FirstLadyB | Connecting Faith and Hollywood
On September 21st, singer-songwriter Rory Feek celebrated the release of an album and DVD set that is one part love letter to his late wife, Joey, and one part chronicle of their GRAMMY®-winning career as a country music duo.
The Singer And The Song: The Best of Joey+Rory is a collection of twenty of their most beloved hits, while the two-and-a-half hour-long DVD provides an up-close-and-personal look at their timeless love story.
Since Joey passed away from cancer in 2016, Rory has talked openly about their relationship (they met in the early 2000s as Joey was working to kick off her career in country music), their time spent performing together, as well as finding his way forward as a single dad. This summer, he published the New York Times bestseller Once Upon A Farm: Lessons on Growing Love, Life, and Hope on a New Frontier. The book chronicles the events of the past two years and how Rory carries Joey’s passion and lessons forward as he parents their four-year-old daughter.
The album and DVD are inspiring, offering a look at Joey and Rory’s emotional journey through his perspective. Rory hesitates to categorize The Singer And The Song as a “greatest hits” album, preferring to think of it as a “best of” album. In the 28-page photo booklet included with the CD, he says the songs he chose for the album aren’t the couple’s greatest hits, but “the songs that brought out the best in us.”
“Each time we went into the recording studio, we tried our best to choose the best songs we could for where we were in our lives,” he says. “Sometimes they were songs that we had written, a good bit more of the time they were songs from friends, strangers, and now and then heroes of ours.”
Since the release of the album and DVD, Rory has been talking about the experience of making his way forward while missing Joey, as well as keeping her memory alive while raising their daughter, Indiana. He sat down with E! News for an interview, discussing what it’s like to experience the joys of fatherhood without having Joey there to share in them. Rory also met with the Today Show to discuss his new project – a school for his daughter and other children with a variety of learning abilities. Meanwhile, he and Indiana stopped by the Rachel Ray Show to chat about their new children’s book, The Cow Said Neigh! A Farm Story.
As Rory moves forward with fatherhood, the story he tells is one of grief; but it is also one of overwhelming hope. In the DVD, he describes what motivates him and keeps him going each day.
“I know how amazing this life that God has given us is, even though it’s taken some tragic turns,” Rory says. “I mostly walk around pinching myself. That’s saying a lot, but it’s because I didn’t do it. She didn’t do it. He did it. And as much as there have been some very, very hard times the joy-filled times outweigh them. You carry them around with you, and for some reason they put some perspective to the pain, and it helps.”
The Singer and the Song: The Best of Joey+Rory is airing as a weekly special on over 15 television networks including RFD and TBN (Trinity Broadcast Network), CTN, Dish TV, FamilyNet, The Heartland Network, Gaither TV, Liberty, TLN and more. The CD and DVD are available throughout general market stores and the Christian marketplace in addition to online retailers including iTunes, Apple Music, Amazon.com, CBD.com and Gaither.com.
