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Singing News has posted some minor upgrades to their website, www.singingnews.com. The most significant is making some freely available feature articles and supplements to feature articles–things which were previously only available via the print magazine.

Like all forms of print media, they struggle with the tension of providing relevant content in the Internet age and providing meaningful content in the print publication that still makes it worth a subscription.

They promised some upgrades this year, and bit by bit, we are seeing several encouraging improvements.

Here my picks in the second round of the Singing News Fan Awards:

• Group - Ernie Haase & Signature Sound. I really, really, really wanted to vote for the Perrys, too. I like both groups equally.
• Male Singer - Ernie Haase. My first-round pick, Mark Trammell, didn’t even make Top 10!
• Female Singer - Libbi Perry Stuffle. I didn’t even have to read who the other nominees were; all I had to do was find that I had to circle 7 to vote for Libbi.
• Horizon Group - Ball Brothers. I considered Tribute but went with the Ball Brothers.
• Horizon Individual - Dustin Sweatman. I wanted to vote for Dustin in either Horizon or Young Artist, and so voted for him in this category and Joseph Habedank in the other.
• Young Artist - Joseph Habedank. The Perrys’ sound improved when Joseph moved to the lead spot.
• Musician - Roger Bennett. I nominated Stewart Varnado, but he didn’t make the top 10. I wanted to honor Roger. He’s won the pianist award for more consecutive years than any other SG performer has won in any category. I think it would be appropriate to honor a legend of this stature with one final award. I must admit I was also a little curious to find out what Debbie would say if she was given a chance behind the microphone! If SG fans don’t see things the way I do, I will probably vote for Kim Collingsworth in the final round (especially after all the nice things you said about her yesterday!)
  
• Songwriter - Dianne Wilkinson. I’d like to see her win this award at least once.
• Album of the Year - Once Upon a Cross (Mark Trammell Trio).
• Tenor of the Year: Ernie Haase. I’d really like to vote for Eric Phillips someday, too, but I went with Ernie again this year.
• Lead Singer of the Year: Ryan Seaton.
• Baritone of the Year: Mark Trammell. There are several good options here - Doug Anderson, Andrew King, and Nick Trammell particularly come to mind - but in the end I went with Mr. Baritone himself.
• Bass of the Year: Randy Byrd (Blackwood Brothers). I considered voting for Tim Duncan right off but figured he’d make the top 5 without my help.
• Alto of the Year: Libbi Perry Stuffle. I didn’t have to spend any time thinking this one over.
• Soprano of the Year: Brooklyn Collingsworth. I wanted to vote for the Collingsworth Family in at least one category, and there aren’t many options in the Soprano category anyhow.

Let’s start with the big stuff. Triumphant Quartet walked away with the most nominations (seven). That’s an impressive accomplishment, but they are less likely to ace the top 5 ballot because two of their nominations (for Eric Bennett and David Sutton) are in the highly competitive Male Singer category. Conventional wisdom would hold that if Kingdom Heirs fans will split their votes between the two, this could keep both out of the top 5 in this category. Nonetheless, it’s still an impressive accomplishment for a group this new to walk away with the most first-round nominations.

The Perrys are still undeniably one of the hottest acts around, picking up six nominations and getting a nomination in virtually every category in which they were eligible. I think the only reason they didn’t tie with Triumphant Quartet for seven is that Perrys fans split their votes in the Male Singer category between Joseph Habedank and Tracy Stuffle. Tracy Stuffle has been the group’s usual nominee in this category, I think, but Joseph Habedank is wowing audiences with his voice and charisma, and is moving into the spot where he’ll be a serious contender in this spot if he stays with the group for a few more years.

Honorable mention goes to Brian Free & Assurance, who also received six nominations, in virtually the same categories as the Perrys did (with the exception of Male for Female vocalist).

Kudos to the Ball Brothers, nominees for Horizon Group. My initial feeling, roughly six months out, is that this award is going to be between the Ball Brothers and the Tribute Quartet. I like Tribute, but all but one of that group’s members picked up a Horizon Award last year as Monument Quartet. It’s virtually the same group under a new name, so I’ll almost definitely go with the Ball Brothers all the way in this category.

