Christian Retailing

Matt Maher's music travels to space Print Email
Written by Staff   
Thursday, 04 June 2009 11:25 AM America/New_York
I can’t imagine when a music artist cuts a CD that he or she ever imagines the far-reaching impact it could have or the distance it might travel.

If you would have told worship leader Matt Maher that his CD Empty & Beautiful (Essential Records/Provident-Integrity Distribution) would be played during a NASA mission in space one day—not only once, but twice—he probably wouldn’t have believed you.
But indeed it is true. Astronaut Mike Good played Maher’s album in orbit on his iPod for the NASA STS-125 Mission May 11-24. The astronaut toted the CD along for inspiration on his trek into space on Space shuttle Atlantis’ Servicing Mission 4, which was the final astronaut mission to the Hubble Space Telescope.

On his return to Earth, Good e-mailed Matt Maher to let him know “I was praying for you and your band while orbiting above God’s beautiful creation. … It was awesome looking out into space and back at Earth while listening to your beautiful music—really inspiring.”

This is not Empty & Beautiful’s first voyage into space though. In June 2008 astronaut Ron Garan took the CD aboard NASA Mission STS-124.

For more information on Maher and his music, visit www.mattmahermusic.com.