Learning to Breathe is the fourth album by American country music

Country music

Country music is a popular American musical style that began in the rural Southern United States in the 1920s. It takes its roots from Western cowboy and folk music...

 singer Larry Stewart

Larry Stewart (singer)

Larry Stewart is an American country music singer, best known for his role as lead singer of the country pop band Restless Heart...

. The final solo album of his career, it was released in 1999 on Windham Hill Records

Windham Hill Records

Windham Hill Records is a subsidiary of Sony Music Entertainment specializing in Acoustic, New Age and Folk music. Originally founded in 1976 as an Independent record label by guitarist and carpenter William Ackerman and his then-wife Anne Robinson, Windham Hill was a successful and well-respected...

. "Still in Love", the only single, failed to chart. "Summer in the City" is a cover of a single originally recorded by The Lovin' Spoonful

The Lovin' Spoonful

The Lovin' Spoonful is an American pop rock band of the 1960s, named to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000. When asked about his band, leader John Sebastian said it sounded like a combination of "Mississippi John Hurt and Chuck Berry," prompting his friend, Fritz Richmond, to suggest the name...

. After the album's release, Stewart rejoined Restless Heart in 2003, and has been a member since.

Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Stephen Thomas Erlewine is a senior editor for Allmusic. He is the author of many artist biographies and record reviews for Allmusic, as well as a freelance writer, occasionally contributing liner notes. He is also frontman and guitarist for the Ann Arbor-based band Who Dat?Erlewine is the nephew...

 rated the album three stars out of five in Allmusic, saying that he considered it to have a more adult contemporary than country sound, but referring to Stewart's voice as "smooth [and] robust."

Track listing

1. "Take This Heart" (Larry Stewart, John Bettis
   John Bettis
   John Bettis is an American lyricist who has co-written many famous popular songs over the years. In 2011, John was inducted into both the Songwriters Hall of Fame as well as the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame....
   
   , R.C. Bannon
   R.C. Bannon
   Daniel Shipley is an American country music singer, known professionally as R.C. Bannon. Active since 1977, Bannon has recorded for the Columbia and RCA labels. He was also married to singer Louise Mandrell from 1979 to 1991, and charted six duets with her in addition to twelve singles of his own...
   
   ) – 4:54
2. "Anything Else but You" (Stewart, Michael Omartian
   Michael Omartian
   Michael Omartian is an Armenian-American singer-songwriter, keyboardist, and music producer. He has been a participant in over 350,000,000 albums and CD’s sold worldwide, as a producer, arranger, artist or musician, during a career that has spanned over 38 years...
   
   , Bruce Sudano) – 3:45
3. "Learning to Breathe Again" (Omartian, Sudano) – 3:46
4. "In My Dreams Tonight" (Stewart, Jill Colucci
   Jill Colucci
   Jill Colucci is an American songwriter and vocalist. She initially rose to prominence in 1988, singing the main scores to the film Mystic Pizza. She sang the ABC promo campaigns Something's Happening and America's Watching ABC...
   
   , Stewart Harris) – 4:08
5. "Prodigal Daughter" (Stewart, Omatian) – 4:45
6. "Still in Love" (Stewart, Tommy Lee James
   Tommy Lee James
   Tommy Lee James is an American country music songwriter and record producer. Based in Nashville, Tennessee, he is originally from Roanoke, Virginia. He graduated from Northside High School then attended Radford University where he studied voice...
   
   ) – 3:57
7. "Fantasy" (Stewart, Bannon) – 6:34
8. "Gotta Tell Somebody" (Stewart, Phillip Moore) – 4:29
9. "Compared to Goodbye" (Stewart, Moore) – 4:01
   • duet with Tabitha Fair
10. "Takin' My Time" (Stewart, Moore) – 5:07
11. "A Reason to Believe" (Stewart, Robert Ellis Orrall
    Robert Ellis Orrall
    Robert Ellis Orrall is an American singer, songwriter, and record producer. Signed to RCA Records in 1980, Orrall debuted that year with the album "Fixation". His first Top 40 single was "I Couldn't Say No", a duet with Carlene Carter...
    
    , Robert Hart) – 3:47
12. "Summer in the City
    Summer in the City
    "Summer in the City" is the title of a song recorded by The Lovin' Spoonful, written by Mark Sebastian and Steve Boone. It came from their album Hums of the Lovin' Spoonful and it reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in August 1966...
    
