MARS HILL, N.C. (828newsNOW) — Kate Sorrells, 33, is a singer and vocal coach living in Nashville, Tennessee. Before that, however, she was a Mars Hill native, a graduate of North Buncombe High School and a proud member of the Asheville community.

When Hurricane Helene hit western North Carolina, Sorrells didn’t see it coming.

“I was in Nashville when it hit, and I was thinking that I was gonna go home and hunker down, because I thought it was gonna hit Nashville and flood,” Sorrells recalled. “I was like, I’m going to go home, because the mountains are always a safe place to be.”

What Sorrells could not have anticipated was the devastation Helene would wreak on Asheville. What had seemed like a safe mountain harbor transformed into a nightmare.

“I was feeling so helpless about what I could do,” Sorrells said.

Singer and vocal coach Kate Sorrells in the mountains she sings about in “Mountain Strong.”

Sorrells filed missing persons reports for old high school friends and donated where she could, but living in Nashville, she felt far away from where help was needed.

“I was wondering, what can I do to help? Because I’m not there, I can’t get on the ground to help rebuild physically,” Sorrells said. “So, I thought, okay, you’ve gotta use what you can do and use your skills. I’m a songwriter.”

Sorrells sought to channel the pain and destruction of Helene into a hopeful song about the strength and resilience of the Appalachian people.

“I thought to myself, we need something that is going to inspire,” Sorrells said. “I just want to write something that’s going to make everybody feel good and know that we are going to be okay.

The end result, “Mountain Strong,” is an upbeat country-flecked ballad. Sorrells’ voice is powerful and soulful as she recounts her life among the mountains and the tenacity of the people there.

“The chorus goes ‘Come Hell or high water/In the name of the Father/You won’t bring these mountains down.’ It’s really a testament to, it doesn’t matter what hits us,” Sorrells explained. “Floods, landslides, fires, we always rebuild and we always survive.”

Sorrells’ music can be found on all major streaming platforms.