Kitty Parham
Via our good friend SR, some clips of the magnificent Kitty Parham, then and nowish.
Then (watch her wonderful hand motions … talk about choreography):
Nowish: The embed code for this video has been disabled but I hope people will watch it, not least of all because I’m curious to hear what y’all think about how Gaitherized the setting and style is … there’s the Gaither-like figure pseudo-conducting, the collection of vaunted performers from the genre arrayed around the piano, and famous people who rise up from among the group to take some solo lines … heck, the studio even looks like the early Gaither Homecoming videos. This clip feels like it’s from the early 1990s (someone in the YouTube comments says 93-94), which makes me wonder if one trend might have influenced the other and if so, through what channels or paths? And while I’m blegging, any black gospel gurus out there who can name any of the faces in the crowd, you’d fill in some big gaps in my own knowledge.
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Bubba Smith wrote:
Hey Avery,
The reason it looks Gaitherized is because Bill put this together. I don’t believe it was ever released due to record label artist release issues.
Some notables I recognized were Albertina Walker of The Caravans, Richard Smallwood, ace guitar player Al Willis and if looks don’t deceive me, that appears to be the late Billy Preston on organ.
I do remember a pretty good buzz on this years ago.
Posted 23 Jun 2008 at 9:05 pm ¶
BUICK wrote:
I see what you mean about it looking Gaitheresque - - but lots more hats and lots more bling.
Posted 23 Jun 2008 at 10:30 pm ¶
Matt G. wrote:
That sure looks like the gaither studio to me, right down to the MIDI Yamaha grand piano.
Posted 24 Jun 2008 at 12:47 am ¶
Norm Graham wrote:
I believe #1 is correct and that this was done by Gaither.
I wrote the Gaither organization a number of years ago and asked if it had considered doing a video with African-American gospel artists.
The reply said that Gaither had made such a video but was unable to release it for various legal reasons.
Posted 24 Jun 2008 at 5:51 pm ¶
quartet-man wrote:
I am surprised that Gaither hadn’t done his homework beforehand. He usually is a great businessman. I seem to remember this video being discussed back then when he was going to do it. Someone in the comments acted like it is older than I would have thought offhand.
Posted 26 Jun 2008 at 11:17 am ¶
1 old fan wrote:
I would guess the reason Bill got caught off-guard may be because not all music companies are as quick to release their artists to do outside project as s/g labels seems to be. S/g seems to be about the only genre where labels will allow artists to do other projects without the LABELS exchanging money for the privilege. And many black gospel artists are on MAJOR mainstream labels, and they would be less likely to GIVE an artist away than a smaller Christian label might.
Just a thought, anyway.
Posted 26 Jun 2008 at 12:12 pm ¶