Thought Quotient

Are you tired of the stuff that’s on the other so-called music channels? On the Gospel Music Channel, you’ll find the music and the message that you crave. What kind of music are they playing? Any kind of music that is faith-based. That means you will find anything from Rock, Pop, Southern Gospel to Hip Hop … and everything in between.

They have recently acquired the exclusive rights to the archive footage from 35 years of the Dove Awards, and will be showing the performances from your favorite artists in the near future. So be on the lookout for that.

Also, be on the lookout for Gospel Dream. It’s a nationwide talent competition that will be in 10 different cities (Detroit, Atlanta, New York, Nashville, Washington (DC), New Orleans, Chicago, St. Louis, Los Angeles and Houston) starting in July - where the winner will be signed by a major label.

Below is an interview we did over GMA Week 2005 with Jerry Williams of the Gospel Music Channel. Are you interested in this TV channel? Click below for more info on how you can get it…

More info on how to get the Gospel Music Channel - in windows media video (WMV) format:
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Could you talk about your partnership with the Gospel Music Association - for their Dove Award Show archives?

We’ve acquired the rights to 35 years of past Dove Awards shows. So, all of the footage from the last 35 years - we’re going to take that and mix and match it, and use that for programming to help promote - obviously the Gospel Music Assocation, the Dove Awards and all the artists - but also to have some great programming. Think back - we’ve got 35 years of the best “artist of the year” performances, and “song of the year” performances and so, we’ll be doing a lot of different things with that footage. We envision a series something like ‘The Best of the Dove Awards’ or ‘Great Moments from the Dove Awards’ or something similar to that. But we’ve got not only shows that are divied up by the awards themselves but we’ve got a lot of artists who have won multiple awards. For a while there back in the 80s and 90s, it looked like they should change the “female artist of the year” award to the “Sandi Patti” award - she won it so many times in a row, you know? So, we could certainly do Sandi Patti’s greatest moments at the Dove Awards - or Steven Curtis Chapman’s.

How would you describe the Gospel Music Channel?

It’s all Gospel. That’s our slogan - “It’s all Gospel.” So, anything that is faith-based music of any kind. I think John Styll (President of the GMA) said it real well the other day when he said, “It’s not Gospel music, but it’s Gospel in the music.” Any music that has got a Gospel message in it - that’s compatible with the Biblical message - is going to have a home on the Gospel Music Channel. Whether the musical style underlying that message is what you would traditionally think of when you think of ‘Gospel’ - a big church number with a big choir, or a Southern Gospel number, or something like P.O.D. or Pillar, or a heavy metal number, or rap, or hip-hop - everything from Aretha Franklin to Steven Curtis Chapman and Amy Grant - and everything in between is going to have a home on the Gospel Music Channel. So, sacred music - that you would more associate with Gospel, and Rock n Roll and Hip-Hop that you might not associate with Gospel.

Can you fill us in on Gospel Dream?

Gospel Dream is actually a show that’s been around for a couple of years. It aired, I think, on BET as a special. Elvin Ross, who is the creator of the show, started it up with a big denomination and it was part of their annual conference. It was a talent show - sort of like our ‘American Idol’. We’re taking it and expanding it a little bit. Elvin is still on board as our executive producer on the show. We’ll be in ten different cities beginning in July with an open call. People will come out and they’ll peform before six judges. We’ll narrow the list of all those folks that came out down to ten. And then the next night, they will perform in a concert. They’ll each will do a song - along with a major artist who will book into that concert - and the judges will choose a winner from that city. So, by the end of ten weeks, we’ll have ten winners. They will all compete in the final and we’re securing a record company to offer a one-year recording contract to the winner. We’ll have some other prizes along the way. It’ll be a thirteen week series. It’ll start in September and run through early December - when our grand finale will air. I think the recap show actually runs on Thanksgiving. We’ll do 10 weeks, one week from each city, a recap of all the ten weeks that have gone before, and then a two-part finale where we’ll narrow down those ten to one winner of Gospel Dream.

What kind of feedback have you gotten back on the Gospel Music Channel so far?

We’ve had some emails from youth leaders, thanking us for some of the music that we play that their kids finally have an alternative to MTV or FUSE - or some of those kind of networks. We program not just a wide variety of styles of music, but to a wide variety of audiences within the Gospel fanbase - and youth are a very important audience to us. Everyday from 5 to 7 - Monday through Friday we have a two-hour video block that we call ‘Represent’ that is aimed at younger viewers (12 to 24). And Friday nights we do a three-hour block with the same name that is hosted - we actually shoot that in Rocketown here in Nashville. We’re getting ready to launch a block that will air late night Saturday nights of ‘Metal’ and then also one that will air on Friday night late nights of Hip Hop and Rap. So, we’re committed to meeting all of the audience’s need, but the younger viewers as well. We want to make sure that they have an alternative to MTV.

Tags: News and Media

This entry was posted by Roger on Tuesday, April 19th, 2005 at 4:12 pm and is filed under General, News and Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.