Richard Smallwood Interview

Grammy Award winning artist Richard Smallwood mixed evening X-Day. Grammy Award winning artist Richard Smallwood next evening exchange. But the changing sound of gospel music composer and singer Richard Smallwood manages to preserve its traditional sound while staying on the cutting edge. No matter how you classify him his music and his ministry touch people from all walks of life. Welcome Grammy Award which winning artist were just small Well I should say welcome home. I appreciate it's good to be of Howard University let me go back a little bit because

when I was a baby you know my mother said that I said that it's my understanding that the new in the crib you didn't do who you were coming. My mom says that I was a humming baby and of course being a pastor and of being a church 24/7 just about that's all I remember it was a hymn to the sounds that were south of the church. So they would put me in the grid and I would and first my mother thought that she was losing a man and he had a really a baby. But that was that was her first hint that music was going to be something that you and when your father heard it he'd give the book. Yeah they told me that they got me a toy piano when I was about three ideas and I wasn't able to pick out the melody that I would bang out the rhythms of going home. That and the rest of it. It is history by the time you were five years old you were actually playing the piano by.

Yeah I was. As I got older I climbed up the head of my father had a piano climbed up one on the stool and began to pick out a melody that I would hear in and harmony it was a sort of a natural progression. By seven you were formally learning. Yeah I was playing for a church and I had started the piano lessons so that by Levon own gospel. Yeah yeah. At my father's church there were a lot of young people around my age I guess through by putting things like that and I decided to take 12 the better voice than for my own. So that was the first RICHARD SMALLWOOD things and saying all around town and different church you travel so I thought I would use in order to have a near-zero you thought you were grown that you were also what I heard you referred to as a you were best to scare pal you have to play the piano and I had to be there every tab a church

door open where the bible study where the Sunday school for A and B where they were going out in the afternoon to another church. I had to do that with I was in you remember the numbers of the hymn Oh yeah. Where are the Baptists symbol there was like three forty two is what a friend you have of the Bible just as it was and I think that a better babae 166 is holy holy. They were ingrained about in my mind and then in the late 1960s you came to Howard University to do music right. I came here on a music scholarship actually I want to be in the high school. R. forgot to mention where you have a community which at the time was a school where you could made your music I majored in music there and that sort of brought me to Howard University School of Music. And actually when I was in high school in junior high school there was also a school at Howard called the junior preparatory department.

It was for gifted kids from my seven years old to high school and I was in that program as well it was sort of a natural progression that most of them were some of the heady time to be growing up in Washington D.C. You have the civil rights movement taking place here with Ryan time which involved a lot of churches and yet you were in the church with your father as a pastor when you're coming to the campus of Howard University. All kinds of hell is breaking. While there was there was a hidden time it was it was. Howard was in a transition period and there were a lot of sittin there a lot of takeovers in the center of the thing. The students did not like one specific thing that that really sort of impacted me was the School of Music at that time didn't have the program. There was a study of jazz music anything but but classical. You don't invent that group to study so we decided to go by an artist who had a piano up under front steps and play dolls with music all

day long with and by adding to the demands and and consent to have him be in those days there were no requests there were only demands they wouldn't pay as there were requests he was like it's got to be this way. It's the only way I can. But without him it happened it happened in a couple of years. We had a great jazz apartment with the Great Donald bird with the head of the bar. There were courses in African-American music history. I mean I did a project on one tracing the history of how it gave from the time it opened to the time of the riots so it really changed and it was the gospel. Why our began to sing with you that that you did and it changed the way music has been part of this university forever since that's where you were also part of the first gospel group here Howard University it was called Celeste there too and they were made up of students here how

adversity the late great Donny Hathaway was pianists with and when I came in he was one his way out. So I had to he was lazy and simple but the semester that of the two semesters of that year I learned so much from so that when he does who are doing that and never had the thought of musical I don't like when I read that you were in the Celeste as before that was a class of enough of the gospel. When you told me before the Broncos that you took that any other way explain. Yeah you know I had the same piano thing Jack. Interestingly enough even though you guys demonstrated made and caused music teaching us how to change the classical and rules that you picked up while in school you remain to this day and well you know the classical influence really started way before Howard when I was seven years old. My mom brought home recording of Rachmaninov's being a digital number two

and that is this is classical music I know you like all kinds of music. But I'm with you listen to it if you like this. Then out to do some concert. So you build yourself a New York with your gospel music so that I have all of that coming at me going up to carry everything didn't call him musician that I would be in especially the type of writer you know and then at Howard as an undergraduate you focused on ethnomusicology exposing yourself to him. Well actually I came back two years after I graduate from how I came back and did the year and a half on my master's degree and that was in Athens. By that time you know the whole black experience in terms of education had taken place here in it and how in school. So when people hear the Latin flavor and things like nothing without your love that is the result of you're branching out into it. If if it's if it's for from a lot of things that I consumed as a kid you know my mom listened to what band was

considered pop on the radio so I heard like Nat King Cole with Peggy Lee. Sara Vonn you know all of those she worked for the vice president of CBS Records for a while so I would go to work with her doing a summer and I would listen to all the Broadway musicals like Show Boat Sound of Music in My Fair Lady. So I would get all these different you know styles of music coming at me and I brace them all. So you know it's still today though those influences are very present in what I do. When you sit down to come home are you conscious of those influences. Do you consciously include those in France or do they just come to you as you can. Not at all they they just sort of come. I'm usually focusing more on if it's going to be a ballot it's going to be up temple when our focus is on certain artists that that I'm writing for I'm maybe focusing on their vocal abilities and that kind of thing.

