In A Moment

7. In A Moment

Words and music by Chris Sligh

Produced by Brown Bannister



The Writing:

This was the last song that I wrote for the HPF record. We actually had finished recording the album by the time I went to Hollywood week. In Hollywood, I was roommates with Phil Stacey and when we both made it to the top 40, we talked about n him coming up to Greenville to record a couple of songs in the time in between Hollywood and top 24 to have them available once the experience was over and he was talking to labels. I knew that for me, my HPF recordings would be invaluable, and I wanted Phil to have something, too. So, I went home and wrote this little love song for my wife with the intentions of Phil recording it.
 In order for Phil to learn the song, I put together a demo and sang on it. It was a full demo: piano, guitar, drums, etc. And I sang the vocal that you heard on the HPF album. I was proud of the song and took it over for Don to hear and he flipped and told me that I could NOT give that song to Phil. I talked to a bunch of people and everyone agreed, I had to keep that song.


As far as writing goes...it stayed the same from when I wrote it on guitar. Because I was writing it for Phil, I was trying to write my version of a Diane Warren song (she wrote Edwin McCain’s I Could Not Ask For More, Aerosmith’s Don’t Wanna Miss a Thing and literally hundreds of other hit songs). And it worked. 

Just a side note: Brown told me that when he first heard the song, he couldn’t place it but he thought that it was weird that we were covering a Diane Warren song until he realized on second listen that it wasn’t a Warren song. Haha...little did he know. 



The Meaning:


Well, it’s pretty simple: it’s a love song about my wife and how in a moment life can change, both for good and for bad. But with her it’s changed for good.



The Recording:


This one included all the same players as the other Brown productions, with the addition of Stephen Leiweke on acoustic guitar. Brown and I wanted to change this song up slightly with the production, so instead of being completely piano based as the original HPF version had been, we wanted to start off with acoustic guitar and sparse piano...we thought with this one that less would be more, especially at the beginning of the song.

Dan Needham programmed the loop for this one, sitting at his drum set, with a little computer with Logic installed. He programmed at the end of the day on the first day of tracking, so that we could work on this first thing the next morning. Once he was done, Stephen came in that night and recorded the acoustic guitar.



One key difference between this and the original HPF version is where the key change happens. The HPF version’s key change happened right as it was going into the last chorus. Both Brown and I thought there was something special about that last chorus, but we didn’t want to make it so obvious (i.e., cheesy). So, we masked it a little bit by going to E major (from D major) out of an E chord out of the bridge. Simple, yet effective. 



Don, once again, did the string arrangement and we used the same method as we did for “Let You Know” and “Cry Tonight”...Don recorded his “fake” strings and then David Davidson recorded real violins over the top of that.

In a moment, love can pass you by  * 
And in a moment, a heart can come alive  * *

Every moment's getting better   *  Every moment brings me closer to you  * *  Can I hold you till the morning light  *  Takes away the dead of night  *  And sunrise shines on you?  *  Can love take all these fears away
 *  Till morning comes with brand new day?
 *  It's love that pulls us through
 *  In a moment  * *

In a moment love can tear you down
 *  And in a moment a heart can come around  * *  pre-chorus * chorus  * *  I feel you in my heart
I feel you in my soul  *  Oh, you make me whole  *  In a moment…  * *  chorus