5 pop artists that inspire me

Sorry guys - there are only women on this list! :)


Taylor Swift - Taylor Swift is every woman. Her songs are the every-day-girl's anthem yet she's such a glamazon! I love how it seems like you know her, but you don't. She seems really humble. Hats off to anyone who can still be cool with Kanye after he took over her moment when she won video of the year. (No hate - I like Kanye.) One of the most remarkable things about Taylor is what she wrote in the inside cover of the 1989 album where she talks about change. That really inspired me to continue to grow as a person and as a new artist.

Favorite Taylor Swift song - Today was a Fairytale

 

Jennifer Hudson - No one today has a voice like Jennifer Hudson. (Ok, maybe Aretha Franklin.) You can't even put her into a category. Her voice is so big and unfaltering. She doesn't cower down because big voices are not in. She's gone through terrible tragedy with a lot of grace. She's transformed her body and looks great. She's sounds great live! She's a bonafide actress and a bonafide artist. This girl makes you proud to be a Chicagoan.

Favorite Jennifer Hudson song - No One Gonna Love You

 

Sia - This girl's voice is off the wall and her songs tell a great story. I've only heard the 1,000 Forms of Fear album, but I'm sold. She has a song that goes from 4/4 to 3/4 time. Who does that anymore?! She even has a song where she switches back and forward between two keys that seem counter-intuitive, but work. I think the song Chandelier is a musical monster! That album is so creative with the music and storytelling. It inspires you to expand your sound.

Favorite Sia song - Chandelier



P!nk - I've always loved P!nk, but when I saw her perform Glitter in the Air, all I kept thinking is "this girl just sung the crap outta this song upside down!" That performance was MA-GI-CAL! Her voice is so gritty. She's always sounded like a polished artists that's been singing for 20+ years even when she first came out. One of the things that inspires me about P!nk is that she is this rebel, hard-shelled gal singing about fighting and partying who is also comfortable being soft and singing about pain. Through her, I see that I can be firm and assertive and still graceful and lovely.

Favorit P!nk song - Try




Whitney Houston - No one disagrees about Whitney's talent, but there are two special things that inspire me. First, you can see her change with the times, yet she always sounds like herself. That's really hard to do successfully. When she came out with "It's Not Right, but it's OK" she sounded so current, but you instantly knew it was her. Second, Whitney never shied away from her roots in the church. I read that when making the movie The Bodyguard, she insisted that they include the song Jesus Loves Me. It was a tender moment in the movie. I think of Whitney as someone who had great struggles, but knew she could rely on God. If that's not inspiring, I don't know what is.

Favorite Whitney song - Lover for Life



Others who almost made the list: D'angelo and Eryka Badhu. Both of these artists came in under the R&B umbrella, but each album pulls them further away. D'angelo is like the Godfather of funky soul and Eryka Badhu takes jazz to someplace galactical. Love them both.

Blessings

Insecurity issues

I must admit I have issues as a lead worshiper.

I am an average singer. Don't have a great vibrato. Have average range. Don't always sing from my diaphram. I also don't think quick on my feet and my voice sometimes goes out when its hot in my church and the fans are on full throttle. But the average singer thing is my main issue.

It is extremely easy to be intimidated as a lead worshiper when you can't blow. I wish I could rip and run across the scale, but that isn't my strong suit. I love singers who run effortlessly, but that's often the measure we hold everyone by. At least in black church culture. Why is that?

As I've grown in my Christian journey, one of the things I'm more cognizant of is not being wooed by rhymes, runs, and physical attractiveness of something or even an edifice. This goes for a sermon, as well as the music. We (including myself) have got to move past some of the superficial stuff and get to the heart of worship. Don't get me wrong, it's hard to go in when things are pitchy, but it shouldn't be easy to go in just because of someone's ability to sound like Beyonce. (No shade... I love Halo! :)

I may not be able to do the Jason Nelson warm up challenge, but dang it, do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do ain't never hurt nobody. That, I can do all day, every day.

Blessings

P.S. Go on Instagram and check out Jason Nelson's warm up challenges. Some of these people are dope and some are just flat out funny.

Pop-up worship

Reposted from Travis Greene's FB page :)

I love the concept of pop-up worship! If you're in Charlotte, check out Casey J and Travis Greene at this free event Monday at 6 pm.

