What do John Prine, Puritan poetry, a degree in Meat and Animal Science, and a few Dove Award® nominations have in common? If you’re songwriter Wendy Wills, they mark the path you have taken.

The youngest of 5 children, Wendy begged her mother for piano lessons. Finally, at age 10, her mom compromised and bought her a guitar for $5. Though she cut her musical teeth on folk icons like Joan Baez, John Prine and John Denver, Wendy has a taste for all genres. “But,” she confides, “I have a real penchant for country music. Especially the old stuff.”

As a teenager in Wisconsin, she loved playing music, loved playing with words, displaying a natural talent for chords and song form. Her earliest attempts at songwriting were primarily parodies; but since true purpose or focused intent for her songs remained elusive, Wendy eventually sidelined those efforts. It wasn’t until she became a Christian that words and music began to merge in a meaningful, more powerful way.

“I got saved at a Christian music concert. The drive home was a profound experience. I’d driven that same road, passed the same houses, trees, and cornfields a thousand times, but all of a sudden each one of those things had meaning. And, finally, so did I. Next morning I wrote my first song. And I have never really stopped. I write songs because that’s who I am,” she explains. “I think that’s who God made me to be.”

Lyrically rich and poetically fluid, Wendy’s own music ranges from spiritually pensive to humorously clever. She casts a wide net for inspiration: Poetry, hymns, and the Bible; an avid reader, she doesn’t dismiss the ideas that spring from the pages of good literature, either. And, of course, great songwriters from today and yesterday will move her to the guitar or piano. “I think I'm influenced more by great songs than any one songwriter“, she says. Old standards like “Stardust” or current hits like “The House That Built Me” all dovetail into her creative psyche.

It’s no wonder, then, that the breadth and depth of Wills-penned songs, like Dove Award®nominated “Glorious Impossible,” recorded by The Gaither Vocal Band on the Grammy®- and Dove Award®-nominated album, Give It Away, have been favorites among listeners and critics alike. Doug Anderson (baritone for Ernie Haase and Signature Sound), Karen Peck and New River, Janet Paschal, Jeff and Sherri Easter, David Phelps, Gordon Mote, Natalie Grant, 33Miles, Gary Chapman, Jaci Velasquez, Canadian singer/songwriter Jill Paquette and rising country star Paul Bogart are some of the artists who have recorded Wendy’s songs. And her worship songs are being sung in churches all around the world. She has two albums of her own, “Field of Dreams” and “The Shape of Things”, available by contacting her at wendy@wendywills.net