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Photo By Randee
St. Nicholas
By Cheryl Stewart Osborn
After a successful
music career that spans five decades and continues to garner her
several Grammy awards (7 to date), Gladys Knight now knows why she
sings.
“At first I thought
my singing was just to entertain,” says Gladys. “But now I know
this gift from God is a platform from which I am to share His gospel.”
What a platform
she has created!
At age four, when
Gladys Knight first began to sing publicly with her Baptist church
choir in Atlanta, her mother always said God had given her a musical
gift to share. By age seven, her outstanding vocal performance
won the top prize at an amateur singing competition.
Gladys continued
to cultivate her talent and eventually gained prominence with the
legendary Gladys Knight and the Pips, formed with her brother
Bubba and her cousins William Guest and Edward Patten. Named after
their manager and cousin Edward “Pip” Woods, the group enjoyed success
throughout the 1960s, ‘70s, and ‘80s.
Her music hit the
charts with “Midnight Train to Georgia,” “You’re the Best Thing
That Ever Happened To Me,” and the original debut of “I Heard It
Through the Grapevine.” To date Knight has recorded more than
30 albums.
After going solo
in 1989, Gladys Knight continues to broaden her career in show business,
which includes appearing in several television series, music specials
(VH1 Divas Live, guest judge on American Idol) and
motion pictures (Hollywood Homicide), as well as starring
in a Broadway production, writing her autobiography, creating a
cookbook for diabetics, headlining at the Flamingo Hotel (named
“the number one show in Las Vegas”), appearing in a national commercial,
continuing her recording career, and forming and directing the LDS
gospel choir Saints Unified Voices with whom she recorded
her most recent album One Voice.
She has a star on
the Hollywood Walk of Fame and was inducted into the Rock ‘N’ Roll
Hall of Fame along with the Pips. She is a humanitarian
and a philanthropist, devoted to various worthy causes including
the American Diabetes Association. She is a wife, a mother of three,
and a grandmother of 11.
But of all she has
experienced, Gladys says “nothing has affected my life as much as
the joy I feel as a result of finally finding The Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints. Without a doubt, this is the best
thing that has ever happened to me!”
Her journey to finding
the LDS Church began as a little girl raised with deep spiritual
grounding by her mother, who instilled in her a firm faith and trust
in God. As life took Gladys down many different roads, she found
in her adult years that her soul desired something more.
“I understood the
atonement of Jesus Christ. I wanted to live with Him in Heaven,
but when I asked ‘Then what?’ no one could tell me what happened
for the rest of eternity,” says Gladys.
As she continued
searching for answers, her oldest son Jimmy and his wife Michelene
joined the LDS Church through the influence of a neighbor. Initially,
the rest of the family was unaware of Jimmy’s decision. But one
day as Jimmy and his sister, Kenya, sat next to each other on an
airplane, Kenya leaned over and asked Jimmy what he was reading.
“The scriptures,” he replied. Kenya looked closer and commented
that she couldn’t remember ever seeing a “1 Nephi” in her
scriptures. That conversation eventually led to Kenya’s conversion
and baptism.
In time the example
and gentle persuasions of Jimmy and his wife, and Kenya and her
husband, influenced Gladys to meet with the full-time missionaries.
She embraced the gospel and was baptized in 1997.
Gladys shares her
enthusiasm for her new faith at every opportunity. “I want to shout
it from the mountain tops! I want to tell everybody about the Lord
and his wonderful truths. I’m so excited to be a member of this
church that my friends have to calm me down.”
A few years ago,
Gladys married her long-time friend William McDowell. Though determined
to not be influenced by his wife’s beliefs, it wasn’t long before
William was studying the gospel and taking the missionary lessons.
But he kept it a secret from Gladys. “Everybody in the ward knew
except me,” says Gladys. “William finally told me the day before
his baptism so I could be there.”
Since joining the
Church, Gladys aspires to have what she views as one of the best
church callings: ward choir director. Though that calling still
hasn’t come to her, Gladys soon realized that God has a larger purpose
for her gift as she uses it to do the Lord’s work.
“My singing is to
be part of my light, shining so that people may see it and, in return,
I can be the example Heavenly Father would have me be. I just want
to do what He has asked all of us, to feed His sheep,” says Gladys.
For years, she humbly
accepted invitations to share her testimony and sing at stake firesides
throughout the United States.
“What an awesome
opportunity I have to serve the Lord through music. I have always
sung for the Lord, but now I get to use more hymns and scriptures
to tell the world His story,” she says.
In 2002, when her
stake asked her to present a gospel-sharing fireside for the Las
Vegas community, Gladys was delighted. With the eagerness of a
kid in a candy store, and with the help of several ward members,
she organized a large group of singers from the stake and named
them the Saints Unified Voices to reflect her idea of Latter-day
Saints singing as one. She also put together a program that included
her, William and Kenya boldly bearing their testimonies of the restored
gospel of Jesus Christ as LDS African Americans.
When three professional
musicians from her show at the Flamingo heard about her choir, they
volunteered to help. Though of different faiths, they view this
as an opportunity to praise the Lord through music.
After each show
at the Flamingo, the musicians worked with Gladys and with Kelly
Eisenhower, who is LDS and was then Gladys’s backup singer, to create
gospel-type arrangements for hymns the choir would sing, such as
“Because I Have Been Given Much” and “I Need Thee Every
Hour.”
click
to enlarge
Photo By Levi Ellyson, Opulence Studios
“I choose all of
the choir’s songs for their basic messages,” says Gladys. “I fell
in love with I’m a Child of God when I sang it at my granddaughter’s
baptism long before I joined the Church. I heard the message in
it even then.”