But the the style just sort of it sort of happens you know as you've been quoted as saying that in the 1970s in the nineteen eighties when we're getting awards you were getting them for contemporary right and then in the 1990s. Here's a chart. For traditional GOD YES SAME MUSIC BUT YEAH YEAH I'M BAD got all caught hype and criticism when I started to contemporary nobody's going to do that. And now consider the traditional art it's not but you know music changes it evolves and I mean that I understand that you know when we're talking about with oh happy day in 60 that was thought revolution revolutionary and now it's like oh that's real tradition you know so you know the music of the day like Kurt Frankel another's 20 years from now I'll be tradition. So you know it it just continues to evolve as a composer would you think of the use of sampling in gospel. You know I don't have a problem with it as long as the composer is paid.

You know I don't travel there really go both ways but I had no problem with it whatsoever you know I really love the way the music is going today I think I don't have a problem with the trappings or the the the musical package. My at my my main concern is that the method is not bad and that's the most important. Let me read a quote from the New Year's RICHARD SMALLWOOD music does not say this. Stay the same. I think the church falls down because we've tried to put God in a box. We've tried to see them work only if it sounds like this looks like this. I believe the God we serve is so awesome and so magnanimous that we can't even begin to imagine how I believe he raises a parties and music style that which is the most they haven't they have I mean. Got to understand that as you look around today there are kids who never see the inside of a church. I mean their parents never saw its abjured. So you have to reach people from where they are you may not be able to reach them with Amazing Grace and behavior Jackson and somebody else the My mother came up

on but as long as the message is the same I don't I'm not really concerned if it sounds like hip hop or R&B or whatever I just think that the message needs to be clear and it has to be something that gets the ear of the listener. You know when you emphasize the message has been stellar composer Award winning composer of the numinous mentioned and you say that the Mrs. Colston would it suggest to me that there are others who might sometimes lose track of that and get so caught up in the style of music that they begin to associate with one in the style that God wants and that ultimately the message is the thing the message the most important thing and I think you know historically it's preciously when music became. The gospel music became sort of on the cutting edge in terms of style a lot of record companies wanted to do the best so they could have what they call crossover you know and it could be played on the radio stations then it wouldn't be

offensive you know to anyone. So instead of saying say you know you can say baby but you say you know your smile is wonderful and I love you to sing that to my girlfriend I mean who am I talking about you know I'm saying call a spade a spade it's going to be secular because I have the problem with I have a problem with a good love song. But let's call it what it is and I think as a minister and as music been my ministry was so loud the message has to be concise and get the deaf adults at any point during that phase when the words wind watered down this is in order the music was over. Did you have a delta and when the message continued to drive. It was scary for a while but then I think it was scary for a while. I remember here I remember a big gospel song that came out I guess with the aid it was by a gospel artist. It was played on you know all the stations secular as well and I had a friend of mine who.

Was not in church and the song came on one day and said What kind of song is that. So I said it's God's will mix it up. So I thought with the artist you know singing the gospel say yeah but you know sounds like a love song to me I mean you know I know I could take my girlfriend out to dinner and you know with that playing on the radio and you know a big romance or whatever and I'm like yeah the point you know and that really sort of brought home to me that it's so important that we are clear about who we are talking about what we're talking about because ultimately that. That's the that's bad is the best is it's going to help people and make a difference. You have performed all over the world. You're part of the first black gospel Mormons and you've reduced to a variety of people in the location. Is there a difference in how the message was received in the Soviet Union which at that time was a communist country was did not really acknowledge the existence of a god

and the way the music is received if you happened to Jericho it definitely was a difference you had an interpreter basically would begin to interpret whatever song we would get saying saying and you know but the thing is is that music is universal and it does not need an interpreter. There's something about music to the spirit and I remember many nights we would sing and the audience would just start standing up and cry you know and sometimes they would watch the states and I remember. Several people asking me why is it that we feel this way. You know a rock band opened up opened up for us and was like a heavy metal rock band you know that was our opening act you know and we traveled like from city to city and I remember one one evening the leader of the rock band came to me and said in broken English he said Richard why is it when I say I feel bad now but when I