The Big News in the musician category was that Kim Collingsworth, pianist for the Collingsworth family, picked up a nomination this year. If a woman has ever won this award, it’s been decades. But obviously, she was nominated not because she was a woman, but because she is one of the best pianists out there. And that’s why I’m hoping she makes it to the final round.

The Mark Trammell Trio must have an extraordinarily strong fan base, because the “Once Upon a Cross” song and album got top-10 nominations before most fans would have heard either. I’ve heard the song (in live concert), but not the album yet. (The album will probably be the next CD I purchase, though, now that it is available as of last week.)

In the category of surprisingly weak showings we find Gold City, the Kingsmen, and the Palmetto State Quartet, all of whom got only one nomination each. They’ve all seen better years, but each group has been hurt by the departure of their most popular members. In the cases of Gold City and Palmetto State Quartet, we can add “recent departure.”

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By the numbers, the top nominees were:

• 7: Triumphant (Male, Male, Songwriter, Triumphant Quartet, Song, Album, Musician, Group)
• 6: Perrys (Female, Young Artist, Song, Horizon Individual, Album, Musician, Group)
• 6: Brian Free & Assurance (Male, Young Artist, Song, Horizon Individual, Musician, Group)
• 5: Greater Vision (Male, Songwriter, Song, Album, Group)
• 5: Legacy Five (Male, Song, Album, Musician, Group)
• 4: McKameys (Female, Young Artist, Song, Musician)
• 4: Inspirations (Song, Album, Musician, Group)
• 4: Mark Trammell Trio (Young Artist, Song, Horizon Individual, Album)
• 4: EHSS (Male, Album, Musician, Group)
• 3: Hoppers (Female, Female, Group)
• 3: Talley Trio (Female, Female, Young Artist)
• 3: Crabb Family (Male, Young Artist, Musician)
• 3: Kingdom Heirs (Song, Album, Musician)
• 2: Mark Bishop (Male, Songwriter)
• 2: KP& NR (Female, Young Artist)
• 2: Booth Brothers (Songwriter, Group)
• 2: Young Harmony (Horizon Individual, Horizon Group)

Groups and individuals with only one nomination:

• 1: Collingsworth (Musician)
• 1: Ball Brothers (Horizon Group)
• 1: Gaither Vocal Band (Song)
• 1: Gold City (Album)
• 1: Kingsmen (Horizon Individual)
• 1: Palmetto State (Horizon Individual)
• 1: Jeff & Sheri Easter (Female)
• 1: Greenes (Female)
• 1: Whisnanats (Female)
• 1: Tribute Quartet (Horizon Individual, Horizon Group)
• 1: Dixie Melody Boys (Horizon Individual)
• 1: Ivan Parker (Male)
• 1: JBIF (Young Artist)
• 1: TK & McRae (Young Artist)
• 1: Mercy’s Mark (Horizon Individual)
• 1: Poet Voices (Songwriter)
• 1: Austins Bridge (Horizon Group)
• 1: Browns (Horizon Group)
• 1: Crist Family (Horizon Group)
• 1: Crystal River (Horizon Group)
• 1: Dills (Horizon Group)
• 1: Paid In Full (Horizon Group)
• 1: Soul’d Out (Horizon Group)
• 1: Mike Bowling Group (Horizon Group)
• 1: Gerald Crabb (Songwriter)
• 1: Sheryl Farris (Songwriter)
• 1: Ronny Hinson (Songwriter)
• 1: Kyla Rowland (Songwriter)
• 1: Dianne Wilkinson (Songwriter)
• 1: Sharron Kay King (Horizon Individual)

I don’t do this every year or every round, but I think I’ll also guess which nominees will make the top 5. But that’s another post.

I in an email blast sent out to Singing News subscribers, Editor-in-Chief Jerry Kirksey announced that Singing News is reinstating six categories in the Fan Awards: Tenor, Lead, Baritone, Bass, Alto, and Soprano. Kirksey said that he had overlooked “a VERY IMPORTANT element of the Fan Awards process–the Fan.” He said that the calls, emails, letters, and comments after concerts persuaded him to reinstate those six favorite categories.

