Beauty Has Grace (2005)

Joel Caballero
Sep 24
3 min read

Updated: Sep 27

Beauty Has Grace is the 12th studio and ninth English album by Christian/

Latina pop singer Jaci Velasquez, released on May 3, 2005 by Word/Curb/

Warner Bros. Records. This album is Jaci's final release on Word Records after being on the label for close to a decade.

Two years have passed since Jaci's last English album Unspoken and her final Sony Discos Spanish language album Milagro. So for this release in 2004, Jaci traveled to the U.K. in the district of Kensal Town, which is in the region of London to record Beauty Has Grace. Jaci worked with Swedish producer and musician Martin Terefe, who is also London based. Terefe has worked with and produced albums by Jason Mraz, James Morrison, a-ha and KT Tunstall among others. The album's sound has more of an indie pop and organic sound showing a new musical side. Jaci originally wanted to name the album Kensaltown, after the district and the recording studio where she recorded and wrote the album, but the label was concerned that people would confuse "Kensaltown" with "Tinsel Town" so they changed it to Beauty Has Grace, a line in the song "This Love." The release date for the album was pushed back several times to May 3, 2005. The label also changed the track listing of the album which first featured the song "Hold On to This Moment," but it was replaced for "Reason to Believe." The track "Tonight" features guest vocals by English singer and songwriter Michael Clarke.

Jaci was involved in the making of the album serving as a co-executive producer

with Dion Lopez and Jaci and Lopez both produced the track "Something Beautiful," while Terefe produced the rest of the album. Jaci co-wrote six of the album's ten songs. Beauty Has Grace's first single "With All My Soul" failed to chart on either the Christian CHR or AC charts. The second single "Lay It Down" did chart, but only on Radio & Records Christian Inspo chart peaking at number 14. Both tracks did not chart on the Billboard Christian songs charts. The label did very little to promote the album. Beauty Has Grace debuted and peaked at number 13 on the Top Christian Albums and peaked at number 195 on the Billboard 200 Albums, making this her last appearance on the latter chart.

NOTE: an exclusive artist edition of Beauty Has Grace was sold exclusively at Family Christian Stores comes with a Jaci Velasquez signature on the front cover of the CD and the bonus track "Love Will Find You." It is not the same track that was recorded in English that Jaci originally sang in Spanish as "Llegar a Ti." Jaci and Lopez produced the bonus track.

Track listing

1. I'm Not Looking Down (Jaci Velasquez, Martin Terefe, Michael Clarke) -3:48

2. With All My Soul (Jaci Velasquez, Steve Hindalong, Mark Byrd) -4:00

3. Prayer to Love (Jaci Velasquez, Chris Faulk, Hunter Davis) -4:12

4. Lay It Down (Chris Eaton, Brian White, Don Poythress) -4:01

5. Something Beautiful (Yancy, Jeremy Bose) -3:29

6. Tonight (featuring Michael Clarke) (Mark Byrd) -3:53

7. When You Hold Me (Andy Smith, Brian Lee, Chad Howat, JT Daly, Josh Heiner)

-3:20

8. Reason to Believe (Jaci Velasquez, Martin Terefe, Brad Jacoby) -4:36

9. Supernatural (Jaci Velasquez, Martin Terefe, Darren Potuck, Nick Whitecross)

-3:32