Proud.

Written by Heather Small and PJV.

ASCAP and BMI Award winning, Stevie American Business and Anvil Awards winner, Proud had a convoluted journey to the outside world. Heather and I originally wrote the song as part of a film soundtrack I was writing. On the day we wrote it Heather announced (upon arrival at the studio) that she would like to do something that simply “made her feel proud”. We wrote the chorus almost immediately and later that evening I recorded myself hundreds of times in an attempt to simulate a choir singing in accompaniment. Despite trying to add some great session singers in the final production, the only way the chorus seemed to come alive was to leave that one-man choir from the demo (I lost my voice doing it – but it had the right vibe). We had no idea at the time that Proud would become so widely used in conjunction with the Olympic games (Sydney 2000/London 2012) and so many sporting events and programmes, the theme of Oprah Winfrey’s show (to benefit victims of Hurricane Katrina), and in 2009 the most played TV theme in the United States for its usage in ‘The Biggest Loser’.