CD Review: Dr. Norman Hutchins – Where I Long to Be

TBGB reviews...

Where I Long to Be
Norman Hutchins
JDI Records 2006
www.jdirecords.com

Dr. Norman Hutchins has a knack for writing gospel lyrics that become standard church parlance and songs that become compulsory for choirs to learn and perform. “God’s Got a Blessing (With My Name on It)” is the most famous example.

This is no coincidence: Hutchins’s music is designed with church folk in mind. The latest proof of Hutchins’s church roots is on his new CD, Where I Long to Be. Throughout the project, Hutchins shifts back and forth with ease between traditional and contemporary sounds, and without any feeling of contrivance or sense of obligation. With his vocals planted firmly in the traditional church, Hutchins gives even the most contemporary of sacred songs a short lesson in gospel blues when he sings.

Indeed, the standout tracks on Where I Long to Be are the churchy ones, particularly the opening “Get Ready for Your Miracle” (another likely entry into the lexicon of religious phrases), and the pentecostal “Everything Will Be Alright,” which features a splendid vocal by Shervonne Wells of the Kurt Carr Singers. “Because of You” also has a drop of old-church in it.

“Testimony” confirms the CD’s live in-service feeling. The project is supported by high-volume and powerful singing from The “A” Team, a group of background vocalists that any gospel artist would die to have supporting him or her.

Dr. Norman Hutchins’s star continues to rise, and it’s because he lets his roots show while pushing the gospel music envelope forward.

More on Frederick "Nee" Smith and the Sensational Gospel Light

Two years ago, TBGB reviewed “Couldn’t Hear Nobody Pray” by Frederick
“Nee” Smith and the Sensational Gospel Light (Rae Cox 144) as an Essential Gospel pick.

Classic Gospel: Essential Recordings - Week 112

As with many 50s and 60s quartets, biographical information is often scarce, and at the time we were unable to say much about the artists of that powerful performance. I posited a plea for more information. Minister Donnie Addison wrote TBGB recently to shed some “gospel light” on Frederick “Nee” Smith and the Sensational Gospel Light.

It turns out that Freddie was an original member of Tommy Ellison & the Singing Stars, and performed with The Five Blind Boys of Alabama during the time when Clarence Fountain was pursuing his solo career. Smith recorded several songs on some of the Blind Boys’ HOB LPs. In addition to his Rae-Cox singles, Smith also recorded for Hoyt Sullivan’s Su-Ann and HSE imprints.

Although anyone who has met Donnie Addison knows he is a walking encyclopedia of gospel quartet history, how Addison came upon information about Smith is quite interesting.

Addison told TBGB that he was leafing through a stack of records at his aunt's home and came up with something like ten copies each of some of Freddie's 45s. Of course, his curiosity was piqued, and he asked his aunt why she had so many of Smith’s records. She told him that she used to date Freddie Smith when she lived in New York.

His aunt proceeded to tell him hilarious stories about how Freddie & the Sensational Gospel Light female singers would practice their fancy footwork in front of a mirror to make sure everyone was on time with their “shout moves”. As Donnie relates, tongue-in-cheek: “Well, it was the 1960s and hard quartet gospel was competitive. What would it look like to not shout in synchronization?!”

Sadly, his aunt lost touch with Smith and does not know his whereabouts or if he is still alive. Meanwhile, we have a photo provided by Addison to admire (thanks, Donnie!).

Sister O.M. Terrell - Bottleneck Evangelist

Below is a marvelous website and 2001 CBC radio interview with Bruce Nemerov of Middle Tennessee State University on how he came to locate Sister Ola Mae Terrell. Sister O.M. Terrell was an itinerant "Holy Ghost Preacher" who recorded six sides for Columbia Records in 1953, and never recorded again.

Everyone who enjoys bottleneck slide guitar, gospel music, or a good story about finding a long-lost folk music pioneer will appreciate this interesting interview.

Sister Ola Mae Terrell

TBGB Pick of the Week: July 24, 2006

“Man in the Mirror”
The Williams Brothers and Their Superstar Friends
From the album SoulLink Live 3: Man in the Mirror
2006
www.blackberryrecords.com

Blackberry Records’ superstar quartets do an admirable job covering Michael Jackson’s 1988 hit single, the latter which also featured gospel superstars, notably the Winans and Andrae Crouch. This time, the Williams Brothers, Canton Spirituals, Christianaires, Lee Williams and the Spiritual QCs, and Hip Boot Joe provide the gospel flavoring. They replace Jacko’s trademark hiccup and vocal angst with soulful testosterone on a lyric that is inspirational and introspective.

