Music was always a big part of her life, but it was not always the plan. Faith Martin, a Gamecock alumna, went to USC for criminology. Six years later, she released a single, "Caroline," and an EP, "HOMECOMING."
“Caroline” is about the nostalgia Faith Martin experienced after moving away from North and South Carolina. After growing up in North Carolina, she attended USC for four years, where she worked as a resident assistant at Columbia Hall. She briefly stayed in South Carolina after graduating, before moving to Florida and later, Washington.
“I was living in Florida the entire time that I was writing music that then became this EP,” Faith Martin said. “There's a touch of homesickness here and there … I was just thinking about some of the imagery and things from home, as far as how downtown areas have changed … Even South Carolina, like the campus looks way different now than what I knew it as.”
AJ Dollmayer, a coworker and friend of Faith Martin's from her time at USC, said they bonded over being small town girls who grew up listening to bluegrass, folk music.
Bluegrass reminded Faith Martin of her home and led her to the title of "HOMECOMING" for her EP. She values hearing a woman in the folksy-country music scene, she said.
"What's so funny is I've heard her sing," Dollmayer said. "Having someone that I admire and having someone that I think is just such an absolute delight in this world, have her own little space in Spotify was so cool."
"Caroline" was one of the first songs Faith Martin professionally wrote. She was inspired by the bluegrass music she heard throughout her life.
Faith Martin said she grew up around music her whole life. Her father played guitar, and her mother sang at her baptist church and she would accompany them to performances with a toy microphone and guitar.
“I was just always kind of surrounded by (music),” Faith Martin said. “We had a music room in our house that had a ton of guitars. At one point, we had a drum kit, … a bunch of different keyboards, a banjo, mandolins, all kinds of stuff.”
When she was in fifth grade, Faith Martin learned to play the guitar from her father, Bill Martin. Faith Martin asked her father to teach her a few chords so she could play a song from her Taylor Swift CD.
Bill Martin helped her learn the key, chord progressions and basic chords. By the end of the week, Faith asked for him to listen.
“I went back there,” Bill Martin said. “I thought she was just going to play the song I had taught her, but she played several songs she had learned by herself off the CD … She was just natural. She started picking it up and learning stuff on her own, and she just grew from there.”
Music became Faith Martin’s hobby, and she joined her first band when she was 12. She did small performances like joining her parents on stage and holding a Christmas concert in a mall.
Before pursuing music as a career, Faith Martin worked as a child forensic interview specialist in Florida. She worked with children that were victims of abuse and neglect. The job was emotionally taxing and not something she saw herself doing for a long time, she said.
“Raindrops,” a song on "HOMECOMING," was inspired by something one of her coworkers said to her.
"You had to just kind of box it up and deal with it later," Faith Martin said. "And that's not necessarily a healthy thing, but in the moment, you can't be on camera in front of a child and they're telling you about the worst thing that's ever happened to them, and then you lose your cool ... Cheryl said, ‘If I ever started crying, I don't think I'd stop,’ and that kind of stuck with me."
Faith Martin said that “Raindrops” was about releasing intense emotions in order to better help others. She used the allegory of storms to show that after bad weather, flowers bloom from the water. Beautiful things come out of ugly moments, she said.
In 2023, Faith Martin had the opportunity to play with folk rock artist, Brandi Carlile. She went through an audition process and eventually played at Carlile’s Mothership Weekend in Florida and Girls Just Wanna Weekend in Mexico. Playing with Carlile changed her perspective after years of focusing on a non-music career.
“It was absolutely horrifying,” Faith Martin said. “The adrenaline of being back on the stage and some of the muscle memory coming back from it, I was like, ‘Okay, actually, I do kind of miss this, and maybe I do want to do this for real this time.’”
Faith Martin decided to take a chance on music when her child forensic interviewer job wrapped up. Dollmayer expressed her pride in Faith Martin's career change.
"I feel like you hear a lot of who she is in her music and her songs and in her voice," Dollmayer said. "Her dependability, her compassion, her love for creativity, you can hear that in her voice."
"Caroline" and "HOMECOMING" are available on all platforms. Follow Faith Martin's Instagram for more updates.