Cherise Carver, a country musician from Rogers, has hit the radio with her new song, “Get Back Home,” with the catch phrase “It’s never too late if I’m breathing.” The 51-year-old singer sings about self doubt and the power of reconnecting with one’s true self. Carver stopped by the The Free Weekly’s podcast studio for an interview with music editor Monica Hooper.

Q. Tell me about your new song, “Get Back Home.”

A. So “Get Back Home” is a song that was written about a year ago. Chris Collins and I have a studio called Crimson Rose Studio in Rogers. And that’s where we write and produce music. So about a year ago, I sat down, and I was actually new to guitar; I play piano. Chris had showed me four chords. It was all I knew. I wanted to start writing more country songs. And I just started within those four chords. I just started writing this song. And this one actually came together pretty quick. Most of them can take days, sometimes weeks, sometimes months. But this particular song came about in about 20 minutes. The funny thing is, I didn’t like it. … So that’s been a joke about this song. I was saying, ‘It’s not a song. It’s not a song.’ But Chris really liked it, and he said, we should go ahead and record it. And so we did. Chris actually did all the production on the song and all the instruments with the exception of some of the guitar playing, which was done in Nashville by a studio musician there.

Q. I’ve read that at 50, you decided to throw caution to the wind and focus on your passion of music. So was there a particular event that led to this, that led to you to focus just on music?

A. There was. Being in corporate for over 22 years, I was at the point where it’s kind of ‘now or never,’ and my son is about to finish college at the University of Arkansas, so it was really good timing to say, ‘You know what, this is the time to do it.’ So I just decided to switch careers.

Q. When you were in the corporate job, were you also playing music during that time period — on the side or at home or by yourself?

A. Yes, I played at home, and I was writing. Because I did have to work a full-time job and I had a son, my goal at that time was just to be a songwriter, and to pitch to other people. But then things changed. I decided I would go ahead and be an artist; I had been an artist before. Years ago, I was in Southern gospel music. But again, I put it on hold to have my career and my son. So I’m getting back into it. I’m not new at the business, but I’m new to Red Dirt Country. And this is the first single, and this genre really fits us. We resonate with it, and we love that. It’s older country music, but they’re new songs with that traditional sound. So it just fits us really well.

Q. You said you’re planning and looking at doing gigs gigs now, so you haven’t played a lot of shows yet?

A. Correct. We kind of did this backwards. We were writing and producing music, and we just kept meeting people in the business. Then it was decided the song would be a good song for radio. … We were really shocked. I’m hoping to break 100 next two weeks. [The song was at number 87 as of July 19.] But what we have to do now is to start gigging. We got our first gig lined up yesterday, and it’s going to be in Beeville, Texas, Sept. 10, for a music festival. So we’ll be gearing up for that, but we would love to have a few shows before. We’re here in Arkansas. So if anybody listening [or reading] would like some live country music, we are ready to go.

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Listen Here!

Listen to the podcast of this interview at nwaonline.com/717carver. See a video of Cherise Carver performing, “Get Back Home,” on the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette’s YouTube page: www.youtube.com/c/nwademgaz

Follow Cherise Carver at: cherisecarver.com