About the Creative Process
Music Production Related
I want to be honest with you about how these songs came to life — because I think the story matters, and because I believe transparency is its own form of integrity.
It Started With the Words
Every song on Empowered Energy began the same way: with me, a blank page, and something I needed to say.
The lyrics are mine. Written from decades of spiritual practice, ministry, and the kind of lived experience that doesn't come from anywhere but real life. I wrote what I know. I wrote what I've needed to hear. I wrote what I believe the Spirit was asking me to put into the world.
In some songs, the melody came with the words — a natural rise and fall that arrived as I wrote. In those cases I shaped the melodic direction intentionally, humming it into being before it ever became a production.
The creative vision — the feeling each song was meant to create, the truth it was meant to carry, the soul it was written for — that is entirely, completely mine.
Then I Found a Collaborator
To bring these songs to life sonically, I partnered with Suno AI — an artificial intelligence music generation platform that can translate creative direction into fully produced music.
Think of it the way a songwriter works with a producer and session musicians in a recording studio. The songwriter brings the lyrics, the melody, the vision. The production team brings the instruments, the arrangement, the sound. The song belongs to the songwriter. The production is a partnership.That's exactly what happened here — except my production partner was AI.
For each song I directed:
●The musical style and genre
●The mood and emotional tone
●The instrumentation and arrangement feel
●The vocal character and styling that best carried the lyric.
I also have a background of leading a music team — which meant I knew exactly what each song needed vocally and could direct those choices with intention, not guesswork.
Why I'm Telling You This
Because I think we are living in a genuinely new creative moment — and pretending otherwise doesn't serve anyone.AI didn't write these songs. AI didn't pray over these words. AI didn't sit with the question of what a soul in transition needs to hear at 2am. I did.
But AI made it possible for a minister, author, and lyricist — without a recording budget or a production team — to bring her music into the world in full sonic color. And I think that's worth celebrating, not hiding.
I believe creativity has always been collaborative — with Spirit, with inspiration, with the tools of the age we're living in. Every generation of artists has used the technology available to them. This is mine.These songs are real. The words are real. The intention behind every lyric is real. The production just has a very modern kind of magic in it.
A Word on Integrity
I hold ordination in the Unity movement, and I take integrity seriously — in my ministry, my teaching, and my creative work. I would never present something as mine that isn't, or obscure a process that deserves to be understood.
What I can tell you, with full confidence and zero apology, is this:
Every word on this album came from my soul. Every creative choice came from my vision. And every song was made with the genuine prayer that it would find the person who needed it.That part has nothing to do with how it was produced.
All lyrics © Rev. Leslie Woods / Shine On Y'all Publications. All rights reserved. Music produced in collaboration with Suno AI. Lyrics, melody direction, and vocal styling direction by Rev. Leslie Woods. AI-generated vocals.