The Soul In a Soul Singer

I’ve been back home to Minneapolis for over a month now. Back to the life I know here at home. Singing, time with friends and family, ministry. Being a cat momma. I even did a little dog-sitting! (I thought I might adopt a dog and that decided it for me!)- NO.

Writing felt so easy when I was alone in Sicily. As good as I am at being alone, I do need to know that someone somewhere is out there listening. Adding to this blog was a good way to feel like I was still communicating. It was a great temporary friend.

I’ve got a show coming up on Sunday, August 27th that I am really excited about. I’ll attach the poster and all of the links below. Prepping for this show got me to thinking about a conversation I had with my good friends Jeffrey Bailey, Norm Blagman and Chryss Altamirano a few weeks back. In our text chat before getting together to celebrate my birthday, Norm mentioned that he’d like us all to think about the music that made us who we are as singers and musicians and to bring 2 songs that influenced us greatly to share with the group.

So what’s the connection? Well…first here is the story I shared with my friends that night. Back in about 1987 I had just turned 16 and started driving. Some of you can relate to the awesome feeling of independence this provides! I got a job as a peanut vendor at The Metrodome and worked whenever the MN Twins were in town. I drove my parents Jeep Eagle station wagon to work which I loved because it had a CASSETTE TAPE deck. Remember those? With my mega millions I was making in commission (actually pretty good for a teenager) from throwing peanuts, I started buying music. It’s interesting right, because when you spend your own money you start to buy things YOU like. Life for a kid is so often what the parents want and want for us. It’s interesting when that switches.

I know I’ve got you all curious here…what was the first cassette I bought with my own money? I'll tell you the first two because I think I bought them together:

Janet Jackson-Control & Anita Baker-Rapture. Followed up just a few weeks later by Bobby Brown-My Prerogative and New Edition (can’t remember the album title…just “If It isn’t Love”)

Growing up before jr. high school or so, I didn’t hear much music that was secular. When some of you hear that I know what you’re thinking. Musta been an uptight, legalistic Christian cult. It wasn’t. My mom was not like that. She has always loved all music. She grew up listening to Motown, The Beatles, and all of the greats of the 50s and 60s. In 1971, the year I was born, she found Jesus and Jesus found her. It changed everything in her life. Including her music choices. The 70s was the pinnacle of the Jesus Revolution (as told in the movie) and artists like Honeytree, 2nd Chapter of Acts, Amy Grant, The Imperials, Keith Green and Andrae Crouch were writing and singing about their experience with God through Jesus. It was a beautiful time and incredible music came out of it.

It was just my mom and I for the first eight years of my life and we always listened to this music in the Ford Pinto (on the 8-track!). I never got the impression my mom felt she COULDN’T listen to secular music or her old favorites. She just WANTED to listen to this music. I just did what my mom did and fell in love with the songs.

As a child I always gravitated toward the soulful songs and the soulful singers. What do I mean by soulful? Well here is where it gets tricky…you can say “the black singers” but that is just a little too simplistic (and stereo-typical). I did love Andrae Crouch the most. His music had all the Black church sounds…the big vocals, complex harmonies, the B3 organ,…the groove. Sometimes Andrae’s songs sounded more like R&B songs than church. But it wasn’t just Andrae and his legendary singers like Tata Vega that were soulful. Listen to Matthew Ward of 2nd Chapter of Acts, Russ Taff of the Imperials, Bryan Duncan of the Sweet Comfort Band…even Keith Green at times was incredibly soulful. O Lord You’re Beautiful is a great example. All but Andrae and Tata are white folks like me and there is just something to be said for representation.

The truth is, I can’t remember my mom ever saying I couldn’t listen to secular music, I just didn’t.

Fast forward to 1987 and 16-year old Sara. By then, my biggest influence was not my mom or my church, it was my neighborhood. I lived and went to school on the North side of Mpls. There were plenty of white people on the northside at the time but we were not the majority. I was surrounded by black people and black culture, so black music was part of that.

Again, as always, I gravitated toward the soulful. I wanted a groove, lush harmonies , complex chord changes and most of all, a singer that made me feel something. I spent the next two years building a massive collection of cassette tapes. Music was always on, especially in the car and on my “walkman” when I walked home from school. Some other faves were Stevie Wonder, Terrence Trent D’Arby, James Ingram, Al B. Sure and Keith Sweat. Representing the white folks was George Michael. Sheesh, that man could sing.

Back to 2023 and my conversation with my friends “You Bring Me Joy” -Anita Baker was the first song I brought up to my friends during our conversation. Anita was the first singer I saw myself in. I sang with her, memorized every note and run she did. I loved the background vocals, the groove, the melodies. This entire album is still today one of my very favorites.

But it wasn’t just one song we were supposed to bring up. My second song was Spread Love by Take 6. And the heart of my story is the road it took to get to that song and why it’s so special to me.

Right after high school, I attended a religious event with some friends. A conference if you will. As I mentioned earlier I had left the church I grew up in and wasn’t attending anywhere else. I had affirmed my faith in Christ at a retreat camp at about 16 years old, I was a definitely a believer, but not part of a church.

Something that was said by the speaker at the conference compelled me to throw away ALL of my secular cassettes (hundreds). I didn’t throw away any Christian music because I didn’t have any. I remember, reluctantly, but with a lot of determination walking with a couple of giant black trash bags full of cassettes and placing them in the garbage bins. I believed at the time that those cassettes and that music had become too important to me and was an “idol”. It wasn’t so much about the content, more about how much I had invested in it. It was a sacrifice and a step in faith towards God. I didn’t really want to do it, I just did it.

Huh. It was the first time in my life that I had done something like this. I didn’t tell ANYONE. I felt stupid about it. Or maybe like a dumb sheep falling for a dumb trick.

I missed my music but life went on. I still listened to the radio and watched MTV and one day I heard the song “Spread Love” by Take 6 on the radio. A few days later I heard “Heaven” by BeBe and CeCe Winans.

Here is where I could stop typing and have a good and grateful cry. It’s a moment where pieces of your life that don’t make sense or seem so fragmented come together. It’s where a 52 year old looks at an 18 year old and says, “everything happens for a reason…it all matters”.

You see my church world and my neighborhood came together. My faith and the soulful music I had always felt pulled to like a magnet came together. And my world opened up to a new sound. GOSPEL MUSIC. And this gospel music was on the secular radio, in the same countdown as Duran Duran. I wonder, had I held on to the music that had half of what I needed, would I have found the music that had it all completely?

I’m a Gospel singer now. I’m a soul singer. I sing and write songs about my faith in God. My songs have groove, and complex chords and lush harmonies. They have soul. I sing in church, but also in parks and on porches, and at supper clubs. Because it’s the music that is complete to me.

Take 6, BeBe and CeCe, The Winans, Commissioned, Kirk Franklin, Andrae Crouch, Fred Hammond...these artists showed me how to sing with my soul. And now today, Tonia Hughes Kendrick, Billy Steele, Kennadi Hurst, Lawrence Miles…they show me how to sing Gospel music.

Some of you ask why I don’t only sing Gospel music at church? Why do I choose secular venues? The answer is that I’m really glad Take 6 and The Winans didn’t do that.

Come and hear us sing songs that mean the world to me on Sunday, August 27th 2023 at Crooner’s.

Two shows, 5 & 8pm.

https://tinyurl.com/5PM-SHOW-WINANS
https://tinyurl.com/8PM-SHOW-WINANS