She heard As
I Have Loved You for the first time in a Relief Society meeting.
“The message was
so basic I just knew the choir had to sing it. It is the foremost
request our Savior makes of us, to love one another.”
Within a few weeks,
Gladys was ready to teach her new choir how to sing gospel music.
But directing a choir of volunteers wasn’t going to be easy.
“Except for a few,
these wonderful people had never sung gospel music before,” says
Gladys. They were also not accustomed to singing without sheet
music. Given only the words to the hymns typed in paragraph form,
the choir learned to sing the songs by following Gladys.
“All they get is
the lyrics because I don’t want anybody reading notes on paper.
They have to feel this music,” says Gladys.
The experience taught
her to be more patient and loving. “I’ve been known to be pretty
hard on my choir. But they have taught me as much as I’ve taught
them.”
After months of
hard work, her choir was ready. During two firesides held on a
hot August night in a Las Vegas stake center filled to capacity,
the Saints Unified Voices directed by Gladys Knight turned
a traditionally conservative mood into a toe-tapping, hand-clapping
celebration praising Jesus Christ through music. The response was
tremendous.
click
to enlarge
Photo By Levi Ellyson, Opulence Studios
Surprised by the
attention, encouraged by her stake presidency, and determined that
this was the Lord’s will for her, Gladys held new auditions to bring
the choir to a higher performing level and commitment. Amazed that
so many people from all over the greater Las Vegas area lined up
to audition for her choir, Gladys eventually choose 100 culturally
diverse voices. All are members of The Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints.
At first the SUV
Choir, as Gladys affectionately calls it, presented its fireside
program only in Las Vegas. However, Gladys was thrilled when the
SUV choir was invited to perform at the Tabernacle at Temple Square
in 2003 during the anniversary celebration of the priesthood being
available to all worthy men.
Word spreads quickly
throughout this church, and requests for more firesides pour in
continually from mission presidents and stake presidents all over
the world. The SUV Choir has now presented stake firesides in California,
Georgia and England, and will present a fireside in Hawaii this
year.
As with all SUV
Choir firesides held in LDS stake centers, nearly half of the 1,200
or so in attendance are visitors of other faiths. Most of them
have never been inside a LDS church and likely wouldn’t come except
to see the R&B legend Gladys Knight.
“People may come
because they think they’re getting a free concert, but they leave
with a better understanding of this gospel and wanting to know more.
Our message is clear. We hear stories of their baptisms, of their
lives being changed after hearing His gospel,” she says.
At each fireside
Gladys encourages visitors to take home and read the Book of Mormon
that is waiting for them in the lobby. Approximately 500 copies
of the Book of Mormon are distributed at SUV firesides, along with
church videos and pamphlets.
“Some read the Book
of Mormon and agree to meet with the missionaries, some don’t.
But their perceptions and attitudes are changed after feeling our
love, and hearing our testimonies, and, most of all, feeling the
Lord’s Spirit,” says Gladys who, along with William and Kenya, was
recently called and set apart as a ward missionary with special
focus on her fireside work.
“I wish the SUV
Choir could go everywhere we are invited, but the lack of money
to cover costs is holding us back. That is our greatest challenge
to doing this work, and for the areas that really need us to come.”
The SUV Choir’s
ability to present firesides outside of Las Vegas is limited as
funding for each fireside event comes only through private donations
to this nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization.
Gladys has sacrificed
much for being the choir’s director. Not only does she financially
contribute to the choir and spend a great deal of time in rehearsals
and planning, but also she turns down concert opportunities and
various public appearances to present fireside events, which affects
her livelihood. Most recently, Gladys wasn’t present at the Grammy
Awards ceremony in February to receive in person the Grammy she
won for her duet with the late Ray Charles. Instead, she was informed
she won the award by her bishop between sessions of an SUV fireside
she was presenting in Las Vegas.
“We, the 100 members
of this choir, count it our greatest privilege to share the message
of the restored gospel through music and through the testimonies
we bear during each fireside,” says Gladys. “Everyone involved
with this choir make sacrifices. They’ve got the vision and understanding
of our calling as a missionary effort, and they are dedicated to
the work.”
When Gladys and
the Saints Unified Voices released One
Voice, the album
hit Billboard’s Gospel Charts in its first week and by the
end of that month reached the #2 spot. With 15 songs, from the
energetic gospel classic Pass Me Not to the inspirational
duet Did You Know? and from the sentimental Hawaiian song
Iesu Me Kanaka Waiwai“ to the familiar Come Come Ye Saints
with African drums, One Voice offers uplifting musical insight
into ways people of all faiths and cultures praise the Lord through
music.
A highlight of each
fireside and featured on One Voice is the solo He Lives,
performed by Gladys with lyrics reluctantly written by William at
her insistence. Through her loving persuasion and their combined
efforts, the result is their musical testimony of Jesus Christ.
As she soulfully
sings the final verse, Gladys is the missionary she is called to
be as she proclaims “But most of all He’s our Lord and Savior, Jesus
Christ. He lives.” And just as she enthusiastically does herself,
she invites us all to “Go tell the world, tell them that our Savior
lives!”
For more information
about the Saints Unified Voices directed by Gladys Knight,
visit www.suvchoir.org.
One
Voice is available nationally at retail music stores,
and at both www.amazon.com
and www.deseretbook.com The
SUV Choir schedule is full for 2005.
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Meridian Magazine.
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