kerrie roberts interview

Meet Carrie Roberts! Check out her video above, "Savior to Me" and enjoy learning more about her heart, music, and message!

Crown of Beauty: What or who first inspired you to play music?

Kerrie: Well, I would have to say it’s definitely my mom. I’m a pastor’s kid and my mom has always served alongside of my dad doing the praise and worship or choir directing, and they’ve been in full time ministry now for over forty years. So I just grew up with mom sitting at the piano all week, you know, preparing for Sunday and there was just always music in the house. Either with that or musicals playing, but she’s definitely very musical and was the person that sort of just had me surrounded by music all the time since I was a baby.

Crown of Beauty: So what is your favorite song to perform live and why?

Kerrie: Okay well this definitely changes. I’d have to say currently my new song, it’s called Rooted. It changes but right now as of today, it’s my favorite song on the new project and I love singing it live. I got to sing it for the first time a few weeks ago at a women’s worship night. I just love the message of it and the melody and the way that it’s written. You know it has, you like jump up an octave after the second verse and there’s just something always so powerful about that moment and how that matches with the lyrics, and just the truth of the message. So Rooted is the current winner!

Crown of Beauty: So talking about your new record Boundless, we're excited for you! Would you share with us a little bit about the message behind your new project?

Kerrie: Sure! I think that the biggest difference in this project from all the other ones is that we're diving deeper. Like if you sit down and listen to the record you might not feel like you’re listening to a typical praise and worship album, but basically that’s exactly what it is. And every single one of these songs could be sung in church. It was my main goal to do a project like that, an album full of praise. I had a little girl last February, she just turned one yesterday actually, so it was just a total different experience of writing and recording and having something else that’s really important to me to balance in all of that. So I think that that makes this album a lot different too. There’s just a different spirit to it, and there was so much creative freedom given to us by the record label and I think that you can really hear that in the album too. That’s another thing that just makes it really special.

Crown of Beauty: What does being courageous mean to you?

Kerrie: Goodness, I think for me it’s about having the confidence and the truth that you stand on and just living out that truth wherever you are. It's just about being real about where you are. Being transparent takes a lot of courage to just kind of be honest with people about the process that you’re in in your faith, in your walk, your career and so on. And I think that's what it takes (transparency) to create an awesome community. It takes a strong person to do that.

Crown of Beauty: What is your biggest advice to young people about being courageous even when it’s hard?

Kerrie: I would say that, if you’re young it’s hard to have the perspective, but just to know that it gets easier and cooler to be the person that stands out as you grow older. For me,it was hard being the Christian in the crowd that didn’t fit in and didn’t live the way that other people did. And I would just say, stand your ground. And definitely find community. That is where you find your strength to continue in your faith and in your walk. You cannot do it alone, absolutely not. So I think that would be my encouragement is just stand your ground, find your community, and you know build your tribe that way, of people who are like-minded. And then you’re always gonna have friends outside of that circle that you can be a witness to and love on and learn from. But, yeah, don’t do it alone.

Crown of Beauty: How do you overcome stage fright?

Kerrie: I don’t actually have stage fright! I sang my first solo in church when I was five years old, so to me it’s just it’s so natural. And the fact that I’ve spent so much time onstage, I’m not very affected by messing up and you know, just making a fool of myself in front of people, because it just happens so much that you’re like “Oh yeah, it’s just like tripping down the hallway.”

I’ve fallen off the stage before. I still forget lyrics and what is terrifying too is now, you go places and they have like lyrics on the wall, so it’s everyone knows that you just messed up! Or the sound is weird and you come in and you’re like in the wrong key and it sounds horrible. But for me that's just an opportunity to play it off and be real. Be like “hey, sorry, I made a mistake, but I’m still here with the same heart and intent and we’re still gonna have a good time!”

I think it’s kind of crazy the expectations that people have of musicians and singers and I mean, we practice and we wanna be perfect. But I always look at famous sports teams and I’m like, no one expects any player bat perfectly or make every basketball shot or every football catch. So I don't think that any of us can be expected to be perfect. So for me, I just play it off. That actually just happened to me a couple of weeks ago! For some reason, I totally blanked on the verse. The song started and I was just kind of up there like jamming like, “Yeah, isn’t this a great song? I’m gonna come in on the chorus!” So yeah, it just happens. :)

Crown of Beauty: Who is your favorite Disney princess?

Kerrie: Oh my goodness, so hard! Alright, I’m gonna have to go with Rapunzel, for today.I think maybe I’m a little bit more like Belle, because of all of the book reading and I was always such a nerd. But I love the scene in Tangled where she’s just like having her breakdown and she’s super happy and then very sad. She’s just kind of manic and crazy and I watch that, and I was like, “Oh, sometimes I feel like that! I really identify with her.” Yeah, I love that movie, so I’m gonna go with Rapunzel for today. :)