Y’Anna – The Promise

Y’Anna
The Promise
Imago Dei Music Group 2010
http://www.yannacrawley.net/

“I’m a diamond in the rough,” Y’Anna Crawley asserts on “Stronger,” a track from her debut CD The Promise, released last month on Max Siegel’s new Imago Dei Music Group imprint.

The singer, known simply as “Y’Anna” (pron. EE-AH-NAH) demonstrated that statement when she took home top honors on BET’s “Sunday Best” program, the “American Idol” of gospel singing.

Without reading the liner notes, one can tell from the album’s very first note (on the anthemic “I Believe”) that Imago Dei surrounded the singer with some of the industry’s top talents. Among the leading lights gathered for The Promise are Lou “Buster” Brown, who produces and co-writes. PAJAM’s J Moss and Paul Allen deliver the goods on “I’m Blessed,” though the synth-drenched “Right Now,” produced by Scott “Shavoni” Parker, sounds more like PAJAM than PAJAM. James “Big Jim” Wright, Rickey Grundy, Natalie Wilson…the list goes on.

Naturally, The Promise includes Bill Withers’ “Grandma’s Hands,” the song that catapulted Y’Anna to the top of the judges’ list on the television program, although the inspirational title track and autobiographical “Stronger” are more revealing of the artist’s personal life. Listen to “Stronger,” in fact, and you will hear the story of the young woman’s struggles and overcoming.

Thanks to the assembled talent and Y’Anna’s unfettered energy, the album is power packed and speeds along at the brisk pace of a Damita Haddon or Kiki Sheard recording. Amidst the urban AC and power pop arrangements, Y’Anna is given room to exercise the full range of her vocal skills on “Lookin’ Toward Heaven” and “You’re Still God.” It is on these two tracks that she shines most brightly and the world gets a sense of what she has to offer. As such, it would be great to hear her knock out an old hymn or two on her sophomore CD.

The Promise is a fitting title because it introduces a young artist at the dawn of her craft, though even now, at this early stage, she is clearly far more diamond than rough.

Four of Five Stars

gPod Picks: “The Promise,” “Stronger,” “Lookin’ Toward Heaven.”

Reviewed by Bob Marovich for The Black Gospel Blog.