Article Contributed by Gratefulweb
Published on 2026-09-29
Photo credit: Russ Harrington
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — September 26, 2026 — Wooten Hill, the Americana duo of Grammy-nominated, Dove Award-winning singer-songwriter Kim Hill and celebrated songwriter, musician and award-winning film composer Paulette Wooten, announces its new album, How Did We Get Here, available digitally October 23, 2026, via Parker & Yon Records. A vinyl edition will be available later this year.
The 12-track album was co-produced and engineered by Grammy Award-winning Charles Yingling and co-produced by Wooten Hill. Cornerstones include the title track along with “I Hear You Calling,” “Tell Me Now” and “Rise.” An all-star lineup of guest vocalists, including Vicki Hampton, Robert Bailey, Kim Keyes and Shelly Fairchild, appears on several tracks. Noted musicians on the project include Philippe Bronchtein, Kevin Dailey and Marc Rogers.
The songs were primarily written by Paulette Wooten, with several co-written by Kim Hill, including “Gold Stars,” co-written with New York Times bestselling author Jen Hatmaker.
How Did We Get Here was recorded in Nashville at The Blueroom Studios, the same room where legendary producer Brent Maher first told them in 2016 that they should sing together as a duo “like the Everly Brothers or The Judds.”
The album plays like pages from a travel diary, with snapshots from the musical journey Hill and Wooten have taken since forming as a duo a decade ago. The album launches alongside a companion podcast, The Road to Wooten Hill. Each episode shares the stories behind the songs and conversations with friends who walked different stretches of the road with them.
“There’s a level of gratitude I have now that I couldn’t have accessed at the beginning of my career. This record is about realizing you’re allowed to become a new version of yourself—to lose what once defined you, question what you thought you knew, start over, fall in love, and find there’s still so much life ahead. We’re not trying to prove anything. We’re just finally ready to share where the road has taken us.”
— Kim Hill
“This album has been the work of a lifetime—a work I didn’t know I was creating. Most of these songs were written as a process, not a performance. Snippets from my journal. My heart. Little pieces of a life unfolding before I knew what they would become. Somehow, all those pieces became How Did We Get Here.”
— Paulette Wooten
“This was the truest project I’ve worked on in years, and probably my career. Wooten Hill brought everything they had to the studio, and left nothing out. It was so real and raw, and the vocals just blew me away with how they meshed with each other.”
— Charles Yingling
How Did We Get Here Tracklist
1. “Gold Stars” (Paulette Wooten and Jen Hatmaker)
2. “Billiard Fool” (Paulette Wooten)
3. “Rise” (Kim Hill and Paulette Wooten; featuring Vicki Hampton, Robert Bailey, Kim Keyes and Shelly Fairchild)
4. “How Did We Get Here” (Paulette Wooten)
5. “I Hear You Calling” (Kim Hill and Paulette Wooten)
6. “Robby James” (Kim Hill and Paulette Wooten)
7. “Tell Me Now” (Paulette Wooten)
8. “Hold My Hand” (Paulette Wooten)
9. “Borrowed Time” (Paulette Wooten)
10. “Gone Like a Ghost” (Paulette Wooten)
11. “Getting Through” (Paulette Wooten)
12. “Let It Be Love” (Kim Hill; featuring Vicki Hampton, Robert Bailey, Kim Keyes and Shelly Fairchild)
For 10 years, Hill and Wooten made a living doing just about everything except music. Hill pivoted from a career that had already produced a dozen No. 1 singles on Christian radio, two of which were from her 1988 debut album, and Wooten set aside her own career as a songwriter, musician and film composer. Sixteen years ago, the two fell in love and chose each other, knowing it would cost them the worlds they had built their lives in.
Unwinding those careers took years, and they built new ones along the way, from creative retreats to a design company to a nonprofit. In 2020, they released their first EP as Wooten Hill and played their first show the night before the world shut down. COVID closed their retreat, and they lost the property. So they turned to Wooten’s famous pecan bacon rub, the one retreat guests always asked about, and began selling it. When New York Times bestselling author Jen Hatmaker put the brand-new company on her holiday wish list, orders poured in from across the country.
Now, a decade after choosing each other over the careers they had built, Hill and Wooten are finally making the music they set out to make.
About Wooten Hill
Wooten Hill is the Burnsville, North Carolina-based Americana duo of Kim Hill, a Grammy-nominated, Dove Award-winning CCM artist, and Paulette Wooten, a songwriter, accomplished musician and award-winning film composer in the Christian music genre.
Hill achieved 12 number-one songs on Christian radio and specialized CCM charts—CCM Update and Christian Research Report Inspirational and AC charts. The first two No. 1 hits were from her 1988 debut album. She also had a No. 1 CMT video with “Janie’s Gone Fishin’” from her BNA Records album So Far, So Good, produced by Grammy Award-winning songwriter, producer and composer Wayne Kirkpatrick.
Wooten’s film-scoring credits include Eva’s Desert (2008) and Rise of the Wahine: Champions of Title IX (2014), winner of the Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature at the Hawaii International Film Festival. Hill and Wooten formed the duo in 2016 after producer Brent Maher suggested they sing together at Nashville’s The Blueroom Studios. Their debut EP was released in 2020.
Beyond music, Hill and Wooten host The Nashville Treehouse women’s retreats, started The Treehouse & Co. spice company, and founded the nonprofit Friends of the Treehouse, which offers retreats and resources for people facing loss, grief and crisis. Their new album, How Did We Get Here, on Parker & Yon Records will launch with the companion podcast The Road to Wooten Hill.
For more information, visit www.wootenhill.com.