The entertainment world lost a gospel music pioneer Monday, when Edwin Hawkins succumbed to pancreatic cancer at 74.
Hawkins was a legend if ever there was one. When his "Oh Happy Day" hit airwaves fifty years ago, music fans had quite simply never heard anything like it. I argue that we've not heard anything like it since.
“Oh Happy Day”’s fusion of so many different musical styles, from traditional gospel to jazz to R & B to blues, served as a blueprint for artists to follow, and many have. Members of both the Crouch and Winans families, two other gospel music dynasties, have expressed a debt to Hawkins for showing them the way.
“Oh Happy Day” and many other Hawkins classics provided me with a melodic balm on many, many days in the house I grew up in. A couple of years ago, I almost lost consciousness at Davies Hall in San Francisco when BeBe Winans thanked Hawkins from the stage, and I realized Hawkins was sitting just a couple of rows in front of me. I walked over after the concert and introduced myself, and I’m not at all embarrassed to tell you that I teared up when Hawkins agreed to an interview.
Below are some excerpts from a conversation that I will never forget!
HuffPost:How's it feel when BeBe Winans says he might not have done what he's done if you had not done what YOU did?
Hawkins:It’s quite an honor that someone would think that I’d inspired them. It’s overwhelming, really. I saw Yolanda Adams at the memorial for Daryl Coley, and I complimented her on her great talent. She said I was the cause of some of that and I told her ‘No I’m not. I’m not the giver of gifts. God is.’
HuffPost:Who did you listen to growing up?
Hawkins:My mother bought albums — or I should say 78s back then, records — by all of the great artists who formed the foundation of gospel. I’d have to start with Thomas Dorsey, the Roberta Martin Singers, the Sally Martin Singers, the Davis Sisters, Brother Joe May, the Caravans, Dorothy Love, and it just goes on. Then of course later it was James Cleveland. But in our home, because my dad was not in church at that time, we heard secular music as well, and one of my mother’s brothers was a professional jazz musician so we heard all kinds of music. I was influenced by everything that I heard.
HuffPost:I understand that you and your family grew up singing in church.
Hawkins:The family unit, as small children, sang at somebody’s church almost every Sunday afternoon. We’d go to our own church for Sunday morning service, and then rush home for Sunday brunch, and then there’d be some 3 o’clock service. I started working with the choir at the Ephesians COGIC in Berkeley where Tramaine [Hawkins] was. She was just a little girl then, maybe four years old, so I watched her grow up. So when we started the Northern California State Youth Choir which became the Edwin Hawkins Singers, she was a part of that. My grandfather was a great pianist. He was always at the house. And the piano that we learned to play on, all of my brothers, that piano was there from day one. So we all would take turns playing and we’d pick out melodies, and we take one note and add another note and create a chord. God taught me to play the piano.
HuffPost:I've heard that the success of "Oh Happy Day" came as a surprise to you and your family.
Hawkins:We went into the church with a two-track home machine. We did it because we were doing concerts throughout the Bay Area, and we thought we should make something that we could leave with the people, so that was the purpose of that recording. I was completely overwhelmed and it just…amazed me that a two-track recording could take off like it did. That was the furthest thing from my mind.
HuffPost:You're making new music! Tell us about it!
Hawkins:We are in the studio with the new Edwin Hawkins Singers, and we hope to have [the new album] finished [soon]. I can't tell you anything else at this time, but we've received interest in the album [from a record label] -- so stay tuned!
As we say farewell to Hawkins, we await that new album’s release. Let’s hope we get to hear it soon!
RIP Edwin Hawkins, and thanks.
Follow freelancer Michael P Coleman on Twitter.