Arden, North Carolina (November 5, 2021) — Following a year that’s seen success for her two most recent singles, “Goin’ Home Comin’ On” and “My Kind of Nightlife,” Mountain Home Music Company artist Carley Arrowood reveals new dimensions to her talents—this time as a songwriter—on her latest release. Written with award-winning composer Becky Buller, “Letting Go Now” offers a classic take on romantic disappointment as the singer and fiddle player gives a performance that convincingly delivers the lyric’s melancholy story.
Backed by the same group that appeared on its predecessors — IBMA and Steve Martin Award-winning banjoist Kristin Scott Benson, powerhouse mandolin player Wayne Benson, award-winning guitarist Daniel Thraikill and producer Jon Weisberger (bass) — the song offers a compelling match between Arrowood’s imaginative ability in creating its narrator and her interpretive skill as a singer. Punctuated by warm, sympathetic solos from Thrailkill and Arrowood (who can’t resist sneaking a bit of fiery virtuosity into the end of hers), “Letting Go Now” depicts a woman done with trying to make a one-sided relationship work, and while it’s taken her a while, the song’s ending— “since you don’t feel the same, so long to all this pain” —makes clear the finality of her decision.
“’Letting Go Now’ was a fun co-write over text messages with Becky Buller in early 2020,” she recalls. “Within three days of texting and sending voice memos we had it done! It’s a bittersweet song about how sometimes you can do all you can to hang on to someone, but if they aren’t as devoted as you it may be hurting you worse. I love how Becky added a ray of hope to the poor heart in the song, though: ‘There’s a greater picture, a plan that I can’t see…’ refers to God’s awesome plans for our lives, regardless of how we think they should go. It makes me think about my own life a little bit as well, in seeing how sometimes certain relationships aren’t meant to be, and how God provides the right one at the right time if we’ll just let go of the past in faith. It brings a lot of relief and peace, and I’m glad I wound up with the one who was ‘meant for only me’!”
Cast as a duet with Thrailkill, whom she married in June, “Letting Go Now” serves as still another reminder that, though she’s only 25 years old, Carley Arrowood is already an artist whose musical maturity, emotional depth and abundant talent set her apart from the rest.
Listen to “Letting Go Now” HERE.
About Carley Arrowood
Though she’s young, Carley Arrowood is already something of a musical veteran. Singing since she was old enough to talk, she’s been playing fiddle for over thirteen years and has spent the past five years as a featured band member with the award-winning duo of Darin & Brooke Aldridge.
Carley began playing in a classical vein but soon gravitated toward the bluegrass music and fiddle tunes of her western North Carolina home. With her sister, Autumn, she formed a band called Carolina Jasmine, which became the first all-female group to win the Junior Band Championship at the famed Fiddlers Grove convention. Her career progress flourished through high school, as she began to work at Dollywood, competed in — and took home trophies from — an impressive list of fiddle contests, and became one of the featured musicians in the International Bluegrass Music Association’s (IBMA) annual Kids on Bluegrass program.
A developing songwriter — her “Jesus Drive The Train,” a co-write with the award-winning Becky Buller, earned her a showcase appearance at the IBMA’s World of Bluegrass in 2015 — Carley’s been recognized for her fiddle playing as well, receiving an IBMA Momentum Instrumentalist of the Year trophy in 2017. And in 2014, just a day after graduation, Carley began filling in with Darin and Brooke, joining them full-time that fall after turning 18. Since then, she’s performed with the duo at the Grand Ole Opry, on television shows like “Larry’s Country Diner,” on European tours and at bluegrass festivals and concerts around the country.