Joe Henschel never planned to become a solo artist. In fact, he was happily leading his band, Farewell Down, until an undeniable call to create praise music captured him – if you will.


“If you had told me five years ago that I was going to be a solo artist, I would have thought you were crazy,” Henschel admits. “I was a band person, all the way.” However, Farewell Down is no stranger to spreading the gospel message, on mission trips to England and Russia and all around Henschel’s hometown San Diego area. But recording solo worship is a new and exciting venture for Henschel. “I’ve always had a passion to be a worship leader, definitely, but I never thought I’d be a worship artist.


Nevertheless, Henschel’s {L}istener Records debut, Capture Me, presents this talented singer/songwriter as a seasoned praise music creator, equipped with a passionate worship leader’s heart. Henschel’s heartfelt 10-song ode to the creator is summed up best in the lyrics to “Sing Your Song” where he pleads, “Sing your song/Sing it loud through me.” Henschel’s “song” is one of deep wonderment over God’s unfathomable majesty, which he expresses beautifully during the CD’s opener, “My Heart Speaks”. “My heart speaks of a mystery of you/All that you do, my Jesus.”


It’s been said that necessity is the motherhood of invention, and for Henschel, the nudging of a colleague initially prompted him to create Capture Me. “Jonny (Macintosh) and I had talked about possibly making a worship album,” Henschel recalls, “and a month later I had 15 songs that I presented to him.” By focusing on songs of worship, Henschel looked inward in ways he had never done before, which then produced the lovely outflow that is Capture Me. “Writing worship songs was very vulnerable for me,” Henschel confesses. “I kind of had to bring my heart out and really speak to the Lord and say, ‘This is what I’m feeling,’ in simple words. That’s just where the whole album came out of; it’s just this idea of the Lord capturing me. And he has captured my heart.”


Henschel grew up in the church, the son of a pastor at Calvary Chapel, Vista, and accepted Christ as his personal savior in the 8th grade. After ingesting a steady diet of Switchfoot, Jimmy Eat World, and Coldplay music, Henschel was inspired to make his own rock music. But these days, folks like Charlie Hall, Phil Wickham, and Chris Tomlin have fueled Henschel’s mission to make personalized worship music. Henschel was only sixteen when he first started playing music. “The minute I picked up a guitar and had learned two or three chords,” he recalls, “my dad, who was a men’s group leader, put me out in front of all the men and I started leading worship.”


God called Joe Henschel to a life of worship at a tender age and has been faithful to continue the good work He started. Now, with the release of Capture Me, it is Henschel’s desire that God will lovingly capture many more souls for the kingdom.