#The Blind Boys of Alabama

[cbjustmusic]

This May Be The Last Time: A Film about the Blind Boys of Alabama

[krispyweiss]

The Blind Boys of Alabama at Holland Theater, Bellefontaine, Ohio, Dec. 10, 2022

Ye want to be healed? Ye need to be healed?

Get ye to a Blind Boys of Alabama show.

Their magic works not only on concertgoers, but on the band members themselves. Original Blind Boy and nonagenarian Jimmy Carter is proof of that.

Though he is small and frail - and battling a cold - Carter, who sometimes sits motionless on stage for long stretches, possesses a big and powerful voice that seems to come out of nowhere to to overtake the two other Blind Boys and their band. Next thing you know, the group’s manager is leading Carter down the stage steps and into the audience, where he happily takes pats on the shoulder and leads call-and-response gospel shouting as the crowd claps along rapturously and the rest of the band summons the spirit on stage.

Following this display of joyous exuberance, Carter returned to the stage and the Blind Boys closed their exhilarating, 80-minute performance with “The Last Day of the Year,” a kind-of-straight-gospel, kind-of-Christmas song that fit the split setlist just perfectly and left the exiting revelers feeling a whole lot better than they did as they entered the theater.

And so it went that on Dec. 10, Bellefontaine, Ohio’s, Holland Theater was transformed into a pulpit and a Saturday night transmogrified into Sunday morning.

The three Blind Boys took the stage with hands on one another’s shoulders for guidance and launched into “Walking in Jerusalem,” a song the original band first sang 78 years ago, per Carter’s introduction. Backed by rhythm section, keys and electric guitar - and with the sighted band members wearing dark shades in solidarity with their leaders - the singers quickly moved in to “Up above My Head, I Hear Music in the Air.”

Dressed in red and black formal wear and standing to take featured vocal spots, the Blind Boys also ceded some lead vocals to their wholly capable band. “White Christmas” was thus jazzy with a funk outro. Carter’s original “Merry Christmas I’m Having a Ball” was unexpectedly secular. “Silent Night” proved just how blue(sy) the Blind Boys can get. And “Go Tell it on the Mountain” was funky, strutting on a sauntering bassline that was powerful enough to pull everyone up that hill.

Carter made a point to differentiate Christmas music from gospel music. And gospel music was the order of the evening.

The Blind Boys urged their followers to “Take Your Burdens to the Lord and Leave Them There.” They promised that “God Knows Everything.” They sang “My Eyes Can See” through their faith. And the conviction and harmony made it entirely believable.

And when the group sung their version of “Amazing Grace,” set to the melody of “House of the Rising Sun,” there was not a shred of irony when the formally dressed, elderly, sightless and nothing-but-classy singers referred to themselves as wretches and declared: I was blind, but now I see.

It was a miraculous evening.

Grade card: The Blind Boys of Alabama at Holland Theater, 12/10/22 - A+

12/11/22

[ponderingrandomthings]

Feels nice listening to them...

Something about the cover too...

[soulmusicsongs]

Just Wanna See His Face - The Blind Boys Of Alabama ( Spirit Of The Century, 2001)

[peninsularian]

2021 RSD release version of The Staples’ classic

[mybeautifulchristianjourney]

I Shall Not Walk Alone Blind Boys of Alabama | Runtime: 5mins 26secs

[musiconspotify]

#BlindBoysOfAlabama This may be the last time

[positivebeatdigest]

If I Had a Hammer

[cbjustmusic]

Daryl Hall and The Blind Boys of Alabama performing "Last Month Of The Year". __________________________ Last Month Of The Year Traditional

Tell me when was Jesus born Last month of the year Tell me when was Jesus born Last month of the year Tell me when was Jesus born Last month of the year Yeah, wasn't January, February, March, April or May June, July, August, September, October, November Was the 25th day of December Was the last month of the year He was born to the Virgin Mary Last month of the year He was born to the Virgin Mary Last month of the year He was born to the Virgin Mary Last month of the year Yeah, wasn't January, February, March, April or May June, July, August, September, October, November Was the 25th day of December Was the last month of the year He was born in an ox manger Last month of the year He was born in an ox manger Last month of the year Yeah, wasn't January, February, March, April or May June, July, August, September, October, November Was the 25th day of December It was the last month of the year Jesus, Jesus, Jesus

[krispyweiss]

Book Review: “Spirit of the Century: Our Own Story” by the Blind Boys of Alabama with Preston Lauterbach

The complete and unvarnished story of the Blind Boys of Alabama is finally told in “Spirit of the Century: Our Own Story.”

