s all for the love of music.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle-free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
There is nothing about the road that has been smooth. Bumps the whole way, but eventually, those bumps just kind of sync with the beat of your heart and become part of who you are. Growing you, molding you, making you more resilient. I can’t say I enjoy them, but I am thankful for the way they’ve helped shape me.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
Like everyone else in this town, I’m predominantly known as a singer/songwriter. I’ve been going between the bluesy stuff and now some southern rock, just finding my Nashville sound and hopefully my place in Music City. My new single was produced by Jeff Huskins, who is a musical genius so I’m excited about that and Lord willing, to get back out there playing live.
Of course, the other work is the magazine, which is honestly just a blast. Getting sent music from hundreds of people a day is just about the coolest job I can think of.
We’re always looking for the lessons that can be learned in any situation, including tragic ones like the Covid-19 crisis. Are there any lessons you’ve learned that you can share?
The biggest thing I’ve learned is the importance of planting good seeds. Typically, through our words and thoughts and actions and everyday life we are planting seeds then moving throughout our days so busy that we either aren’t noticing the fruit of them (whether it’s good or bad) or experiencing the consequences of that fruit because life it so busy it’s easy to not feel it.
When the world shut down, all of a sudden I was sitting at home with nothing to do and the fruit of the seeds I had planted started coming up and I had nothing to distract me from it for the first time ever. It was all right there in front of me. I was feeling the full consequences of what I had put my energy into, my thoughts into, my effort into. Seeing and experiencing what I had “fed” into the previous year(s) and honestly, it wasn’t all good. It wasn’t all pretty. There’s a scripture that you reap what you sow, and for the first time, I had nothing to distract me from what I had grown. So Covid and its effects on my personal life were really an eye-opener as to what seeds I’m planting in my life and in the world by what I do and say. Just to be more intentional in general.
Contact Info:
- Email: editor@bridgemusicmagazine.com
- Website: bridgemusicmagazine.com, terahlynnmusic.com
- Instagram: @terahlynnofficial @bridgemusicmagazine
- Facebook: @terahlynnofficial @bridgemusicmagazine
