We all love a little bit of Gospel music, irrespective of whether saint or sinner, Christian or heathen. Holding their Celebration of the genre, BET gathered some of the best and brightest in the industry to praise and rejoice live on camera! Hallelujah!!
Divas performing included Anita Baker, Yolanda Adams, Tamela Mann,Shirley Caesar and the Clark Sisters. But the stand out performance came from a pregnant Tamar Braxton, who not only earned a standing ovation for her rendition of Be Grateful but had many at home proclaiming "I didn't know she could sing like that".
Check out how our Divas did, below!
Note: I can't get the videos to not auto-play, so be prepared for a wave of Gospel goodness to hit as soon as they come alive. It is not God trying to send you a message via this blog (!)
Tamar Braxton:
Tamela Mann:
Shirley Caesar:
Karen And Kiki Sheard:
Yolanda Adams:
Anita Baker:
Thoughts?
Tamar's belting is sublime.
ReplyDeletewhere's the anita clip?
ReplyDeleteNone of the videos show up on my tablet. -(
ReplyDeleteSorry about that, I'll add it!
ReplyDeletelol! Someone needs to repent!
ReplyDeletetotally
ReplyDeleteawesome! after i posted my question i noticed there was a stream of other videos at the bottom that you can scroll through horizontally. blonde moment, but thanks for adding it for ease! she sounds great in this clip and you can feel the industry's respect for her pulsing from the seats. i thought it was a stirring performance for both vocalists, even if Donnie is a little homophobic.
ReplyDeleteIt would be really cool if you did a vocal profile on Yolanda Adams!!!
ReplyDeleteSomebody does but it's obviously not me. Clearly I don't even need to hear gospel. Yes, I am THAT righteous!
ReplyDeleteTamar beasted. KiKi did really well, too. Would you ever consider doing a profile for Kierra? I think she's really stepped up her game vocally.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite was Tamela Mann, Tamars was boring to me
ReplyDeleteTamela Mann's performance really was something. Her power in the fifth octave is stellar. She has so much vocal wight up their and...can sound so buttery smooth. I just love this woman's voice. What is she a thick mezzo?
ReplyDeleteI didn't find Tamar's to be boring. I just was struck odd by how she eyed down the camera.
ReplyDeleteLe'Andria Johnson was my favorite performance. Her and Tyrese just moved mountains. Le'Andria just isn't afraid to get down and ugly when she sings which for me, I haven't ever seen anyone do this before. I just...I don't know what to say.
ReplyDeleteI dont know I felt like she was out of place
ReplyDeleteShe is my favorite gospel singer
ReplyDeleteHer faicial expressions were disturbing. But to me, no one can feel out of place when it comes to singing gopsel. It's about the dilivery of the message first and foremost and I think no one can go wrong with that. But she song my favorite gospel song too.
ReplyDeleteLOL Yeah, she looked.... special haha
ReplyDeleteI think for me there is an honestness one must present she seemed to busy with the counting notes than feeling the message. But of course that is my opinion.
ReplyDeleteGosh, this made my day! HAAHAHAHAHA.
ReplyDeleteLove her, she'll get one!
ReplyDeleteA profile, that is! Yikes.
ReplyDeleteHahaha timely save!
ReplyDeleteThe belting at the end is what saved the performance imo. Up until that point i found her performance quite shaky and disappointing. Her vocal treatment of the song wasnt interesting or captivating either. I just watched all the way through waiting for her to slay like i knew she eventually would. Id give that a 6/10.
ReplyDeleteDefinitely, it was boring up until that point. But when she started belting "Be grateful", I threw my hands in the air and shouted, "YES LAWD JESUS."
ReplyDeleteI really love her tone up there though. It's so rich and bright.
Yeah im a big fan of her voice. She's one singer who despite not having the best technique, can still vocally slay many a chick :D
ReplyDeleteAgreed!
ReplyDeleteAlso, she has kind've a weird range, She's much more comfortable singing a G5 than a G3.
Go on YouTube and search for - Braxton Family Values S02E15 Soul-O Act 1/3 its got a really interesting piece about Tamars technique, range and comfort zone :)
ReplyDeleteShe can act really ratchet at times xD
ReplyDeleteI have to say I'm suprised with how little she understands her voice and her lack of musicianship!
Have you heard her first album from back in 2000 btw? It has some a nice r&b vibe. Though her voice was nothing like what it is now. I hope her new album is similar but modernized!
I haven't to be honest. Ive only just started getting into her since the past 6 months when i started watching Braxton Family Values. We're behind in the UK so we havent got to season 3 yet. Ive just been trying to catch up on YouTube :) I think with Tamar she has obviously had a little bit of training but as that video shows its not something she has consistently had and followed which explains why she can often be pitchy. She has a great instrument though and enough know how to avoid damaging her voice in an Xtina fashion. I doubt Tamar at her age will start consistently having vocal lessons but i think she will continue to surprise us every now and again with a knockout vocal performance.
ReplyDeletesorry if i don't use the right words for things.
ReplyDeleteI think her musicianship (here at least) is quite sharp, actually. There's a lot of isolation of certain rhythmic structures that's used to emphasize the lyric/and or build/progress through a sort of juxtaposition/extension (sunshine - down in the first line or w/e, then sunshine, same 'double' with a bit of a flourish thrown in to 'build up.' to the next section of the song/chorus.' Her rhythmic phrasing 'goes with' (and yet, almost equally pushes against and goes behind) the music behind her in a somewhat subtle way, but lyric-centered way.
She's not just hitting the heavy beats (actually sometimes she's not even doing that), she's actually kind of capturing the movement of various lines behind her (not always even the same line in a measure - jumping from percussion to strings), and her use of the light beats? like on 'not?' that's beautiful. It's wonderfully at odds with the flow established by most of the phrasing done before that point, in a way that I think suggests a certain hard-edged authority that fits with an interpretation of a song like this. There are moments where her improv doesn't seem to fit quite so nicely with the backing music to me, the last 'worse off' riff before the vamp? didn't quite work for me but it made sense, in a looser yet still musical context, as a cousin to her earlier ad-libs, just not so much with the backing material.
I love this performance mainly because I think she manages to project (via her deliberate phrasing) such a beautifully complex psychological presence as to suggest embodying simultaneously both a duty-bound stoicism on God's behalf - and yet a fearful, desperate powerlessness that I would imagine seems far more sympathetic to the audience. Somehow, I feel she's managed to turn this song into a vision of the struggle to/for faith and ultimately the transcendence of it - one founded, in a sense, on memorializing and submitting to its ugliness and bitterness.
Also, I was quite surprised - the first time I watched this - to realize she was capable of this sort of agility. I'd listened to earlier stuff of hers but it never sounded quite this...out and out riffy. Specifically - her arpeggios. I guess that's what they're called. But then I listened to some song she sang with Silk and then 'Try Me,' and figured maybe this isn't really anything so new for her vocally. But she used those arpeggios to good effect here, to mark transitions between significantly different sections, to outline falling action, to set up (surprise!) rising actions, and then even at the end, to kind of do all the previous ones with the intent of illustrating resolution. Quite impressively motivic, and not heavy-handed.
...Also some of her register transitions are sick-nasty (2:05? another one that i totally can't find right now, too), and the contrasting and inverting of texture-groupings and dynamic-progressions during the 'vamp,' is nice, too. For all that's happening here, it's a bit remarkable it's so self-contained. Anyway, not saying they're on the same 'level,' but it's clear she learned a LOT of very good things from Mariah.