Southern Gospel Concerts

I went to be in service with The Rowlands on Sunday night (6/22/08) at Trinity Baptist in Asheville, NC. This was a church service, so they were to sing 3 songs and let Bro. Ralph Sexton preach, but God decided to move through and bless using the group.

Ron Martin proved again last night why he is one of the best vocalists in Southern Gospel music today. Not only does he have “power to burn” (if I may borrow a quote from George Younce), he also has amazing control to sound so soft and smooth. Even though Ron is starting to get a few years on him, he can still hold his own when it comes to singing songs like their opening number, “Field Of Grace”. This song was just outstanding!

Their tenor, JW, recently was hospitalized with salmonella, most likely from the tomato scare that’s hit the nation. He was still weak last night, but did an excellent job on Kyla Rowland’s “Safe Thus Far”. Kenneth, the baritone & pianist, sang “Will Grace Be Enough” after the story was told of how he had lost half of his right hand in an accident & had it reattached, enduring 13 major operations. God really moved on these 2 songs. They sang an additional song and Ron Martin gave the story behind a new song that you may be hearing soon. It was titled something like “You’ll Always Be My Son” or something similar. Since it was a brand new song, I’m not 100% sure of the title, but I’m sure I’ll get to hear it again in a month when The Rowlands come to my house for a photo session and meeting about the artwork for their new project. They will also be singing in a couple of churches in Spruce Pine, NC.

Check out The Rowland’s schedule to see if they are going to be anywhere close to you. Go and see them if you can.

UPDATE: Scott Robinson of Eighth Day has contacted me about the “new” song by The Rowlands. It’s actually a previously released song entitled “Back To Me” and it was originally released to radio last year by Eighth Day. It reached #26 on the October, 2007 Singing News Top 80. The song was new to me…I don’t think I had heard it before. Thanks for the update, Scott!

As a fairly new Southern Gospel music fan, I had not attended any of the Mull Singing Convention concerts.  This one on Saturday, June 28, was in the theater of the New Hope Church (the former Lee Greenwood Theater) in Sevierville, TN. It was a large, comfortable venue, but what is it with smoke machines?  Can someone explain to me what the value of fog on the stage is?  Anyway, the featured artists were The Roarks, The Booth Brothers, Ivan Parker, and The Hoppers.

First up were The Roarks.  I had seen this group once before in a multi-artist concert.  They are a family trio of mother, father, and son with the strongest member of the group (in my opinion) being the son, Shane.  I think that most people would recognize their single “There Is a God.” They have a country sound and they even performed a song named something like “I Want Jesus as My Number One Fan” that Shane wrote about how he’d rather sing gospel than country music.  This group was enjoyable, but I’ll admit to being more anxious to hear the other artists that were on the program.

The Booth Brothers were up next and were my favorites of the evening.  They started out with a Mosie Lister song, Where No One Stands Alone.  Very few groups can match the smoothness of their sound and harmony.  They sang many of their most popular songs - Look for Me at Jesus’ Feet, Hallelujah Meeting, I Would (from Ronnie’s solo CD), The Secret Place (from Michael’s solo CD), Tears Are a Language, He Saw It All, The Eyes of Jesus, I’ve Been Changed, The Night Before Easter, Castles in the Sand, and Still Feelin’ Fine.  The Booth Brothers do an excellent job of featuring each of their members on very special songs that let the audience fully appreciate their vocal abilities while very strongly getting the message across.  Michael even sang the chorus of The Secret Place a-capella very slowly after the track ended to present the message just one more time.

Next on stage was Ivan Parker.  My favorites of the night were The Grace that I’m Under, I Choose, and the old Gold City standards When I Get Carried Away and The Midnight Cry.  He also performed God Bless he USA and I wondered how it felt to him to be singing that particular song in the former Lee Greenwood Theater!  He also performed his current single from his new “Inseparable” CD, You Can’t Take My Crown, which hasn’t quite grown on me yet!   On the second part of the program, Ivan also brought out Kim and Dean to join him on What a Lovely Name.

The Hoppers did a great job with songs like Yaweh, Marriage of the Lamb, Grace Will Always Be Greater Than Sin, I’m Just Waiting for My Ride (with the video —- not my personal favorite!), I’ve Come Too Far to Look Back, Jerusalem and Shouting Time.  On the second part of the program, I really enjoyed their performance of God Already Knew with Karlye being featured on one verse and Michael joining in on the vocals as well.  And then, little Lexie - not to be outdone by big sis - ran across the stage!  I’m a sucker for kids doing cute things, so I really enjoyed it!

It was a great evening of Southern Gospel music and I’ll plan to attend another Mull concert as soon as I can!

