vickybeeching.com Archive

4

Vicky’s Video Shoot in London!

Hi friends!

Yesterday I spent the day in central London with a camera crew and my manager Wendy, filming a video piece to go with my new EP and album! It was bucketing down with rain, under a grey cloudy sky… so it’ll look very legitimately British! We started off inside St Mary’s Church, a beautiful, tall church built in the early 1800s near Marble Arch and Marylebone in the heart of Westminster. We filmed the stories behind the songs on the album there. Then after grabbing sandwiches we piled into Wendy’s car and drove around the city center with both camera men hanging out the windows filming the city in motion!

We parked near the River Thames and got footage of me chatting about themes on the album and about life in general. The rain didn’t stop so I pulled out my black and white polka dot umbrella! We filmed the London Eye and the Houses Of Parliament, then drove into the dark and very heart-breaking area of Soho – it has been London’s prostitution district for the past 400 years.

I got out of the car with the camera crew and we captured the explicit and devastating nature of those streets. I shared thoughts with the camera on worship and justice and my passion to see human trafficking ended. We ventured down some very dark, small alleyways lined with prostitutes and pimps. My heart was racing when we got accosted by one of them and told to stop filming as what was going on was private and not to be documented. It was scary and we felt pretty vulnerable…but I am so glad we were able to go there and let our hearts be even more deeply broken by what goes on behind closed doors. Worship and justice MUST go hand in hand – one of the songs on the new album is all about that…so my decision to shoot some film in Soho was one I’m still glad I did.

Watch out for the video! We’ll post some “Flip camera” B roll in the next week or so to give you a taste of what the full version will look like!

Not long til my 3 song EP comes out…. Feb 9th!!

Love,

Vicky

4

Leeland Sing ‘Gang Vocals’ on Vicky’s Record

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I had a wonderful, unexpected surprise this past week. My friends from the band “Leeland” – who if you’ve never met them are some of the greatest guys on the planet – were sound checking in San Diego for the Christian Music Awards. They had a few hours free, so they drove to the studio I’m recording in and sang some ‘gang vocals’ on some of my songs. Thanks guys!

Here are some pics…

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Lots of headphone cables so everyone could hear and sing along!

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The first step for recording was – turn off our phones! (You can see how many iPhone-users we had in the building!!)

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Me teaching the songs on acoustic, and people learning the lyrics from their sheets…

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Sarah teaching vocal parts… Baby Scarlett watches wishing she could join in the singing!

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Some of the songs I joined the ‘gang’ and sang on… Others I just stood and watched as it was a special moment for me to see all those people singing my songs and bringing their voices and hearts to the record.

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SINGING!

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Jonathan, my Producer, at the desk recording it all!

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Group shot! Thanks SO much everyone :-)

Look for my 3 song EP coming out this Fall. Then the full-length album early next year! I can’t wait for you all to hear it.

Also…. Leeland’s brand new album hit the streets TODAY! Go buy it here!!

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Are you part of a music community? Do you have people that you play with, sing with, jam with? For any musician or songwriter, a good musical community is a real gift from God. Do you have that or are you praying/searching for that?

Love,

Vicky

11

Photos I Took At The Ocean…

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So I’m still loving my digital camera… It’s one of the best things I’ve ever bought… so much fun! I’m taking it to England to snap some shots of my family and homeland to show you on here :-)

Recently I was at the beach in San Diego and saw a guy flying two cool kites…and some beautiful yellow flowers too… Thought I’d try and capture it all on my Nikon!

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Photos always remind me that life passes us by so quickly. David wrote in the book of Psalms that “life is like a vapor, like a shadow, like a mist”. Its here one moment, then it’s gone. Another great quote I read recently was “We don’t remember our life in days, we remember it in moments”. It’s true – our main memories of life aren’t categorized into years, months and days. They are simply snapshot moments of the times in our life that most powerfully affected us. It reminds me to stop, look and let me heart and mind take those snapshots – and to not miss the beauty that’s all around me!

I took the shots above with my 17-70mm lens. I’m testing out a different one – a 50mm – over the next couple weeks (thanks to Jonathan Paul for loaning it to me!).  Anyone got any advice on how to get the best results from a 50mm? I’m wanting to use it for portraits, where the face is razor sharp and the background is super blurry, for maximum depth of field. Should I just set it on ‘Auto’ and snap? Or are there techniques using the different settings like “P”, “A” and “S” that can get me more of what I’m looking for in the photos?

Peace!

Vicky