    " (Mark Sebastian, Steve Boone
    Steve Boone
    Steve Boone is the bass guitarist for the rock band, The Lovin' Spoonful.After the Lovin' Spoonful stopped touring in 1968, Boone went to work producing an album for Mercury Records by the Oxpetals. Soon after finishing the album Boone bought a 56 ft sailboat 'Cygnus' and moved onto it in the...
    
    ) - 4:13
    • intro: "In the Hall of the Mountain King
      In the Hall of the Mountain King
      In the Hall of the Mountain King is a piece of orchestral music composed by Edvard Grieg for the sixth scene of Act II in Henrik Ibsen's play Peer Gynt, which premiered in Christiania on February 24, 1876....
      
      " by Edvard Grieg
      Edvard Grieg
      Edvard Hagerup Grieg was a Norwegian composer and pianist. He is best known for his Piano Concerto in A minor, for his incidental music to Henrik Ibsen's play Peer Gynt , and for his collection of piano miniatures Lyric Pieces.-Biography:Edvard Hagerup Grieg was born in...
      
      

Personnel

As listed in liner notes.

• Mike Brignardello – bass guitar
  Bass guitar
  The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....
  
  
• Mark Douthit – saxophone
  Saxophone
  The saxophone is a conical-bore transposing musical instrument that is a member of the woodwind family. Saxophones are usually made of brass and played with a single-reed mouthpiece similar to that of the clarinet. The saxophone was invented by the Belgian instrument maker Adolphe Sax in 1846...
  
  
• Tabitha Fair – background vocals
• Billy Gaines – background vocals
• Vince Gill
  Vince Gill
  Vincent Grant "Vince" Gill is an American neotraditional country singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. He has achieved commercial success and fame both as frontman to the country rock band Pure Prairie League in the 1970s, and as a solo artist beginning in 1983, where his talents as a...
  
   – electric guitar
  Electric guitar
  An electric guitar is a guitar that uses the principle of direct electromagnetic induction to convert vibrations of its metal strings into electric audio signals. The signal generated by an electric guitar is too weak to drive a loudspeaker, so it is amplified before sending it to a loudspeaker...
  
  
• John Hammond – drums
• Tom Hemby - electric guitar
  Electric guitar
  An electric guitar is a guitar that uses the principle of direct electromagnetic induction to convert vibrations of its metal strings into electric audio signals. The signal generated by an electric guitar is too weak to drive a loudspeaker, so it is amplified before sending it to a loudspeaker...
  
  
• B. James Lowry – acoustic guitar
  Acoustic guitar
  An acoustic guitar is a guitar that uses only an acoustic sound board. The air in this cavity resonates with the vibrational modes of the string and at low frequencies, which depend on the size of the box, the chamber acts like a Helmholtz resonator, increasing or decreasing the volume of the sound...
  
  
• Michael McDonald
  Michael McDonald (singer)
  Michael McDonald is a five-time Grammy Award winning American singer and songwriter. McDonald is known for a soulful baritone singing style and a multi-octave range. He began his career singing back-up vocals with Steely Dan...
  
   – background vocals
• Chris McHugh – drums
• Jerry McPherson – electric guitar
• Michael Mellett – background vocals
• Gene Miller - background vocals
• Michael Omartian – piano
  Piano
  The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
  
  , organ, synthesizer
  Synthesizer
  A synthesizer is an electronic instrument capable of producing sounds by generating electrical signals of different frequencies. These electrical signals are played through a loudspeaker or set of headphones...
  
  , accordion
  Accordion
  The accordion is a box-shaped musical instrument of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone family, sometimes referred to as a squeezebox. A person who plays the accordion is called an accordionist....
  
  , programming
  Programming (music)
  Programming is a form of music production and performance using electronic devices, often sequencers or computer programs, to generate music. Programming is used in nearly all forms of electronic music and in most hip hop music since the 1990s. It is also frequently used in modern pop and rock...
  
  
• Tiffany Palmer – background vocals
• Chris Rodriguez – background vocals, electric guitar
• Nicol Smith – background vocals
• Jimmie Lee Sloas – bass guitar
• Micah Wilshire – background vocals

Strings

String section

The string section is the largest body of the standard orchestra and consists of bowed string instruments of the violin family.It normally comprises five sections: the first violins, the second violins, the violas, the cellos, and the double basses...

 performed by the Nashville String Machine

Nashville String Machine

Nashville String Machine is a musical collective comprising session musicians and has been credited on recordings as far back as 1974. The Nashville String Machine's composition varies from project to project. It has appeared as large as an orchestra, or as small as a duo.-Notable members:Being a...

, contracted by Carl Gorodetzky and arranged by Michael Omartian.