We journeyed over to Tallassee, Alabama on Friday, June 27 for Triumphant’s yearly visit to the Westside Baptist Church. This church always makes Triumphant’s stay such an enjoyable one by treating them to great food, boating, fishing, basketball, and more great food!! And then Triumphant provides a wonderful concert for them! It was such a joy for me and my travelling buddy to see the friends we met last year and to see how the kids have grown. It’s a lovely church and there’s not a bad seat in the house.

The music we heard that night was outstanding. It was announced that Clayton Inman has been singing with Southern Gospel groups full-time for 25 years and he was certainly in great form that night. His rendition of Welcome to Heaven brought the first standing ovation of the night and The Old White Flag brought the second! They performed several of the songs from their newest CD, “Intermission” - The Cloud He’s coming Back On (it’s even better in person than on the CD, of course!), Welcome to Heaven, It’s a Wonderful Day, and For God So Loved. Jeff Stice performed a medley of hymns including Thinking of a Mansion, Amazing Grace, When They Ring Those Golden Bells, and How Great Thou Art. He also played his medley of When We All Get to Heaven that includes the Do-Re-Mi song from the Sound of Music (my personal favorite!). And to the crowd’s delight, he also played the Hallelujah Chorus. Here’s a video I managed to get of Jeff’s hands during part of the Hallelujah Chorus.

I certainly hope to go back to Tallassee for the next annual concert!

I had a great time at a concert in Gainesville, Georgia on June 21.  The concert featured Mike Upright, Gold City and Triumphant Quartet.

Mike Upright was first on the program. I hadn’t heard him live before although I had heard his songs on the radio. He’s a tall guy with a big voice! He’s got a real country sound - but not twangy - both in his voice and the instrumentation on his tracks. He sang a total of about 14 songs in the two portions of the program.  My favorites were “He Is Risen” - he said it was an old Wendy Bagwell song - and “Love Letter in the Sand” - about the adulterous woman that the crowd wanted to stone and Jesus was writing in the sand as he spoke to them and the woman.

Gold City was next and I was delighted that they did some of the songs from the new album “Moment of Truth” including “I Cast My Bread Upon the Water”, “Turn Your Back” (Aaron McCune did a great job on this but I still prefer the Triumphant version!!), “What Children Believe” (I really liked this one!), and “When Jesus Saves” - a very loud, in-your-face, brassy, non-traditional song.  I’ve gotta say here that all of the music at this whole concert was VERY loud - of course, I was sitting right up under the speakers on the 5th row! They also did several of my very favorites - “When I Get Carried Away”, “Teach Me Lord to Wait”, “Midnight Cry”, “In My Robe of White”, and “I’m Not Giving Up.” All of the guys sounded great and I really enjoyed hearing Bruce Taliaferro for the first time and meeting their bus driver, Ed. Josh Simpson did a very nice job on his piano solo, How Majestic Is Your Name.

Then came Triumphant!! I see these guys a lot and many times their program is basically the same as the previous concert, but I never get tired of hearing them! It’s hard to list favorites, but I really enjoy Clayton’s rendition of Welcome to Heaven. WOW!! What a great song and a great singer! He gives it everything he’s got every time he sings it. They also did “The Cloud He’s Coming Back On” from the new Intermission album, and I like the TQ version better than the Kingsmen version! Great song! David and Jeff had the crowd on their feet with “Goodbye, World, Goodbye.” They are fabulous together on the harmonica and keyboard. Speaking of Jeff, he did two solo selections and was really fantastic. At the last couple of concerts where David has sung ‘For God So Loved,” they have followed that with “He Loves Me” and I just think that combination is SOOO effective. Eric asked the audience to join them on He Loves Me and I heard quite a number of people singing along.

This was a great concert but it was very long and only the true, die-hard fans stayed until the end.  I think you can guess what kind of fan I am!

On May 19, I went to a concert featuring Greater Vision and three soloists. The concert was hosted by soloist Greg Lockridge, who was recording a live video yesterday evening. He brought in Greater Vision and the other soloists to help draw a good audience. (The plan worked; I’d estimate attendance at 400 to 600.)

The concert started with Lockridge taping his live video. (The rest of the 3.5-hour-long concert was also taped, but it was unclear what would make onto the finished product.) Lockridge performed nine songs and did two audience sing-alongs:

• So Good to Be with the People of the Lord.
• All You Need is a Need.
• Blessed Assurance.
• I Am the Way.
• He Sent Angels. Introduced by a touching story of how he played it for his grandmother shortly before her death, and she commented that she liked the song. It was the first time she had spoken in several weeks.
• I Know He Lives.
• I’m Guilty.
• I’ll Fly Away. Audience sing-along.
• He Touched Me. Audience sing-along. These two were done without soundtracks; John Darin Rowsey played piano.
• Written in the Scars. A well-written play off the astrology-influenced phrase “written in the stars.”
• Just Stand. Lockridge asked the audience to stand during the song’s intro. The song was good enough that the audience probably would have stood anyhow, but perhaps not until the chorus.

