…And Then There Were Two: Trin-i-tee 5:7’s Angel and Chanelle

By Bob Marovich for The Black Gospel Blog

Known as the best selling female gospel trio in music history, Trin-i-tee 5:7 is now a duo. New Orleans natives and original group members Chanelle Haynes and Angel Taylor spoke with TBGB about their early influences and their new music.

TBGB: How does it feel to be a duo now, instead of a trio?

Chanelle: In some ways it is different, but Angel and I are high school buddies, so it’s really like being in high school again.

Angel: I agree. It feels like the day we started, just the two of us, very natural. It’s a good feeling. We’re now carrying a lot more of the pressure, too, but that’s good as well.

Chanelle: It’s quite fascinating how God put us together and sustained us. I remember us spending a lot of time in the gym exchanging music. And when I say a lot of time, I mean we were supposed to be in class! But we were musical soulmates.  We didn’t know then that this passion and love for music would be the glue to our friendship into womanhood.

TBGB: What kind of music were you exchanging in high school? Who were your musical influences?

Angel: Chanelle introduced me to Commissioned. I gave her one of my Yolanda Adams CDs, but mostly I was giving her R&B music because she couldn’t listen to it at home. And she was introducing me to different gospel artists.

Chanelle: Our early influences are R&B and gospel. That’s really the sound of Trin-i-tee 5:7.

TBGB: Is there a New Orleans influence in your music?

Chanelle: Absolutely. My grandfather is a jazz pianist, and my grandmother was a singer in church. As a jazz musician, my grandfather made me understand the importance of honoring the song. He would say it’s great to do your own thing and put your own twist on it, but always respect the body of the song. We have a lot of pride in the musicians who have come out of New Orleans: Louis Armstrong, Mahalia Jackson, Harry Connick, Jr. Lil’ Wayne might be a stretch, but I like him!

TBGB: “Over and Over,” the first single from your forthcoming album, Angel and Chanelle, has had an immediate impact on radio.

Angel: We’ve gotten incredible feedback from the song. It’s humbling, because you never know what’s going to happen with any music that you put out. You just go into the studio with the best intentions. We want to make great music for our fans and for the world, and to see that happen with the song! We already knew when we heard PJ [Morton]’s demo that it was a beautiful and anointed and touching song, so it feels great to get that kind of feedback.

TBGB: Did you know PJ Morton from your New Orleans days?

Chanelle: Yes, we’ve known him since we were teenagers. His father, Bishop Paul Morton, has been one of our spiritual advisors since the day Trin-i-tee was born in 1998. We go way back; we’d be at his parents’ home getting counsel, and he’d be playing around on the piano, but it’s our first time working together professionally. We knew whenever that day would come that it would be something magical.

TBGB: What is the underlying message of “Over and Over?”

Chanelle: That it’s always important to go back to the basics. This world is filled with distractions, and everybody’s ideals are different. You get lost trying to be what people think you should be, but I’m just so glad God loves me for who I am and not for who I could be. This song is all about Him blessing us without us even deserving it. You can’t deserve God’s blessings, He just loves us. We just want to encourage people to embrace the love that He has given all of us.

Angel: It’s the story of Him being in our lives. We never thought we’d still be together fifteen years from the time we came together. We’ve been through a lot: we’ve been up and we’ve been down, but through it all we stuck together as friends, so the song is our life testimony. He keeps on blessing us, and nobody is ever deserving of what God does, so we’re very thankful.

TBGB: Is there an underlying theme to the songs on Angel and Chanelle?

Chanelle: We write about the moment we are in, right then and there. The album is very honest and very current. It’s not something we wrote two years ago. It’s about real life experiences. It’s easy to write about the same topics in gospel music, and they are wonderful and appropriate, but it’s also appropriate to write about what we are going through in ways relatable to our generation.

For example, one of the songs [on the album] is about letting go of the things you desperately want to hang on to. But when you let go, it feels so good, you feel lighter, you feel better. This is a message not just for Christians: we can’t talk to just one group of people; we have to talk to all of God’s children. This includes people who don’t necessarily go to church or who have never thought about having a genuine relationship with God.

TBGB: Are you still helping out with the Hurricane Katrina recovery effort?

Chanelle: It’s a lifestyle now. I think in the beginning, everybody thought, ‘Let’s come together, let’s contribute over here, let’s build over there.’ But if you are a native of New Orleans, you know that this is not just one moment to come together, this is the rest of our lives. It’s going to take that long to get the city…I don’t know that it will ever be what it was.  But the people of New Orleans are very resilient. They are passionate about our culture and the beauty of our city, so what Angel and I do is go back home and do several concerts without charging the churches there. We give concerts that help raise money for the community. That’s one of the ways we’ve given back.

TBGB: What’s next for Trin-i-tee 5:7?

Angel: Promote, promote, promote!

Chanelle: Promoting the record, knowing how much it means to us that people have embraced our music. We never take it for granted that someone says, ‘I love your music.’ It could be a six-year-old child who tries to sing the songs back to you. Moments like that are special to us. We’ll continue spreading the news of God, of Jesus Christ, and hope more people are drawn to Him through our music.

NOTE: Trin-i-tee 5:7 asks everyone to please keep in touch with them through Facebook and Twitter. “We are there a lot,” Chanelle said. “It’s how we stay connected. Angel’s twenty million times better at it than I am, and I figure it out as I go along, but please visit us!”

For more information, go to www.facebook.com/trinitee57 or twitter.com/therealt57

Visit the Trin-i-tee 5:7 website at: musicworldent.com/artists/trinitee57