Gospel Music

First of all, kudos to Steven Dolins of The Sirens Records for the consistently high production quality of his releases. This is the second project I’ve heard from this Highland Park, Illinois-based label that has as its mission the preservation of roots piano. Each CD sounds as if the musicians [...]

Hailing originally from Chicago’s West Side, Percy Carter, Jr. and Alton Woodley, Jr. recently released Whatever Brought You Out on Perseverance Records. This is a very pleasant project, fun to listen to, and the melodies are memorable long after the CD stops spinning. This is not surprising, as both Carter [...]

NU DNA is made up of Midwesterners Larry and Marc Frye and Kelvin Moore. According to the group’s press kit, “NU DNA is what happens to a person’s Deoxyribonucleic Acid after just one real encounter with Christ.” Recognizing that biochemical theology is not a subject typically bantered about in gospel [...]

When one thinks of Chicago gospel, names such as Thomas Dorsey, Roberta Martin, Kenneth Morris, Sallie Martin, and Mahalia Jackson come to mind. But there were many other shining lights in the Chicago gospel music community "back in the day," and many of them came out of the Church of [...]

Judge Not, the debut CD from Omaha, Nebraska-based quartet Second Chance (Higher Praise Records), is slated for release on November 26, 2004. The project’s magnum opus is a mostly a cappella rendition of “Lord’s Prayer.” It sounds strikingly similar to the beautiful arrangement that Rev. Claude Jeter and the Swan [...]

It’s not entirely accurate to call Dana Divine an “emerging artist,” as she has a sizable music resume, including more than a dozen singles to her credit, and is well known for originating the “Gospel Slide” (“I wanna get funky for Christ”), perhaps the first time in music history that [...]

"View the City" -- Rizen 2003 On CD Rizen (Light Records) Their official website (www.rizen.biz) calls Michigan-born Rizen a “retro gospel girl group.” That makes perfect sense. Shades of the Caravans, Davis Sisters, Ward Singers and Gospel Harmonettes spring to mind upon hearing Rizen – Adriann and Aundrea Lewis, Kanika [...]

For a long time, gospel music and what is now termed contemporary Christian music were disparate genres. Today it seems as if each is picking up some of the qualities of the other: CCM is getting rootsier and funkier, and gospel is incorporating some of the lovely melodies that have [...]

A native of Durant, Mississippi who now serves as senior pastor of Victorious Christian Worship Center in Rockford, Illinois, Cornelius “Neal” Roberson is a talented minister, singer, songwriter, and a very funny master of ceremonies. I had the good fortune of seeing him in action a couple of times at [...]

This well-written article, posted on PopMatters (www.popmatters.com), is at once a succinct history of Golden Era gospel quartet singing and a poignant tribute to an African American migrant -- "as old-school and country as they come" who moved from Georgia to Harlem after the Second World War in search of [...]