David didn’t write Broken all by himself. He did the music and had a composer working with him (co-wrote). They worked on it while David was in Manila.

I remember David said in an interview that the music/melody comes first to him before the lyrics.

@JoyYap @CanadianArchie David did not write Broken. He did the music and worked with the writer while we were in Manila.

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Kari Sellards (@kariontour) July 16, 2012

@Marylee_DA2014 I was there and it was emotional

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Kari Sellards (@kariontour) July 16, 2012

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Libbie Linton recorded Don’t Give Up after David left Utah for his mission.

@pastelpastel glad you liked her voice. She recorded it after David left. They were never in the studio together.

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Kari Sellards (@kariontour) July 16, 2012

Libbie Linton, a Utahn singer/song writer, who duets with David on Don’t Give Up (my favorite now).

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Also, Kari said he has lots of songs he starts working on.

@jAsZcaLLmejAsz not sure. He has lots of those he starts working on.

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Kari Sellards (@kariontour) July 16, 2012

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Dean Kaelin, David’s voice coach before AI, shares on David Archuleta and BEGIN.:

I am afraid that I won’t be very helpful on this at all unfortunately. Kurt and John are great and very talented, so I am sure the album came out well, but I haven’t even heard the finished project yet. My only involvement really was warming up David and keeping his voice in shape throughout the very compressed recording process.

David’s part of the entire album was finished in the last 2 weeks before David left on his mission. In fact, even on the Monday before he left he was doing some finishing touches. Kurt Bestor and David selected the songs to record. Kurt put together quick arrangements so that there would be something for David to sing to. Then David sang all the songs. After David left, Kurt and John finished the arrangements and orchestrations, mixed and mastered it and Deseret Book put together the artwork, CD duplication and marketing.

For David’s part, he did an amazing job. On the recording session I attended David sang the song 4 or 5 times (*Dean attended “Everybody Hurts” by R.E.M) so that Kurt would have different takes to choose from. I felt that any one of the takes could have been used for a finished product. David’s tone, interpretation, pitch and control were so great that each take sounded like it was ready for the album. This is EXTREMELY unusual in today’s music world. Most singers go over and over a section trying to get it close, then the engineers use electronic tools to tune the voice and make it sound good. The fact that David did this so quickly will definitely give the album more of a ‘live’ and an honest feeling. It isn’t ‘manufactured’ and perfected by electronic gadgets, but David’s soulfulness, emotion, passion and interpretation come through clearly and naturally. I am quite certain that his fans will really enjoy it.

Source: AFS