Dave's Top Eight

1. Jerry Reed...Revisited by Darrell Toney (reviewed 6/07) (5 Stars)
2. Sounds Like Sunday by Janet Paschal (reviewed 5/07) (5 Stars)
3. True To The Call by Kingdom Heirs (reviewed 3/07) (4 1/2 Stars)
4. Revival by Gold City (reviewed 10/06) (4 1/2 Stars)
5. Get Away Jordan by Ernie Haase & Signature Sound (reviewed 2/07) (4 1/2 Stars)
6. Breakin' Chains by Three Bridges (reviewed 5/07) (4 1/2 Stars)
7. Big Sky by The Isaacs (reviewed 4/07)
8. Skywriting by Mercy's Well (reviewed 7/07)

Click title to purchase at CBD.com...click artist name to read Dave's Review. A CD will automatically fall out of the Top Eight after twelve months if no CD surpasses it before then.

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February 22, 2007

Advice For Groups Choosing Songs

A member of a regional Southern Gospel group wrote me today explaining his group's particular situation and asking for some advice. His group is based in an area that doesn't get a great deal of Southern Gospel. His local fans tend to have different expectations than Southern Gospel radio, or at least, he perceives his situation to be that way. He would like to please his local fans as well as the general Southern Gospel market, including SG radio.

An added layer to his dilemma is that songwriters (naturally) tend to give their best songs to better known, national level artists first.

He wanted to know what I thought his group should do in the future. My reply to him is below:

I think attempting to balance the expectations of your local audience with the expectations of SG radio is a mistake. Focusing on your strengths is much more important, in my opinion. The first question you should ask when selecting a song to learn is, "Can we sing this song with as much appeal as any other artist who might attempt to sing it in the future?" Sure, you might have to concede that another group may do better with better vocalists. If there are several dozen groups you know who are more suited to delivering what the song requires, though, move on...no matter how much you like the song.

That being said, it's still important to choose songs you enjoy performing. When a group is enjoying what they do, it carries over to the audience. This needs to be the case not only on stage, but in the studio as well. Pick songs you enjoy, but only after they've first passed the test of matching your strengths as singers.

You mentioned your local audience's expectations. For a regional group, local expectations are much more important than national expectations.

The following is something that illustrates this principle. I've determined this from my personal experience working in retail and being a customer as well:

If someone calls a retail store when a cashier has customers in line, and that cashier is the only one in the store who can answer the phone, it's fine for them to go ahead answer the phone. What should happen next is they should politely tell the customer on the phone it will be minute before they can assist them. They should then put the caller on hold, and process the customer holding the cash first. The most important customer at any given time is the one trying to give you cash!

My advice to you is similar. If you're going to cater to the expectations of anyone, cater to your local customers who are already buying your CDs. Your avenue to greater success down the road may not even lie with Southern Gospel radio. It may be Christian Country programming or something else entirely. Not to contradict the writings of St. Paul, but in music, pleasing your existing audience as much as you possibly can will serve you better than trying to be all things to all people.

In summary, I think you'll go further by sticking with styles that:
A) you do well,
B) you enjoy doing, and
C) already get the best response from your existing fans

Hope that helps!

Reading this over again, I would probably add that trying new styles is great. It's never good to get into a stylistic rut. However, it's not wise to try something new just for the sake of trying something new, especially if it totally fails to capitalize on your abilities as a group.

For example, Brian Free & Assurance hit a home run with "Long As I Got King Jesus." This would never have happened if they had merely tried to please their existing fans, but more importantly, their performance succeeded because the song suited them and they clearly enjoy singing it. Fast forward a year, and BF&A's next CD had two more songs in a similar style ("Jesus Will Pick You Up" and "The Coming Of The King"), because they wanted to KEEP the new fans they had gained with the previous hit. That wasn't all, though. They also took a new sound for a test drive with "If It Takes A Valley," and it did pretty good for them.

This is how a group retains existing fans while adding new ones. In the case of "Long As I Got King Jesus," it wasn't a matter of waiting on a songwriter to write something new they could use. Instead, they took an existing song and re-invented it.

That might be a way out of the "songwriters don't send us their best songs" dilemma.

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posted by David Bruce Murray @ 9:45:00 PM


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