Cody Carnes ’ songs have always brought joy to me , and impacted my life . I was able to meet him briefly backstage at a Worship Together Conference a couple years ago , and we have interviewed him before in [ WM ], but I didn ’ t handle those personally ( our beloved writer Alex MacDougall did ). This time around , I was looking forward to connecting with him , as we have had his wife , Kari Jobe , participate in our Christian Musician Summit conferences before . My time spent with Cody on a Zoom call did not disappoint . In his kindhearted and gentle way , Cody has some important things to say about worship that we should pay attention too . Read on …
[ Bruce ] For some perspective , tell our readers how you first got started in music and then in worship leading ?
[ Cody Carnes ] Yes , so I grew up in a musical family . I started playing drums my parents say at age two , and I ’ m watching my youngest son do the same . He ’ s four now and he is in full-on prodigy mode ,
[ WM ] That ’ s amazing .
[ Cody ] Yeah , so I grew up really young on drums and my Dad was a musician . He was a professional musician for 20 plus years , and so I was thrown into the mix . He was a Country musician , so that ’ s what I grew up on , nineties Country from Texas . So that was me as a kid , just playing those songs with him and learning that .
And then I started leading worship when I was 14 in my youth group . And so I grew up in a small West Texas town . I went to First Baptist in Big Spring , Texas and was a part of the youth group there . And I was like the next man up , the worship leader that was leading when I was coming into high school was graduating . And so , I was really the only other kid at the time who knew how to play guitar and sing as it is , you step in because you ’ re needed , and you ’ ve got some gifting there to do that . So that was me . I just jumped in as a worship leader and just fell in love with it . And I really led all through high school . I moved to Dallas after high school , became a part of Gateway Church . I started serving there and I just kept going , just kept leading worship . That ’ s where I started writing songs , it was in that season at Gateway I met Kari at that church .
[ WM ] There you go . It ’ s all history from there . See what you get for serving the Lord ? You get a wife … you get a ministry . ( laughing )
[ Cody ] Exactly right . ( laughing )
[ WM ] To me there ’ s something about a worship drummer , a good worship drummer . They can add so much . You start your new “ live ” record with the song , “ Be Glad ” with a big drum part . Tell us about who that drummer is ?
[ Cody ] So that ’ s my good friend Austin Davis . We ’ ve been friends for a long time . Actually , he was Kari ’ s drummer from 2009 to just recently 2019 , so 10 years or so . He played drums for Kari and we ’ ve been friends for a long time . So , I started playing with Kari around the same time in 2010 . We got married in 2014 , and so Austin
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