"Man in the Mirror” is the main title for SoulLink Live 3, the latest step in Blackberry’s goal to eke every ounce of utility from the landmark December 2003 SoulLink performance in Atlanta, Georgia. No argument here: American Idols have come and gone since December ‘03, but the SoulLink sound remains fresh and relevant.

Houston Gets All-Gospel FM Station

From TBGB correspondent Joseph Middleton:

Houston, Texas now has its own all-gospel FM radio station: KROI 92.1 FM.

On July 17 at 6:45PM CST, KROI, 92.1 FM changed its format from Spanish radio to gospel. The first song they played was Kirk Franklin & The Family's "Why We Sing". It's a Radio One Station. I found it particularly interesting because I don't think there are many other all-gospel FM stations in the US. I know Atlanta, Raleigh, and Columbus, OH have them; there may be more.

Houston's primary all-gospel station for the time was an AM radio station. Reception was horrible since it was based about 30 miles from town. I could hardly pick it up while in the car. The only time I could pick up gospel on FM was on Sundays when Texas Southern University's radio station would play gospel all day long, Sunday mornings until 1PM on the local R&B station, and on Wednesdays on the same R&B station during its "15 mins. of Praise Show", though they would play only a few gospel songs, or if you were lucky, they would extend it to a special "hour-long presentation". They would sometimes toss gospel songs into the regular secular rotation during the week, most often Kirk Franklin songs.

Then for the past few weeks, I've been wondering why there wasn't an all-gospel FM station in Houston, because I know there is a market here for it. On the 17th, while eating at a restaurant after church, I "accidentally" overheard a conversation a man was having on his cell phone with someone. He mentioned some announcers and said that a station was changing formats. I leaned over to my mom and said, "I overheard something about a station changing formats, I wonder if it'll be to gospel?"

So as we were leaving, we struck up a conversation with him, and soon found out that he is a gospel music producer, and that the station was indeed changing its format to gospel, since the Spanish format was having trouble attracting listeners. I found that to be a little odd because of Houston's high Latino population. Well, I have a new station to add to my preset buttons on the car radio.

TBGB Pick of the Week: July 17, 2006

“On Broken Pieces”
Bishop Paul Morton and Bishop James Dixon II
From the album On Broken Pieces – A Hurricane Relief Project
Blackberry Records 2006
www.blackberryrecords.com

“On Broken Pieces” is a somber but optimistic recording about the resilience of the human spirit in the face of great tribulation – Hurricane Katrina specifically. The song has plenty of street cred: Morton’s Greater St. Stephen Full Gospel Baptist Church in New Orleans suffered significant and crushing damage when the levees broke.

Bishop Morton is joined by Bishop James Dixon II (Hymns to Hang On To), whose native Houston, Texas played no small role in the evacuation of the Crescent City.

“On Broken Pieces” is part of a tribute project with the same title, released this past April by Blackberry Records, from which 100 percent of the proceeds will go to help hurricane victims. But when the singer’s voice breaks a little at the end of the line, “We lost houses and banks, churches, too…even family and friends,” you are reminded of the losses that no proceeds can ever bring back.

Allison to Receive Some Love from Her Beloved Philly

From the Belle Report, July 14, 2006. TBGB congratulates Margaret Allison, a guest on "Gospel Memories," on her well-deserved public appreciation:

Back in the Golden Age of Gospel in the 1950s, Philadelphia produced the Clara Ward Singers, the Davis Sisters and many other great female gospel groups. Among them was Margaret Allison’s Angelic Gospel Singers.

Formed in 1947, Allison’s group will celebrate its 60th year of continuous ministry next year. They were the first gospel group to score a Top Twenty R&B hit when their signature song, “Touch Me Lord Jesus,” reached #13 on Billboard’s R&B chart in 1949 when they recorded for Philly’s fabled Gotham Records label.

Over the years, the group had several personnel changes, but Allison was the only constant – as was her simple quartet melodies. Her punchy keyboarding and husky alto graced such radio hits as “He Never Left Me Alone" and "Jesus, When Troubles Burden Me Down."

They later moved on to Nashboro Records where hits continued to flow. Hollywood agents even came offering opportunities for mainstream success – if they would sing more pop-oriented material. Allison turned down such offers and stuck to the church music she felt called to sing. After Nashboro was sold, the group was picked up by Malaco Records, where they have recorded hits such as “I’ll Go” and “It Could Have Been the Other Way” for the last 25 years.

The soft-spoken woman, who shared stages with a who's who of classic gospel, turns 85 years old in September and recently released her latest CD "Go On" for Malaco Records.

