Tag: Shawn McLemore

Sponsored Post: Buy your ticket for Summerville’s ‘Spare the Rod’ play (Video)










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Sponsored Post: Summerville’s ‘Spare the Rod’ play comes to Carolina Theatre Sept. 29, features Le’Andria Johnson

Sponsored Post: Summerville’s ‘Spare the Rod’ play comes to Carolina Theatre Sept. 29, features Le’Andria Johnson

Tall One Outreach Ministries presents the award-winning gospel stage play, “Spare the Rod, Spoil the Child – Part 2,” written and produced by Dr. Mildred Summerville and directed by Trina Jeffrie (aka Sister Cantaloupe) at the Carolina Theatre, 309 West Morgan Street, Durham, NC, on September 29, 2018, at 7:30 pm. 
 
Viewers are in for an unforgettable experience! Gracing the stage are Grammy award-winning artist Le’Andria Johnson; gospel singing sensation Shawn McLemore, who is known for his hit single “I Believe” featuring James Fortune; recording artists Dr. Pauline Plummer, Rhonda McLemore, and Queen of Gospel Comedy, Trina Jeffrie; and Apostle Aaron McNair, renown preacher, teacher, and author. The additional
supporting cast members will be selected from Durham School of the Arts and North Carolina Central University Department of Theatre and Dance. Also making an appearance is the Grammy nominated talented R&B diva Angie Stone.
 
A must-see story, the play is alternately a moving drama and a side-splitting comedy that will be talked about in families and generations to come. These insurmountable challenges have been encountered by most families. In this gripping and engaging dramatic piece, a woman is simply known as “Grandma” serves as the pillar of her surroundings. Her son’s family is in crisis, and those within her neighborhood are drowning in chronic troubles of their own. Through it all, Grandma seeks God on behalf of those who are not spiritually inclined enough to seek Him for themselves. Even those who resent her, such as her son’s sometimes rigid wife, Linda, ultimately end up on Grandma’s prayer list. And when the walls of the lives of those around Grandma seem to come tumbling down, they know who to turn to for guidance and sound counsel. It’s not always advice that they want to hear, but it is consistently the precise word needed to steer them in the right direction.
 
Using spirit-filled music and memorable characters like James, the doting son, Linda, the insensitive daughter-in-law, Tracy, the high-strung teenager, and Sister Cantaloupe, Grandma’s feisty sister, “Spare the Rod, Spoil the Child – Part 2” portrays issues within the community such as family dysfunction, peer pressure, substance abuse, and other pertinent matters that are too often inadequately addressed or considered taboo altogether.
 
Other characters in the cast bring even more drama to the script. In her God-given wisdom, Grandma confronts Tracy’s suppressed anger and bitterness, convincing her to disclose facts about a rape kept secret for years. Also, she fervently prays for her grandson, William, who has a change of heart and avert
a life of gang involvement.
 
Though compounding events take a toll on Grandma, the audience will rejoice in knowing that this elderly woman’s life was prayer-centered, purpose-inspired, and, inevitably, not at all lived in vain. Extraordinary drama, corrupt karma, a supportive pastor, and a praying grandma, all come together to make “Spare the Rod, Spoil the Child – Part 2” a must-see theatrical production! Infused with foot-stomping gospel music, this is soul-stirring entertainment that will warm hearts, tickle funny bones, uplift the spirits, and search the souls of all those who experience it.
 
– From a press release

Live from Los Angeles – Vol. 2 – Beverly Crawford

Beverly Crawford
Live from Los Angeles – Vol. 2
JDI Records (2010)

By Libra Boyd
Gospel Music Fever

Recall Bobby Jones and New Life’s glory days and you will readily recall the voice that made the group a favorite throughout the early 90’s.  Several solo projects, a Grammy nomination, and a Stellar award win later, Beverly Crawford returned again in September with Live from Los Angeles – Vol. 2, and we can see she is still giving God the glory, ministering to His people, and singing us into frenzies.

The project’s opening number “It’s About Time for a Miracle,” set to what may as well be called “shouting music,” ignites the fire that burns throughout the album.  By the time “Miracle” graduates to its vamp, I can most certainly envision that Crawford and her audience are singing, praising, and pickin’ ’em up and puttin’ ’em down all at the same time.

Next up is “It’s So,” a tempo contrast to the preceding track.  Crawford, who serves as co-pastor at Gainesville Family Worship Center with her husband Todd, delivers the verses just like the singing preacher that she is.  By the song’s end, the preacher is in high gear, exhorting us in sermonette fashion to “name it, claim it, believe it, accept it–it is so!”

From there, she sprinkles a fair amount of quartet-flavored seasoning on the Doug Williams-penned “Born Again,” making the choir tune just right for down-home Sunday morning church.  She then reminds us that she not only can take us to church, but can also lead us into worship with the self-penned “For Who You Are”–easily the centerpiece of this project.

Another standout is “Everything Will Be Alright” (written by Shawn McLemore), the James Brown-esque groove with sassy, brassy horns for which Crawford and her friend and industry contemporary Shirley Murdock team up. As expected, the two make a great tag team, taking turns with the soaring lead vocals.  (You’ll likely be hearing them again on Murdock’s upcoming live CD/DVD.  See GMF’s related post here.)  “Serve You Well” is the beautiful ballad that follows.  Then Crawford is joined by her youngest daughter, Latrina Crawford, on “Radical Praise.”  It’s “I Need A Word” however, where Latrina’s vocality as a soloist shines.

Rounding out the project is “Marvelous,” written by Myron Butler and Ted Winn.  Crawford brings Murdock back in the reprise to riff over the climactic vamp, and the two have us headed straight into another frenzy.

With Michael Bereal and Professor James Roberson handling the production of this project, Live in Los Angeles – Vol. 2 encompasses all that we’ve come to enjoy about Beverly Crawford’s ministry through the years and affirms why she remains a force to be reckoned with among today’s female traditional gospel artists.

Favorites
“Born Again” – “For Who You Are” – “Everything Will Be Alright” – “Marvelous”

Fever Meter
SMOKIN’ (4 of 5 Stars)