SouthernGospelBlog.com

On yesterday’s post: I do genuinely enjoy Signature Sound and, in fact, don’t mind the album cover at all. My observations yesterday were simply to the fact that it was different from everything else I’ve seen in Southern Gospel.

Right now, the NQC Silly Season for group turnover seems to have slowed for the traditional groups. The Blackwood Quartet is still looking for a tenor, and the Monument Quartet is still looking for a lead and a bass. But that about does it for personnel changes in major traditional groups.

But if we turn to the progressive Southern Gospel groups, we see that three or four of the most popular ones are in the midst of significant personnel changes.

Annie McRae is still looking for two other singers to form a new trio and keep the McRae group name active.

Adam Crabb and Terah Penhollow recently announced that they will be forming a new trio after the Crabb Family completes its farewell tour next year.

Kelly Crabb Bowling left the Crabb Family earlier this week to join her husband in the Mike Bowling Group. After some rapid turnover, Mike Bowling was the only member left in his mixed quartet. It had been announced that Kelly would join next year, and I guess whichever member she would be replacing decided not to be a lame duck for a year.

The Crabb Family is known for their marketing genius, and Kelly proved yesterday she had a full dose of the family gene. In the press release, she said she’d be happy to sing with her family on any of the dates in their farewell tour in which the Mike Bowling Group was also appearing. Well, guess which group concert promoters will be booking along with the Crabb Family for the next year?

This will mean a lot of exposure for the Mike Bowling Group; but it is not only exposure, it is exposure to that audience of progressive Southern Gospel fans who are most likely to love their music and who are most likely to be looking for another group to name as a favorite. As I said, this is a touch of marketing genius.

So here we have Mike and Kelly Bowling looking for one additional singer, Adam and Terah Crabb looking for one, and Annie McRae looking for two. If the Mike Bowling Group can hire Annie McRae, we could see the makings of another Southern Gospel supergroup, combining one of the most popular members from each of three different groups.

It was marketing genius to handle Kelly Crabb Bowling’s move like she did. If Mike and Kelly can piece something together that the fans want to hear, the added exposure they will probably get in their next year could place the Mike Bowling Group on the map as the “next big thing” in Southern Gospel.

Personal note: I apologize for not getting this up in the morning. Unfortunately, my Internet connection was down.

www.gaither.com has started a pre-sale of Signature Sound’s newest release, Get Away Jordan. Click here to view the album’s cover art.

This album cover art will raise a few eyebrows. Southern Gospel has never seen an album cover quite like this one.

But let’s put that aside for a moment. You can’t judge a CD by its cover, and the track listings promise some classic quartet singing. “Lovest Thou Me” and “Someday” are classic quartet songs, and the new single, “John in the Jordan,” is in the traditional-with-a-twist style that Signature Sound defines.

So perhaps this album cover is, in a sense, a microcosm of the Southern Gospel phenemonon that is Signature Sound–a traditional quartet in contemporary packaging.

I mentioned yesterday that I emailed Marshall Pugh, owner and (formerly) tenor for the Monument Quartet to ask what was the status of the Monument Quartet press release pulled from the Singing News website. He replied with “the only official Monument Quartet press release.” Here it is, for those of my readers who have been following this story (both of you? am I boring you with this?):

Monument Quartet Enters New Era
Marshall Pugh/Monument Quartet

I would like to thank the numerous friends and fans including my church family at River of Life and Pastor Johnny Minick, who have partnered with me in prayer as I sought the Lord’s will concerning the future of Monument Quartet over the past 6 weeks. I sincerely appreciate the many men who have offered their talents and abilities to be used by this ministry. The extensive interview and audition process has rendered 3 new members for the group thus far.

Matt Felts of St. Louis MO has accepted the offer to become the new tenor for Monument Quartet as Marshall moves to the baritone/lead position. Prior to joining MQ, Matt previously sang with the Skyline Boys out of Manassas VA.

As the quartets new pianist, Lucas Case joins the group from Richland MO. Most recently, Lucas worked with Duane Garren and Signature Artist Agency.

Coming from Bristow OK, John Tidwell has assumed the lead/baritone position for the quartet. John leaves his group, Master’s Voice with blessing and support as they make preparations for a new chapter in their ministry as well.

While continuing our search for a bass singer, Hovie Walker avails himself until a permanent member is added. Hovie is best known for being a founding member of the Singing Americans and also his tenure with the Thrasher Brothers and The Classic Imperials.

Rounding out the team thus far, Brian Ledford of Smyrna TN continues in his capacity as sound engineer.

We look forward with great anticipation to our upcoming dates and any opportunity to serve you in your endeavors. All booking is currently done “in house”, so contact us at (615) 377-3315 As new things are happening every day, we invite you to sign up for our free E-Newsletter and frequent our website (www.MonumentQuartet.com) for more information.

We would also like to invite you to join us on the Jubilee At Sea Cruise, 19-24 February 2007. The information on the cruise is on our web sit[e] as well.

My apologies to everyone who looks forward to this website’s regular Friday CD reviews. This week, I do not have any new CDs to review. Let me use this opportunity to remind any groups reading this website of our CD Review Policy.