There was no assigned seating, and I arrived early enough to get a front-row seat. The cameras panning the audience were positioned toward the middle of the audience most of the time, since they also were recording the performers. So if you purchase the DVD, you’re unlikely to see my face in an audience pan. However, based on what I saw in the monitors, since I am not exactly short, you will probably get quite a bit of time viewing the back of my head. Fortunately, I remembered to comb my hair before the concert.

After an intermission–during which Gerald Wolfe made the day of this blog’s contributor Sony Elise by calling her and wishing her a happy birthday–the audience returned for the other three artists. John Darin Rowsey was up first and sang seven songs:

• Home is Always Where I’d Rather Be.
• Singing With the Saints. He introduced the song by commenting that he had written it for the Gaither Vocal Band.
• Lucky We Met.
• Let the Healing Begin. He introduced the song by telling how he wrote it for his wife as she was working through the trauma of memories of childhood abuse.
• Jesus Loves Me / Oh, How I Love Jesus. Audience sing-along.
• Ain’t No Grave. This was the same song recorded by the Isaacs and others.
• I Am Not Ashamed of the Gospel. This was the song recorded by the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir (and possibly others, whose names are escaping me at the moment).

Soloist Mike Allen (who also sings bass with the Prophets Quartet and the Gaither Homecoming series) was up next. He sang:

• God is With Us.
• Roll Away Troubled River.
• Child of the King. He did this one as an audience sing-along.
• The Love of the Lord. Allen recovered well from a microphone malfunction mid-song, even making a joke about it between lines after it was back on.
• Forgive Me when I Whine (a well-done recitation).
• Way Down Deep.
• So I Love Him Dearly.
• What I Have. While it might be hard to envision this Bishops trio song being done by a bass singer, it was well done.

Greater Vision finished the evening with an hour-long set.

• He’d Still Been God. Though the first three artists had been well received, the audience enthusiasm unmistakably went up a notch or two when Greater Vision took the stage with this song.
• Tell Me the Story.
• As I Am.
• We are so Blessed. Wolfe introduced the song by commenting on Mike Allen’s recitation “Forgive Me When I Whine,” a recitation done earlier by George Younce. Wolfe said that the first time he heard Younce do the recitation, he followed it by singing “We are So Blessed.”
• My Name is Lazarus. The song got the most enthusiastic response of the night. Audience enthusiasm kept building throughout the song, and broke into a round of applause leading into a standing ovation during the final chorus. About halfway through the second and final chorus, it occurred to me that this the was song that put Greater Vision at the top, and it was the last time I would hear the lineup that made it famous performing it. So it was special to catch it live one more time.
• Redeemed Medley. Well-received with an audience sing-along.
• A Mighty Fortress. Gerald Wolfe introduced the song by saying how they recently performed their first concert at a Lutheran church. The only Lutheran song they had recorded was Martin Luther’s “A Mighty Fortress is Our God.” Though they had never intended to stage it, they did that night, and it brought down the house. Wolfe said that he decided that thereafter, every time he did a concert and a Lutheran was in attendance, he would sing the song. Two were present, so they did the song.
• It Means Just What it Says.
• Till the Storm Passes By. Host Greg Lockridge introduced the group by commenting how Gerald Wolfe’s rendition of the song was the first Gospel song that broke through to his heart. Greater Vision pulled out all the stops with this rendition and brought down the house. This song got their second standing ovation of the night.
• God is So Good. This was tied in with an altar call, delivered by Rodney.

Since Jason Waldroup was recovering from walking pneumonia, Gerald Wolfe arranged the program so as to not tax his voice; other than incidental lines here and there, his only solo was his verse on “My Name is Lazarus.”

Random fact of the day: By my sister’s count, during the concert, Wolfe, Griffin, and Waldroup tapped their feet 1,597 times.

Concert photos can be found in the SouthernGospelBlog.com gallery here.

We’re off to a running start with contributors of this caliber:

• Diana Brantley (Georgia)
• Obadiah Neasham (Oregon/Idaho)
• Hannah Lefchik (Ohio)
• Sony Elise (Michigan/Indiana)
• John Scheideman (California)
• Aaron Swain (Virginia)
• Adam Edwards (North Carolina)
• Daniel J. Mount (Ohio)
• Matt Paasch (Missouri)
• Bethany Savage (Michigan/Indiana)

Be watching for concert reviews of a wide spectrum of Southern Gospel groups…from contributors across the country!