The resulting 320 pages contain the fullest accounting of the poorly documented Blind Boys the world is likely to ever get, rectifying a fate befalling many black American artists. “Spirit” fills in all the gaps in membership, the lean years and the Blind Boys’ 1980s renaissance and other facts that even long-time followers would’ve been unlikely to know about before diving in to the book.

Written by the band with “The Chitlin’ Circuit” author Preston Lauterbach, “Spirit of the Century” covers the Blind Boys’ 1939 beginnings as the Happy Land Jubilee Singers at the Alabama Institute for the Negro Deaf and Blind through to the present day. Along the way, the gaping holes in the group’s story are plugged with solid research, plenty of archival and contemporary interviews and strong writing.

The Happy Lands, as Lauterbach refers to the early group, turned professional in 1944, leaving behind one Jimmy Carter, who was too young to hit the road, but would come back in the 1980s after a two-decade stint with the Blind Boys of Mississippi to form a “holy trinity” with co-founders George Scott and Clarence Fountain. Carter ultimately became the group’s third leader, after Velma Traylor and Fountain. He retained that title until his 2023 retirement and the passing of the reins to Rickie McKinnie.

In a move described as akin to Mick Jagger leaving the Rolling Stones to join the Beatles, Fountain decamped the Alabama Blind Boys in 1969 and temporarily hooked up with the hard-drinking Blind Boys of Mississippi. It was here Fountain and Carter first reconnected before the former, who had girlfriends scattered around the country and six children he denied in his will, eventually moved on to a star-crossed solo career that found him touring with horny conjoined twins and participating in a stolen-car ring with a con-man manager before rejoining his original group in the 1970s.

Fountain’s life, Lauterbach writes, was “a maze of complications that make Sophocles seem like Dr. Seuss.”

Carter eventually transferred from the Mississippi to the Alabama Blind Boys and, after the band starred in 1983’s “The Gospel at Colonus,” found mainstream success as the musical “made the Blind Boys of Alabama white-people famous.”

This led to working relationships with Lou Reed, Ben Harper, Peter Gabriel and others. The Blind Boys of Alabama picked up Grammy awards and sung for presidents but never lost their taste for their beloved “Mack Donald’s,” where they stopped on the way to perform for George W. Bush.

“So we go into the White House with a guy named Jimmy Carter and all the rest holding McDonald’s bags,” BBA’s manager is quoted as saying in the book.

Lauterbach told the story just in time. Carter, the last surviving original member of the group, is 92 and retired and while the Blind Boys of Alabama plan to continue on indefinitely, their original era is over. That’s all the more reason to give thanks to Lauterbach for uncovering one of music’s most-important sagas and for “Spirit of the Century,” easily the most-informative music biography of the past decade.

Grade card: “Spirit of the Century: Our Own Story” by the Blind Boys of Alabama with Preston Lauterbach - A

4/29/24

[thejoyofviolentmovement]

News/Announcements: Shoutouts to Patreon Patrons and Creatives Rebuild New York

News/Announcements: Shoutouts to Patreon Patrons and Creatives Rebuild New York @thedeltahorse @alicenorthover @NYCPhotoUES @jennyquarx @JaneneSings11 @patreon @Photo_Booker @ArtsCRNY

12 years ago, I started what has been for me — my life’s work. And honestly, when I started this site, I couldn’t have imagined three-quarters of the things I’ve done and experienced over JOVM’s history to ever happen.  I’ve covered roughly 1,100-1,200 shows in NYC, with a handful of shows in Chicago, Baltimore and Philadelphia. I’ve covered about a dozen or more festivals, including traveling…

[heckyestaylorhicks]

FULL VIDEO OF CLOSING CEREMONY. Taylor performs at 1:18:31, 2:22:46, and 2:41:20.