In the May Singing News, the top 10 ballot will also feature a nomination ballot for those six parts. The final ballot will include the top 5 nominees in all categories.The Fan Awards would have been seriously weaker without these awards. Face it, in our genre tenors and bass singers often have less in common vocally than the top 5 nominees in the male and female singer categories. In genres where all men and all women sing more or less the same style, an overarching gender-based category is fine.But in a genre with as much emphasis on harmony parts as this genre traditionally (and currently) has, I believe the Fan Awards will be much better for this change.

Here are my nominations in the first round of the Singing News Fan Awards:

Group - Ernie Haase & Signature Sound
Male Singer - Mark Trammell
Female Singer - Libbi Perry Stuffle
Horizon Group - Ball Brothers
Horizon Individual - Randy Byrd (Blackwood Brothers)
Musician - Stewart Varnado
Young Artist - Joseph Habedank
Songwriter - Dianne Wilkinson
Song of the Year - “Once Upon a Cross” (Mark Trammell Trio)
Album of the Year - “Come Thirsty” (Perrys)

Who are your picks?

Much has been made of the fact that Singing News has eliminated many categories in the Fan Awards. I must admit, I don’t really like the fact that the favorite Male Quartet, Mixed Quartet, Trio, Bass, Baritone, Lead, and Tenor awards were dropped. But I haven’t quite been able to find a way to express my feelings…until now.

Now I am not a sports fan, but many of you are. Just suppose that the rankings for favorite football team were eliminated. Suppose the rankings for best baseball team were eliminated. Suppose the rankings for best basketball team were eliminated. Instead, all the rankings were combined into one overall ranking, “best team.”

Wouldn’t that be much better? That way, rather than spreading the awards around into so many different categories, thereby diluting their impact, we could just point to one team and say that it was the best sports team in the United States.

But wait a minute, you might say. The different teams all play sports, but they do it in very different ways.

And that thought, applied to Southern Gospel, is my point precisely.

The January 2007 Singing News arrived this week.

Cover: Ernie Haase & Signature Sound made the cover for the second time in the group’s history. The formal pose–which was evidently the one that won the poll Singing News posted on its website–is, in my opinion, a good pick for this audience. The average Singing News reader doesn’t need to be convinced that Signature Sound is exciting; he or she already knows that. The average reader needs to be convinced that Signature Sound is…well, that Signature Sound is what the cover design implies, whatever that is. A classic Southern Gospel quartet with a contemporary look?

Gold City’s ad on page 3 marks the one-year anniversary of Doug Riley’s passing with a small box with Doug Riley’s picture and a caption reading “Remembering Doug Riley October 1970-January 2006.) For some reason, my eyes skipped over it until I was writing the review, on
the third or fourth time through the magazine.

Singing News published their top 40 year end chart on page 20. The Gaither Vocal Band’s “I Will Go On” sits atop the list at #1. The fan-voted song of the year, “He Saw it All” by the Booth Brothers, sits at #13. For whatever it’s worth, songs by male quartets hold only five of the top 20 slots:

• #1 - I Will Go On (Gaither Vocal Band)
• #9 - If it Takes a Valley (Brian Free & Assurance)
• #10 - Do You Want to Be Forgiven (Signature Sound)
• #15 - Don’t Let the Sandals Fool Ya (Triumphant Quartet)
• #20 - I Don’t Wanna Go Back (Kingdom Heirs)

The top three songs were somewhat progressive, which makes the highest-placed traditional quartet song the Triumphant Quartets’ Don’t Let the Sandals Fool Ya.

Stewart Varnado took over the Where are They Now? column this month, and did a good job with an article on former Dixie Echoes tenor Gerry Stroup.

The cover story on Signature Sound starts on page 40. It’s well-written. Especially toward the end of the article, where Ernie says he’d love to see “new groups come along and knock my socks off,” the article covers some of the same ground covered in this blog in the interview posted last month.