Now, at last, this living legend is being honored for her accomplishments at the first annual En Sound Independent Music Awards on Saturday, August 19, 2006 @ 8:00 PM at the Robert Treat Hotel Grand Ballroom, 50 Park Place, Newark, NJ. All tickets $28.50 and available at www.ticketweb.com.

Others scheduled to perform include Rev. Timothy Wright, June Rochelle, Bryan Wilson, Earl Bynum and Patrick Lundy & the Ministers of Music, among others. For more info, log on at www.ensoundentertainment.com

Media Contact: Bill Carpenter (202) 526-6322 or carpenterbill@mac.com

Caravans Reunite on Record After Forty Years

From Media Jenny:

Malaco Records, the gospel industry’s largest independent label, is set to release The Caravans: Paved The Way, on September 5, 2006. This project is the first for the group in forty years and brings together founder Albertina Walker as well as members Dorothy Norwood, Inez Andrews, and Delores Washington.

The project, initiated and produced by the award-winning, legendary Norwood (Malaco Records), was also co-produced by the Reverend Milton Biggham (Savoy Records, The Georgia Mass Choir) and Albertina Walker. The album includes seven classic standards and features the group’s hit single “Mary Don’t You Weep,” along with six new songs.

Walker, who became known as ‘The Star-Maker’ for her uncanny ability to find phenomenal talent for the group, began her career singing at the age of four at Chicago’s West Point Baptist Church, where the album was recorded. Under the tutelage of the great Thomas A. Dorsey and Mahalia Jackson, Walker’s talents flourished and she went on to earn the title ‘Queen of Gospel’ following the death of Jackson in the sixties.

The Caravans, known as the most popular touring gospel group from the late fifties to early sixties, helped launch highly successful solo careers for many in gospel music such as Dorothy Norwood, Shirley Caesar, Inez Andrews, Bessie Griffin, James Cleveland, and Cassietta George. Malaco Records and its sister label, Savoy, have been home to many of these artists throughout the decades, boasting one of the richest collections of gospel music available.

“We have been fortunate at Malaco to have worked with some of the finest talent in the industry. We are also proud to have played an active role in helping these artists throughout their careers,” states Tommy Couch, Sr., President of Malaco Music Group. “It is exciting to have these four voices come together and recreate the incredible quartet sound that identified The Caravans as one of the hottest gospel groups of all time. They really did pave the way for many to follow, which is why the album title is so fitting,” finishes Couch.

Walker supports Couch’s remarks and states, “All I have ever wanted to do was sing Gospel music and live in Chicago. We paved the way. I’m not bragging or anything, but the Lord used us. He used us to lay the foundation for the future. Money wasn’t the thing. We did it because we loved the Lord. That is what I was taught and that is what I still believe. We were young. We were saved. And any way that He wanted to use us, we were willing to do it and that is the way it was and still is,” Walker adds.

The reunited group will appear on the BET “Lift Every Voice” special, The Bobby Jones Gospel Hour (The Word Network and BET), TV1’s The Gospel of Music with Jeff Majors, television special, Gospel Superfest. Visit www.thecaravans.net for more information.

Essential Gospel – Classic Recordings: No. 137

“There’s a Leak in This Old Building”
Brother Claude Ely
King 1282
1953

Good thing for Elvis that Brother Claude Ely was already signed to Syd Nathan’s King Records, because if an unsigned Ely approached Sun’s Sam Phillips in 1953, Ely, not Elvis, may have become Sam’s Golden Boy, a “white man who can sing like a black man.” Not that Ely would have easily eschewed his evangelizing to enter a world of hip-swiveling and cheesy movies, but make no mistake: Brother Claude was singing like the Hillbilly Cat when Elvis was still crooning “My Happiness” for his mother.

Listen to Ely’s October 1953 incendiary debut single for King, “There’s a Leak in This Old Building,” and you’ll hear him wreck a Whitesburg, Kentucky church in two-and-a-half-minutes with his hyperactive guitar strumming and bad boy blues vocals, a 1950s George Thorogood with an acoustic guitar.

The late historian W.K. McNeil wrote that Ely, who died in 1978, “put on records some of the most powerful country gospel songs ever made.” Well said. Great God almighty, “Leak” is a powerful record!

New Book Spans a Century of Pentecostalism, Explores its Continued Growth

A press release from Faithday Press:

(Hazel Crest, IL July 7, 2006) - As America's mainline Protestant churches
fight for survival, the nation's Pentecostal and Charismatic
denominations are experiencing rapid growth with no end in sight. This
past spring, nearly fifty thousand worshippers traveled to the city of Los
Angeles to celebrate the 1906 Azusa Street Revival, where the majority
of Classical Pentecostals from around the world trace their roots.

