Good Ol' So. Texas So. Gospel Music

It should have been evident early on at this blogsite, that yours truly enjoys singing and music. Music of nearly any genre! And my favorite genre? Dear reader, that would be Southern Gospel music!

Alas! Southern Gospel isn't as easily accessible here in South Texas as it was back in Tennessee. However, in the past two weeks I've had opportunity to let it bless my appreciative ears on two occasions.

First, annually on the nite that ends the old year and commences the new, Ashley Road Baptist Church holds a New Years Watch Night service. From about six 'til after midnite this little church on the South Side (off Roosevelt Street and not far beyond Stinson Airfield) is alive with the music of several local Gospel groups. Such as, New Life, a mixed group that employs a variety of instruments in accompaniment (including pedal steel guitar), or Frank 'n' Joe, a chicano father-son act (daddy Frank sings lead and son Joe accompanies on piano or keyboard and lends harmony).

An hour plus break commencing about ten gives artists and audience time to retire to the fellowship hall for a late supper of New Years food (think: black-eye peas, tamales, etc.) in addition to plenty of the typical church potluck fare. Then it's back to the sanctuary for the featured group's singing us up to the New Year. In most years that I've attended the Watch Night this group has been The Telestials, from Hendersonville, Tennessee. However, they were absent this time -- apparently lured away by some mega-church that made them an offer they could not refuse.

The absence of the Tennesseans could have been a "downer", since I like their sound and cherish an old hit of theirs, "Help Wanted". But I just focused on the gospel sounds being offered by the locals. New Life was filling in for the former featured group. For about five or six minutes right at midnite, Pastor Anthony Shipp led us in "praying out the old year and praying in the new". New Life was then supposed to do one or two more songs. But there was a Spirit in the place, and we all just kept on praising the Lord 'til one a.m. with Gospel singing! (At Southern Gospel concerts, the audience -- at least some of us -- often sing along with the artists, on familiar songs.)

This past Saturday morning I rode VÍA buses to Fiesta Texas for the employee rehire party. I chose to take a "scenic route" rather than the most direct route (but still arriving in the neighborhood when I intended, just before the party was scheduled to start in Sangerfest Halle). On the way, at Vance Jackson and Wurzbach I saw Oak Ridge Baptist Church with its peaceful campus covered with live oaks. I remembered that in Friday newspaper's "Weekender" section it had been announced that on Saturday afternoon this church would be hosting a "South Texas Southern Gospel Festival" with several groups.

So, after the rehire party I took the bus(es) to the church. (The rehire party, BTW, involved a deejay who among other selections played the "Cotton-eyed Joe" and a country-music line dance number -- it was fun to watch these & would have been even more fun to dance to but I was in serious rehire conversation at the start of both.) When I arrived at Oak Ridge church and found my way into the sanctuary, I discovered that I had missed the first two groups, but was in time for the rather late lunch break. And the festival was scheduled to continue until after six in the evening.

Well, I'd considered attending the festival for only awhile. But each of the five featured groups was very good -- and I stayed around for all the second round. (Thus I got to hear the two groups I'd initially missed.)

One of the groups that was new to me was the Robby Wright Family, a husband and wife and their two daughters from North Texas. One of the daughters wrote a couple of their songs, and they were good; indeed, she has a gift in this! Other songs they sang came from standard repertoire for Southern Gospel singers. On these I considered that the Robby Wright Family sounded just as good as the "big" family names in national Gospel music, such as The Hoppers or The McKameys.

One of the two groups with whom I was already familiar is David's Song, from northeast Texas (one lives nearby in Louisiana). This trio is all "David" by first name, and they all wore dark suits and red shirts and neckties. They sounded as sharp as they looked! I especially felt blessed by their piano player, who was originally from San Antonio. And I was pleasantly surprised when they sang "Boundless Love", an early major hit by the Cathedral Quartet As a trio arrangement they didn't at all sound bad -- even tho' I missed the bass part. Be aware, this baritone isn't exactly fond of bass singers (naturally). Nevertheless, I did cotton to the late George Younce of The Cathedrals, and particularly liked his part on this song. But even without that fourth part, David's Song did them proud, I'd say!

The other familiar artists are The Moodys, a father-daughter act I had heard a few years earlier at Western Hills Christian Church. They're from nearby Universal City. After a few songs, dad John Moody told about how "doors opened" recently for him to go to Iraq and visit with our troops over there. He was insistent that our news media was not giving us the entire picture of what's going on in the Middle East. (I'd known about this journalistic bias toward exclusively the negative and the anti-American for some time). He showed a slide show (DVD or video) which presented phrases like "I am your brother" and "I am your sister" and other family relations, each followed by a picture of a soldier of that gender. Then there were several statements which he said soldiers had made to him during the visit, such as "I miss you" or "I'm doing my job here, don't forget me there!" All of this was backed by soft instrumental music.

I felt convicted! For a long time I had fervently prayed for our troops over there, their families here and our Commander-in-Chief. But I hadn't been doing such praying much as of late. Time to get back down on my knees on behalf of our military (and the people of Iraq)! And dear reader, if you're a "prayer warrior", please get down on your knees, too, for our troops and their families and the peace-lovers among the Iraqis!