hear you sing and I sense freedom and that was the way to really explain what he was singing about and to really make a difference in people's lives and you make great friends over there and it was a great opportunity and that's that's what ministry is all about communicates all over the world beckon to the people on the jury who your mother had them at the time you know and what when you were doing your first role with your piece of the piano with you so that she stood up and indicated that if she the human that if she would run to her. Yeah. There actually she was she was in a wheelchair but she began to shout and she began to cry out in. You know my mom sacrificed so much for me doing my mom in my childhood and I knew a lot of the challenges that you raised then having to play that and hear her we do it in the background is probably one of the hardest things I've ever had that I didn't want to break. But I you know there were a couple of minutes I was like and that will be able to make it through because I knew her pain and I also felt a joy that she had overcome so many

obstacles women. Isn't it amazing when you have performed for presidents and kings and queens and others and in all kinds of settings and that's the only time you really get nervous. Yeah yeah yeah because I mean it's like mom will tell you. That you were a little off tonight and my brother was who was very articulate and she was very demonstrative and she was that you know insult to good night maybe. So I was like I got to do the best that she's going to have a divide as I said you've been on it and performed all the way yet your home seems to have been pretty good to you. That's the Kennedys of the White House. You still live here in Washington a lot of others who have become as well known as the music tend to move away from the home because if you were choking them in that stifling them you stay warm. I really love the city. I moved here when I was 10 years old and that I understand from the time I

was born till I was 10 my father traveled a lot and gradualism work and we went from city to city established churches and maybe stay there like for year didn't you know bullets up and go somewhere else and just did it two years. So I was all over the place and when I got to D.C. when I was 18 and I was like I don't know the one where you know and I really fell in love with the city I mean this is this is all there's no will I love these Uvalde planes and trains and buses and whatever rack and go to where it where it is I need to go see. As the news it has moved forward so it's because it's changed and styles of jeans and you always menace to contemporary even though you emphasize the abyss with U.S. boots as well. I see more the thing but my the same thing I think my desire is to stay

current and never want to become dated. You know I mean that's why I'm always lifting with one a round because music of the day steel inspires me so I want to be current. It's amazing to me that so many people come up to me is that my little 7 year old nephew watch your video all the time I'm like really. You know that but that makes me feel good because actually I must be doing something that is attracting young people you know that's where my heart and soul you know I try to stay clear and try to you know spread the good news we're lacking when we were playing your video to the office which is in the hope that somebody else has a computer wasn't working. With the door open he would just be walking by and stopped in and without even asking to come around and start looking at and that's the one I love the most. This is the one I loved and it would appear that in this town universal everybody knows that's a blessing.

That's the Blair hour what's that that is my whole being you can make a difference that can do them and then read another book and yours which is smaller than I don't deserve this. I've traveled all over this will walk into the store. And so the seeds and 16. It's good. And I'll write some folks out here so we certainly don't have a monopoly. It's just for some reason God chose that other than us to put us where we are. You have a responsibility to not let you get in the gym and ultimately when I leave I just want you to know that I was somebody no one in the group who isn't possible when you're going to forget. You can't I mean because you have all the press going all the hype going oh you with this and you're that of the problem is when you stop believing that they're forgetting who you really are because all you will have ya applause and there's always somebody better than one. So when you start thinking that I'm the best no one has ever done this before and no one

will that was the path that you are sadly mistaken. And I'm just grateful that you know that chose me to do what it is then told me to do and if I can you know use that to help people do that. That's what it's about but I think the danger and I say to the young people all the time no matter how property become or how famous you become Always remember why our number where you came from. You remember that there are people who sacrifice your family and other people so that you could be here today. That's the one you know I remember Coach John Thompson and his coach of Georgetown was in the snow and the bridge incident for this. How does it feel to do the first leg close to when this incident he's like. I resent the hell out of that. Does it suggest that nobody else was that was as talented as I was to be able to get you. I got here because I got the opportunity. The whole lot of guys are going out. Coachmen exact They just never got the opportunity that is that would you feel when you see it's in the most there.

I mean there's so much talent and now I mean it seems like right now and doing good era. There are so many young people with just a London town and the talent to just sit there and watch their hands in amazement and listen to their voice in amazement. So there's so much talent coming up. No one has any monopoly owner on any gift or any style of music or anything. My thing is just a focus is that you know the fact the gospel music in contemporary society has become so you feel that that's helping to rap. Don't do it again that you do hear it on the air with the fact that people like yourself become big stars in it. Do you think that you know I think I think it's very it's very very helpful I think the whole you know the media in terms of TV award show you know Broadway show everywhere you look is just you know commercials so I think that because it's so widely heard and people are exposed to it so much I think it it it it draws people and it is a music

that really regardless of what your culture may be what your religious beliefs may be it's a music that touches the heart and it's a wonderful Jewish lady called me one time and she would come and do a gospel sat at a realtor convention. Nothing to do with people and I was like you really want me to do that. I get to sing. What do you think you say and what I tell you they have such a good laugh they know so it's a universal the universal like it not only unable to do this but message at all of the food that they have and that's a good thing to be able to make a living out of what it is that you love you love to do it and love you doing good. It's small it's all these people. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. That was they should think I was there before. This is home. It's what I would have of the local. That's it for this edition of the evening.