Calvin Bridges as told to JGM's Bob Marovich Looking back, I think God set me up to be in gospel music. In the neighborhood where I grew up, on the West Side of Chicago, there was the Holloway Community Choir. I lived around the corner from them. I would go [...]
By Bob Marovich Dwayne Lightsey informed JGM this morning that Nathan Murphy, a gospel singer formerly with the James Herndon Singers and organizer of his own Nathan Murphy Singers, passed away August 17, 2015. The James Herndon Singers were organized in the late 1960s by Caravans accompanist James Herndon. Members of [...]
Laura Kaczor Restore Me LifeThirst Music (release date: July 10, 2015) www.laurakaczor.com By Bob Marovich Restore Me is Laura Kaczor’s (pronounced kuh-ZORE)’s fourth album and first in five years. It extends her work as a Christian songstress who knows just how to craft Billboard-charting gospels. Kaczor’s voice is lovely to [...]
DALLAS (June 9, 2015) - Grammy Award® Nominee Tamela Mann is the first Gospel lead artist in Billboard Gospel Radio chart history to score three consecutive No. 1's from an album. Her current single, "This Place," is the third song to ascend to No. 1 from her Tillymann Entertainment CD, [...]
“Thank You” Tonya Lewis-Taylor From the CD Delayed But Not Denied www.tonyalewistaylor.com “Thank You” is a contemporary gospel song delivered energetically by Tonya Lewis-Taylor, who seems to summon her estimable vocal strength from within several vital organs to offer a declaration of gratitude to God. The background vocalists urge her [...]
Atlanta, GA - Marquis Boone Enterprises (MBE) and Tyscot Music & Entertainment have formed a partnership to release MBE projects. The first one will be a live set by worship artist Casey J (pictured) who is currently #6 on Billboard's Gospel Airplay chart. "Dreams and visions do come true,” says [...]
Nothing But Love in God’s Water: Volume 1: Black Sacred Music from the Civil War to the Civil Rights Movement Robert Darden Penn State University Press (224 pages) By Bob Marovich “A singing army is a winning army, and a singing labor movement cannot be defeated.” So proclaimed labor leader [...]
“Do Life Big” Jamie Grace From the Gotee album Ready to Fly (2014) www.gotee.com Isn’t it a pity and a shame how many in the gospel music community ignored Jamie Grace’s “Beautiful Day,” despite its longevity on the Billboard charts? It reminds me of how songstress Heather Headley won a [...]
Lecrae Anomaly Reach Records (2014) www.reachrecords.com By Bob Marovich Lecrae’s new CD, Anomaly, is Christian music’s most incisively honest, but at the same time most bravely hopeful, project this year. To Lecrae, being an anomaly, being an outsider, is both an advantage and disadvantage. On one hand, anomalies are outcasts [...]
Bob Marovich of the Journal of Gospel Music interviews Casey J, whose "Fill Me Up" is currently in the Top 20 of Billboard's Top Gospel Airplay Chart.