Rhythm is gonna get you

The funniest thing happened the other night while I was out on a triple date. We were at a Jamaican themed restaurant when the house band started to play a little music. My husband, not a church-goer, commented that Reggae music reminds him of church music. I didn't quite get that until the band went from playing a secular tune to playing How Great is Our God and then How Great Thou Art. "See!" said my husband.

Guess that goes to show that you might hear a praise in an unlikely place. I should've told my hubby you can run, but you can't hide.

Blessings

4 things I think I know about worship based on Chicago's Gospel Fest

Chicago Gospel Fest was held in Millennium Park

The 2015 Chicago Gospel Fest was last weekend and the devil was busy messing with the weather trying to keep Christians from coming out. :) I managed to go to the last set Sunday evening. Here are 4 things I think I know about worship based on the four performances I saw:

1. Your remix better be hot.
To be honest, the only song I know by Anthony Brown and group therAPy is Testimony. That song is fire! I'm not sure I would've taken the gamble, but they decided to sing a new rendition. And guess what; it was hot too! Your fans are expecting your main song to slay so you've gotta be sure you don't disappoint.

2. You've got to run a tight ship.
Marvin Sapp had his band with him, but also used tracks. The backup sounded like they were literally on the stage with him. I'm still trying to figure out how he did it! His performance was flawless.

3. You've got to work the heck out of your new song.
Richard Smallwood is one of gospel's finest musicians/writers. He opened with his popular Anthem of Praise and then moved on to their new song Same God. They sang that song for a good 6 minutes. When that song hits the airwaves, my ears are already primed to receive it because they drilled it in my head at Gospel Fest. That's how you get your fans on board!

4. Get the audience to participate.

Israel Houghton getting his praise on!

Israel Houghton was the headliner and you could tell by the number of staff on stage setting up his mic's/technical equipment. It looked like quite the ordeal. While all of the set-up was a bit taxing, he was the only one to use the video screen to project his words. This really helped get the audience involved. Of course it ended up being a fun performance because everyone was singing along and was excited. I still have whiplash from all the jumping around I was doing. :) Whatever program he used to display the lyrics was visually captivating. The colors were fun and you can tell they spent a lot of effort thinking about the visuals.

 

 

 

 

 

My God-brother, Daybreon, my sis Amber, and Me (Nicole) at Chicago Gospel Fest 2015

Well, that's my recap on this year's Gospel Fest. Maybe next year it'll be warm and sun-shiney.

Blessings

Hillsong goes Hollywood... check out the trailer

Typically praise and worship, gospel, and christian music is enjoyed in a car, at a church, at a music festival, or via outlets like YouTube or Pandora. Sometimes there's a concert at a small venue (typically a church). But, for the first time ever, christian music is hitting Tinsel Town!

Hillsong United is coming to the big screen later this year in Let Hope Rise. Fade to Black director, Michael John Warren, is flipping the script to cover the christian band and its rise to christian music stardom. 

Grab yo kids, grab yo wife... make it a church field trip. Let's get out and support Hillsong United!

Coming to a U.S theater near you September 30, 2015.

Step 1 - Check

I finally did it! I applied for membership as a songwriter at ASCAP. This is the first step of my journey to being the Ne-Yo of Praise and Worship. (That's totally going to be my moniker.)

Since I started "writing," I've come up with about 20 songs or so. The chords are not written and I don't have lyrics for every verse, but the melodies are complete (all in my head). I wanted to leave space to incorporate suggestions from my brother (who'll be writing the chords).

Perhaps what I'll do is come up with some goals for the year and start checking things off as I do them. A little self motivation never hurts.


Onward and upward!

"We Create An Atmosphere of Praise"

This is only a snippet, but I think this song is a winner. It's available on iTunes for your listening pleasure. :) "And you say Chi city!" Y'all know we know how to worship!

Here's a link to Pastor Hudson's Church. I'm a fan.

Zero to 100

It's about to get real interesting for our P&W team. We were asked to lead P&W at our district Good Friday service this year and I agreed like a dummy team player. :)

Our church doesn't have a musician so we typically sing to tracks. However, my brother (a dope keyboard/organist) can attend so he's going to play for us. But wait... there's more. The district music director is going to play keys for us too. I'm a little worried that 2 people on the same instrument might not go over so well. My brother can be a bit of a fire cracker, but I guess everyone loves fireworks. We're getting a drummer and my brother is gonna get somebody on bass. Can you believe it? We're gonna go from tracks to a whole band.