I do want to make note of an article in the Nashville Scene on Mary Tom Speer Reid of the Speer family. It is an interesting look at one of the best pianists in Southern Gospel.

An email is on its way to the Monument Quartet’s Marshall Pugh inquiring about the status of the press release which was (but is no longer) on the Singing News website.

I will be out for most of the day. See you all tomorrow!

Yesterday, I posted a link to a Monument Quartet press release posted on the Singing News SG Wire. Today, this press release is no longer visible on the SG Wire page and does not come up when their news stories are searched, suggesting that the story has been pulled.

But here’s the strange part: If you follow the direct link, which I posted (click here), you can still view the story. So it’s there, but it’s not there. Go figure.

Also, Singing News has issued the results of last week’s poll. The question was: “Do you download Southern Gospel music from the Internet?” 15% answered “Yes,” 85% answered “No.” These results may be accurate, but there is one flaw in the poll. It made no distinction between legal and illegal downloads. My instant reaction upon seeing the poll was that it was referring to illegal downloads, and I nearly clicked “no” before reading it again and realizing that it could just as easily refer to legal downloads.

For about a month after the Quartet Convention ended, there were no lineup changes. Now it seems like they are happening all at once.

Almost precisely a month ago, Monument Quartet split into two groups, the Monument Quartet and the Tribute Quartet. Monument’s Marshall Pugh kept the bus, the tour dates, the association with Aaron Minick, and the record deal; Tribute’s Gary Casto kept baritone Josh Singletary, bass Dennis Dugger, and the association with Beckie Simmons and the Beckie Simmons Agency.

Now, interestingly, both groups chose the same date to announce their new plans. As a matter of fact, Singing News posted the stories within five minutes of each other.

Tribute Quartet has lined up a new tenor, Jacob Kitson, and is working on their first recording for BSA World Records.

The Monument Quartet announced a completely new lineup. For whatever reason, tenor and group owner Marshall Pugh has evidently moved to the baritone position. He is replaced at the tenor spot by Matt Felts, who previously sang with several local groups, as well as the Skyline Boys, and the Blackwood Gospel Quartet. Former Stamps Quartet pianist Lucas Case, and Hovie Walker has joined at the bass position. Walker previously sang with Willie Wynn and the Tenesseans and the Thrashers and was leading a trio that included his wife at the time he accepted the offer to join the Monument Quartet. Aaron and Johnny Minick are filling in at the lead position until Monument finds a permanent lead singer.

As if that wasn’t enough for one day, it looks like the Mike Bowling Group is being totally revamped. In a concert appearance this past weekend, Mike Bowling was the only member of the group to take the stage. He was accompanied by three people filling in, one of whom was Amanda Crabb from the Crabb family. Chuck Peters has the story, which for now is more speculation than fact. Jeff and Kim Bowling were off the road, but whether temporarily or permanently is something he did not know. He also speculated that Kelly Crabb Bowling (Mike’s wife) might join the Mike Bowling Group within the next few months, perhaps even before the Crabb Family comes off the road. But that is speculation; all we know for now is that the group appears to be undergoing changes.

Roger Bennett, pianist for Legacy Five, will be spending several months off the road while preparing for, undergoing, and recovering from his stem cell transplant. Legacy Five announced in their most recent e-newsletter that Tim Parton will play piano for Legacy Five until Bennett comes back on the road.

If you wanted to invite an unsaved friend to a Southern Gospel concert, and could pick a concert by any group, which group’s concert would you take your friend to?

I started a thread on the Singing News forums asking this question. It will be interesting to watch the responses.

But here is how I would answer the question: It all depends on the person.

If the person was a member of the MTV generation, I would probably take them to a Signature Sound concert. That would unquestionably get their attention, and hopefully they would be ready to hear the Gospel message contained in songs like “Forgiven Again” or “Oh, What a Savior.”

But, truth be told, I don’t believe I have any unsaved friends near my own age. I probably have more unsaved friends over 40 than under. Who would I take them to hear?

This question is a little harder to answer. One of the first groups that comes to mind might be the Mark Trammell Trio, because Mark lays out the Gospel so clearly and many of his concerts are specifically evangelistic in nature. But I don’t really know which group I would most prefer to invite an unsaved friend to hear. It will be interesting to read your perspectives, both in the Singing News forum and in the comments here.

A faithful reader of this blog emailed me to ask if I could add a button for clicking to return to the home page. Since she hadn’t realized this yet, and I decided it was not immediately apparent, the title of the blog serves this purpose. Clicking “www.southerngospelblog.com” at the top of the posts will take you back to the home page.

If you will look at the second box in the sidebar, you will notice a new feature. I plan to highlight a featured article every month by posting a link to the post and to an Adobe PDF version of the article in the box.

I’m doing this because I can put quite a bit of time into these articles, and sometimes others do too (especially for interviews). Since my heretofore successful attempt to post fresh content daily bumps these stories off the top within a day or two, they don’t get the extended coverage they ought to. So I plan to highlight one story per month in the sidebar.

I try to keep coming up with new features every few weeks. But I am only one person, and I certainly won’t think of everything. What are some new features you’d like to see on this blog?

I might not be able to pull everything off, but post your ideas in the comments and I’ll see what I can do.