The news page mentions Ishee’s departure from the Palmetto State Quartet. It does contain one detail I didn’t see in any of the Internet articles–that Ishee handpicked his successor, Bryan Elliott of the Anchormen. In the days of nearly instantaneous Internet news reporting, the strength of a magazine is putting that little spin on the story or adding that little fact that isn’t covered in the immediate press release.

One of the highlights is D. Ann Bailey’s At Home with Ricky & Kelly Free. Since many people who surf the Internet looking for Southern Gospel news have read her contributions to various websites and message boards, we were looking forward to her first article published in Singing News. Let’s just say that it lived up to the expectations.

The story behind the Inspirations’ current single, “I Have Not Forgotten,” is found on page 80.

In “Conversations with Tim Lovelace” on pages 80 and 81, Lovelace announces that he will be starting a monthly column for Singing News that will be printed upside down.

Various Southern Gospel artists list their New Years’ resolutions on page 98. Stewart Varnado, who has commented in several articles that he doesn’t read sheet music, is making a New Years’ resolution to practice his skills in that area. If he succeeds, one of Southern Gospel’s best pianists will get even better.

Among the highlights on the Singing News Top 80 chart are Signature Sound’s “John in the Jordan,” debuting at #13, and the Inspirations’ “I Have Not Forgotten,” at #21. While the cat is already out of the bag that Jeff & Sheri Easter’s “Over and Over” will take the #1 spot in the February chart, here’s hoping that Signature Sound will be at #1 in March and the Inspirations’ song in April.

The refrigerator door feature on page 134 features various interesting tidbits, one of which was that Perrys pianist Matthew Holt began playing piano for his church at the ripe old age of four.

Some time back, another Southern Gospel blogger posted his comments on each month’s issue of Singing News. Though he stopped after only a couple months, I thought it might be time to bring that idea back.

So here are my thoughts on the highlights of the December 2006 Singing News.

cover: The Freemans made the cover, which was designed with a Christmas theme.

page 16: Andrew Ishee’s column “A Confession” is a must-read. I especially appreciated the subtle joke about low salaries in Southern Gospel; Scott Fowler had offered $50 to anyone who revealed the perpetrator of a certain prank. Ishee stated that he knew the answer, and said: “So if Scott still has $50, we may be able to make a deal.”

page 22: Congratulations to Dixie Echoes bass (and fellow Southern Gospel blogger) Tracy Crouch on making the Singing News! He was featured in the “Names You Might Not Know…Yet” column. Of course, readers of this blog already knew his name, since we featured an interview with him last month (click here or here).

page 24: Today’s Blackwood Brothers Quartet (Jimmy Blackwood’s group) ran their first ad here, and it is sure a nice-looking ad. I am particularly an admirer of their bass, Randy Byrd, though I’d add that baritone Brad White is one of the best pianists in Southern Gospel. They are advertising their brand-new hymns album, which I will review shortly.

page 30: Duane Garren has more information on Ed Hill’s reorganized Prophets Quartet. It looks like the lineup will be tenor Bill Baize, lead Paul Jackson, baritone Ed Hill, and bass Hovie Walker.

page 32: Jerry Kirksey wrote the first part of a column which seems to be heading toward the conclusion that he has decided to be less judgmental about different hairstyles. But he doesn’t actually get to that conclusion; he leaves the reader hanging.

pages 36-37: Singing News posts several reviews, most notably of the Dixie Echoes’ Sounds of Sunday and the Hoppers’ The Ride.

pages 38-39: The interview with Lari Goss is absolutely fascinating.

page 43: “Ten Things You May Not Know About…Derrick Selph.” Pay special attention to #6, “If anyone wants to make you laugh, all they have to do is…?”

pages 56-57: The interview with Lily Fern Weatherford is fascinating. It doesn’t cover much new ground, but it definitely makes for an interesting read.

page 66: Ed O’Neal proves himself once again to be Southern Gospel’s premier storyteller. This column was another of those that just had to be read aloud to the whole family at the dinner table. That’s saved only for something that is particularly funny, memorable, or touching, and so many of O’Neal’s columns have passed that test that reading his columns aloud at dinner is practically a monthly tradition at this house.

page 106: They print a picture of a younger Ernie Haase, “…before.”