The other thing is, as I mentioned on a previous post, last year's Good Friday P&W was a fail. I guess the pressure is on since I had a lot to say about that. I keep telling my self there's no where to go but up. We have 3 rehearsals starting this Saturday. I will def follow up with more posts on our quest to upgrade the P&W experience at our district service. Stay tuned.

Music, singers, and magic

I just posted a YouTube clip of a great worship song by Martha Munizzi and wanted to share a few thoughts about music, singers and magic. Here's a conversation I recently had with my mom (the pastor).

Me: I really like Martha Munizzi!
Mom: The first album had so many good songs, but she hasn't had anything since then.
Me: This "Make it Loud" cd has a good 4 songs on it.
Mom: I tried to listen to it, but she just can't sing!
Me: Well, I like her songs... And that's exactly how I feel about Mary J. Blige!

First of all, I think an artist's first album is usually the best album. When an artist first starts out, they have lots of songs at his/her disposal to choose from. They can select what resonates most and what sounds the best. There are no expectations from the fan base because the artist typically hasn't settled on an artistic style or target audience. Then for some reason the second album takes a while to release and the artists starts to incorporate a "newer" sound. (You know, they get fancy, try to sound funkier, fresher, and slightly different.)  The fans are expecting more songs like the first album or songs like what they currently hear on  radio/tv/pandora and it's hard to recreate that magic. These types of demands are exactly why I have no desire to be a recording artist. It's a cold, cruel world!

Now let's move on to the actual ability of the singer. In this case, let's talk about Martha Munizzi. Can she sing? That's a matter of personal preference. I think she sounds good enough to be an artist. Have you heard some of these pop artists sing live? They can't sing that great either! (See conversation above.) Do I think Martha Munizzi can blow? No. To be perfectly honest, that's not exactly what I'm looking for in P&W music. I'm looking for sincerity in lyrics and what I like to call singability (easy to sing, easy to understand and memorize the lyrics). That's what's important to me.


Similarly, I don't think Mary J. Blige can blow, but when she first came out, I identified with the songs. You have to admit, she has a knack for singing songs about love lost and hard times. In terms of vocal acuity, she sounds comparable to Martha Munizzi. Now consider Beyonce. While I think Beyonce can blow, I typically don't like what she's singing about in most of her songs. Therefore, I'm not a huge Beyonce fan. But the lady can sing!

Then there's the feeling you get from certain songs/singers. I think of it as magic. I personally love songs from the crooning era and songs from the 60's because the content of the songs are about things that resonate with me. I also appreciate that you can guess the last few words in a phrase because the songs make sense. You instantly feel connected to song. It's like magic. So in essence, I feel that magic from Martha Munizzi.

I think sometimes we need to move past whether or not an artist can blow. If we don't, there will be no Mary J. Blige's or Martha Munizzi's; both of whom have songs that thousands/millions of people enjoy.

It's a big world. There's room for singers of all abilities as long as the music brings something to the table.

P.S. Pastors are the harshest music critics!

Martha Munizzi - No One Higher

I absolutely love this perfect worship song! Enjoy!


P. S. I should also mention that this is a good album.

So excited

In continuing with our goal of adding 12 songs to our repitoire, we had rehearsal this past Sunday. It was going ok, but after about 30 minutes, my sister was about done. (Just like me, she doesn't like wasting her precious time on the weekends.)

She was done, that is, until we went over my original song. I'm so excited that someone other than me is feeling the enthusiasm for new music!

This was also the first time the pastor heard it. She didn't say it was bad so that means it was good. (You know, pastors can be tough.) And as soon as I get registered on ASCAP, maybe I'll post it. (I totally plan to share at some point, but ain't nobody gonna be running off with my good music.)

In closing, let me just say that having a concrete goal for our P&W team was the best thing I've ever done as a leader. We are all working in the same direction and so far, we're still on track.

Anita Wilson in concert

What better way to spend Valentine's Day than listening to the talented Anita Wilson?
She'll be in Waco, TX this Saturday. Get the deets here. (And check out her t-shirts. They're dope.)

Enjoy!

#Demonstrate

Pastor William Murphy is hosting a conference to show folks (i.e., demonstrate) how to be effective in their lines of ministry. Classes for the worship leader, musicians, sound engineers and more. If you're in ATL or wish to attend, check out the Demonstrate Webpage for more info.