Artists
The Blind Boys Of Alabama
The Blind Boys of Alabama have spread the spirit and energy of pure soul gospel music for over 60 years, ever since the first version of the group formed at the Alabama Institute for the Negro Blind in 1939. Today, founding members Clarence Fountain, Jimmy Carter and George Scott are joined by more recent arrivals Joey Williams, Ricky McKinnie, Bobby Butler, and Tracy Pierce on a mission to expand the audience for traditional soul-gospel singing while incorporating contemporary songs and innovative arrangements into their hallowed style.
The group toiled for more than 40 years on the traditional gospel circuit. But in 1983, their career reached a turning point with their crucial role in The Gospel at Colonus, the smash hit musical drama created by Bob Telson and Lee Breuer. This Obie Award-winning Off-Broadway and Broadway success, coupled with their appearance on two original soundtrack albums (in 1984 and 1988), brought the Blind Boys' timeless sound to an enthusiastic new audience.
The 1992 album Deep River - produced by Booker T. Jones and featuring a transcendent version of Bob Dylan's I Believe In You - earned the Blind Boys their first Grammy Award nomination. It was, as their executive producer and long-time booking agent Chris Goldsmith notes, "the first time the Blind Boys ventured into 'gospelizing' relevant contemporary songs that weren't traditional soul-gospel songs." In 1995, the Blind Boys released the roof-raising live album I Brought Him With Me; it was followed (in 1997) by Holding On, an experiment in funked-up contemporary gospel.
Blind Boys of Alabama Discography
The group did not record again until 2001, when Chris Goldsmith decided to self-finance the Blind Boys album he'd been hearing in his head for years. "I saw a show with [blues singer/guitarist] John Hammond and the Blind Boys performing together that was an epiphany for me. Around the same time, John Chelew came by to talk about his ideas for a Blind Boys album."
The result was the Blind Boys' Real World label debut, Spirit Of The Century - a set of hot-wired traditional gospel and carefully chosen contemporary songs that became the group's best-selling album to date and won the 2001 Grammy Award for Best Traditional Soul Gospel Album. One track, a version of Tom Waits' Way Down in the Hole, became the theme song for the acclaimed HBO dramatic series The Wire. (Throughout their 2003 touring season, the Allman Brothers Band played this cut over their PA system each night just before hitting the stage.)
