Who are you?

My name is Joel Hinck, I have a degree in music composition and have been involved in Church music for over 15 years, playing with and leading various worship teams.  I am currently the music director at St. Pauls Lutheran Church in Glen Burnie, MD.

What are you doing?

In March of 2009, I started writing a new worship song every week.  My goal is to write in a modern musical style with meaningful, biblical, and diverse texts.  My focus is on music that will be useful for congregational singing- melodies that can be learned and sung by the Church body coupled with texts that engage the heart and the mind.  I have since stopped the strict weekly schedule, but continue to write, record the songs and release them in a podcast called “Word Like Fire.” For more on why I started doing this, please read the post “Why Am I Doing This?”.

What is a podcast?

A podcast is kind of like a radio show that you can listen to whenever you want.  It is a digital audio file that you download and can listen to on your computer or your portable mp3 player.  If you use podcast-compatible music software (like iTunes), new episodes are automatically downloaded for you as soon as they are available.  Click here to subscribe in iTunes.

What is Word Like Fire?

Word Like Fire is a podcast where I introduce a new song, talk about my scripture influences, themes, and writing process, and then play the song.

Is it free?

Absolutely!  The podcast is a free download.  If you like the song, you can purchase a recording on CD or as an mp3 download.  Please visit the “Albums” page for details.  Sheet music is also available, free of charge, at the “Sheet Music” page.

Where can I get it?

If you use iTunes, click here.  Alternately, you can listen to individual episodes as they are released by clicking on the link in each episode post.

Can we use your songs at our church?

Please do!  That’s the goal of the podcast.  All the songs are covered by the CCLI License (don’t know what that is?  Click here).