The Creation of “I Wish You Peace”

“I Wish You Peace” is a wonderful song about the importance of loving one another, caring for your fellow man and the world around you. Over the years, “I Wish You Peace” has become an annual Holiday video staple at almost 50 music video outlets and networks across the nation. The video achieved true National network airplay a couple of years ago, reaching over 45 million households on a daily basis, in regular rotation on the Gospel Music Channel (GMC).   Additionally, “Peace” went International for the first time in 2009, in regular rotation on CMC Australia, the largest music video TV network in Australia.

Jimmy was asked recently about how he came to write “I Wish You Peace”, and this was his response. “I Wish You Peace” came to be one November morning in 2007 when I was reading a magazine that said every 3 seconds, someone in the world died of “hunger related causes”. I sat there stunned as I began imagining someone dying every 3 seconds. I went in to my studio, and out came this song, as if from another dimension. I recorded it on my little cassette player I use for such occasions, and promptly forgot the entire song! Then I lost the tape player!

I was frantic as I could not for the life of me remember the song, but I knew it was very special. Finally, I found the tape player and recorded a pretty elaborate home demo which I sent to my promoter who went wild for it, demanding I do the master immediately for that holiday season.

I actually did NOT write it for any holiday at all, but the theme of “Peace” did seem to fit the longing of so many people for a world of greater love and compassion, a longing more frequently expressed, unfortunately, only during the holidays. I cut the master and mixed in 3 days, still a record for me, and it immediately went to No. 1 in every smaller market it was first released in.

It subsequently became the most added record in the country on both Biilboard AC and FMQB AC, and has resided in the Top 10 of numerous Mediabase stations every holiday season since. It has become, I suppose, along with “Good Friends Are Hard To Find”, my signature song.

But the purpose of “Peace”, what I felt that November morning, was never for anyone to remember me, or the song. It was simply to remember….to care…to do something about the fact that…”Almost every moment, a starving person dies”. You would think it would be something that we could never forget.

In his impressive thirty year career, White has reached #1 more than a dozen times on the Independent AC Charts and five times on the National AC charts. White has also charted four times in the Billboard AC Top 40 and five times in the FMQB AC Top 10.

Link to the single: https://soundcloud.com/828-records/jimmy-white-i-wish-you-peace
Link to the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JgCGGr0orI

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