How these Spirit-filled congregations have continued to thrive for over a
Century is the subject of Make Room for the Hoy Ghost: The Azusa Street
Revival, Bishop C. H. Mason and One Hundred Years of Pentecostalism in
America, a new 256 page book by Mack C. Mason.

In this Centennial Year release, Mack Mason revisits the Azusa
phenomenon and connects the stories of early Pentecostal leaders William
Seymour, Bishop C. H. Mason, and William Durham, with the many notable
ministers who emerged later, including Aimee Semple McPherson, Oral
Roberts, televangelist Jimmy Swaggart and others. The author also
elevates the often overlooked Garfield T. Haywood, Lucy Smith, Mattie B.
Poole and others.

While the largest Pentecostal groups - the Church of God in Christ and
the Assemblies of God -- both hold Trinitarian views, the best known
Pentecostal minister in modern times is Bishop T. D. Jakes of Dallas, TX
who ascribes to Oneness, a doctrine which divided Pentecostals around
1916. Mack Mason's careful treatment of the subject finally brings
clarity to the origins what was then called "the new issue." Mason also
examines what is now known as the Charismatic Renewal which began in
1959 when an Episcopal Priest experienced Pentecost. Soon thereafter
Baptists, Catholics, Methodists and other groups joined the neo-Pentecostal
movement.

Mack C. Mason is a writer and music critic whose articles appear sites
such as Gospel Flava, The Black Gospel Blog, and his own Gospel Trade
News and Review.

Mason is also a pastor and ordained minister of the Church of God in
Christ, which gives him an inside perspective and appreciation for the
subject. However, he does not back away from the scandals which have
cast negative shadows over the movement. In Make Room for the Holy Ghost,
he thoroughly and graciously enlarges upon the often narrow treatment
of Pentecostalism. The result is an extensive Who's Who among
Pentecostals and long overdue recognition of their various contributions
to its development.

Make Room for the Holy Ghost will surely recruit many new fans for the
author's writing style, which has been called "engaging" by those who
quickly found themselves enthralled by the stories in his previous
books, Saints in the Land of Lincoln and the recent Holding On From The
Inside Out.

Clearly, Pentecostals are here to stay, and Mack Mason's book helps us
to better understand what their "joyful noise" is all about. Make Room
for the Holy Ghost will be available September 5, 2006.

TBGB Pick of the Week: July 3, 2006

“Help Me to Stay Saved”
Keith “Wonderboy” Johnson and the Spiritual Voices
From the album Just Being Me
Verity Records 2006
www.verityrecords.com

You can’t help but grin during old-style quartet redux specialist Keith “Wonderboy” Johnson’s tongue-in-cheek rant on “that’s what’s wrong with the church today." The song reminds me a little of Rev. Anderson Johnson's 1953 slide guitar classic "God Don't Like It," especially the good Reverend's concluding line, "Now I wasn't talking about anyone/I was just singing my song."

Light-hearted, harmless, and with none of the sanctimonious feel of some other songs in this vein, Johnson's “Stay Saved” still gets its point across: you gotta walk the holy walk and talk the holy talk.

Hit Gospel Song is now a Stage Musical

TBGB reported some time ago on the phoenix-like rise of George Jordan's "Jesus Can Work it Out." It went from gospel oldies favorite to megahit, courtesy of the ICEE Records' re-recording of Dr. Charles G. Hayes and the Cosmopolitan Church of Prayer Warriors' 1980s version on Savoy, itself a cover of the Rev. Maceo Woods and the Christian Tabernacle Choir 1970s original. The Warriors' Savoy and ICEE versions both feature the incomparable Dianne Williams as soloist-preacher.

"Work it Out" can now add one more achievement to its CV: gospel musical. "Work It Out," produced by ICEE's Dr. Charles T. White and directed by Rico Nance, will be presented at Chicago's Arie Crown Theatre July 20 - 23, 2006, starring Malik Yoba, Kaye Fox, and none other than Dianne Williams herself. Another fiery gospel singer from Chicago, LaVarnga Hubbard, will be Dianne's understudy. LaVarnga tells TBGB that Dianne will do three shows and she'll do three.

Press on the play says Chicago will be the first of a thirty-plus city tour. So if you can't see it in the Windy City, it may be coming to a stage near you!

For more information on "Work it Out" (the musical) go to www.workitoutplay.com.