INTERVIEW
Bebo Norman: His Heart, His
Home
By Marti Paradee and David
Sisson
The 700 Club
CBN.com
– If you like Bebo Norman’s straight-from-the heart songs,
you’re not alone. Just this year he was nominated for eight Dove awards.
Lisa Ryan recently talked with Bebo about his life--and yes--his new love (sorry
girls!) at his home in Nashville.
LISA RYAN (reporting): So, how’d he get the name "Bebo?" Exactly
the same way guys called Bubba got their nickname.
BEBO NORMAN: It’s not my real name. I’ve been Bebo since I was
4 years old. My little sister couldn’t say big brother. She started calling
me Bebo, and so it stuck. I’m from Georgia. Things like that stick in
Georgia.
LISA RYAN (reporting): Bebo grew up in Columbus, Georgia, in what he describes
as a "functional" family, but his life is now centered in Nashville.
BEBO NORMAN: I’ve known a lot of people, thousands in my life, but I’ve
really only been known by just a few. Those few are here, excluding my family
that’s down in Georgia. It’s just been a blessing.
LISA RYAN: Did you always want to be a songwriter and an artist?
BEBO NORMAN: No. As a kid, as some sort of a big idea, but as I grew older,
I really didn’t have any desire. I wanted to go to medical school, so
I studied biology in college and graduated with that degree and really just
wrote songs almost on the side. I just wrote them in my own time for personal
reasons. It was an interesting process to watch friends start to come around
me and say, 'You know, you should at least see what could happen with this.'
They said they had been effected by it, and that blew me away. They said they
thought that maybe other people could be, too.
Sometimes at night, when I am afraid, I cover my eyes and I cover my
shame. So here in the dark, broken apart, come with your light, and fill up
my heart…
 I
sat in my apartment one night on the couch, coming face to face with a lot
of the fears that I have and realizing maybe for the first time that God is
bigger than those fears. This beautiful lightening thunderstorm had come through
Nashville that night. I had all my windows open. It had been raining really
hard and storming. I remember watching the storm go by, and after, it got
just really peaceful and really dark and really quiet. I just picked up my
guitar and started writing, so that’s what came out. Quite a few of the
songs, especially on this last record, ironically enough, are about home and
about my struggle to find what home is and my struggle to find that in such
an ambiguous career of being gone and of being with different people. It breeds
loneliness and it breeds fear of being alone.
LISA RYAN: How does it feel to be honored with all these Dove nominations
this year?
BEBO NORMAN: It’s great. I mean, it’s one of those things that
is definitely flattering and it’s nice to feel that people recognize
what you’re doing. As fun as that is, I guess it’s always tempered
with that idea of going, 'Ok, that’s great, but don’t be validated
or increased by what people think of you. Be increased by how the Lord sees
you.' That’s my hope.
LISA RYAN (reporting): Overcoming fear is a theme often expressed in Bebo’s
songs. The rugged sport of Kayaking has become one of Bebo’s favorites.
Facing the dangers of the sport help him face his fears.
BEBO NORMAN: You face a lot of fear when you kayak. When you face fears physically,
or even emotionally, it does teach you to how to open up to face fears spiritually
and relationally and all those kinds of things. On one hand it makes me feel
rugged and like a man somehow because I can try my hardest, but I’m not
the picture of physical prowess to anyone.
LISA RYAN: So, kayaking does that for you? (laughter)
BEBO NORMAN: Exactly.
LISA RYAN: Are you in the marriage market, because I do a little matchmaking
on the side?
 BEBO
NORMAN: Do you really? Who do you have in mind? (laughter) I avoided that
question. I’ve actually been dating someone for almost nine months now,
which is kind of crazy to think about, but it’s been a beautiful thing.
It has. It’s been something that I never expected, and I know people
always say that, but I haven’t dated anybody for a long time in my life,
basically since I started playing music.
LISA RYAN: You just broke hundreds of hearts. You know that.
BEBO NORMAN: The weird thing is I haven’t talked about that yet publicly.
I guess I have. I talk about it on stage every now and again.
LISA RYAN: What’s next for Bebo? Decorating?
BEBO NORMAN: Yes, decorating, exactly. I want to work in my yard. I’m
going to take a nice little break this summer from my brain and from my heart
and just be home.
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