Lawrence became the first African-American producer of a major recording company. He worked with other Gospel icons including James Cleveland, Doris Duke, Albertina Walker and many others.
His Angelic Choir of Nutley worked with James Cleveland to produce 11 of Gospel’s greatest albums, including “Peace Be Still” and “Stood on the Banks.”
Roberts was pastor of First Baptist Church on Nutley. He died in Stone Mountain, Georgia, where he retired after serving as pastor of First Baptist Church. (Source: Star-Ledger/The Baltimore Sun)
Lawrence C. Roberts, a world-renowned gospel producer, gifted baritone and former Nutley pastor who taught the reclusive tobacco heiress Doris Duke how to sing spirituals, is dead. He was 77.
The Newark native died at his home in Stone Mountain, Georgia, where he moved about a decade ago after retiring in 1995 as the long-time pastor of the First Baptist Church of Nutley.
It was while he was building his church that Mr. Roberts also built the premiere gospel label, the Newark-based Savoy Records, and became the first African-American producer of a major U.S. recording company.
His Angelic Choir of Nutley, which once included Doris Duke as a member, recorded 29 records and teamed with the Rev. James Cleveland to produce 11 of gospel's greatest albums, including ''Peace Be Still'' and ''Stood on the Banks.''
For his efforts, he received the key to Newark and three other cities, including New Orleans, and won two Grammy awards.
"The gospel world has lost an icon. He was a man known for his charisma and his love of people," said the Rev. Kyle Abercrombie, the associate minister of the First Baptist Church of Nutley.
"But we will not weep. We will rejoice because of his life. God has reassigned him to a new place, and we will meet him again," Abercrombie said.
Roberts is survived by his wife, Delores, a renowned singer in her own right who Roberts credited with inspiring him to pursue his gospel career. He also is survived by three children, a son, Derrick Roberts, and two daughters, Vanessa Walker and Renee Whitney.
Roberts had already become famous for his work with a number of gospel stars, including James Cleveland, Albertina Walker, the Roberta Martin Singers and the Banks Brothers, when Duke contacted him in the 1960s, asking for private tutoring. Too busy at the time building up his church, raising a family and running a record label, Roberts invited her instead to sing with the church choir -- and she accepted.
She toured with Roberts for nearly a decade, beginning in 1968, joining the choir in concerts at the Apollo Theater and Duke Ellington's birthday celebration at Madison Square Garden in 1971. But she stopped in the mid-1970s, Roberts told The Star-Ledger in a 1996 interview, because her visibility with the all-black choir started attracting the media and curious on-lookers outside his church on Harrison Street.
But she never forgot Roberts, the man she credited for teaching her how to sing.
The recluse, who died in 1993, left her more than $1 billion estate to benefit a wide array of charities and individuals, including Roberts, whom she left $1 million.
"If you touch someone's life with God's goodness, that same touch will come back to you," Roberts told The Star-Ledger in a 1996 interview after a New York judge settled challenges that arose over the Duke estate.
A year earlier, Roberts' achievements were celebrated at a retirement dinner in Newark that was attended by many of the gospel singers who got their start with the reverend. At the time, he toldThe Star-Ledger how he grew up in the city and, while a young boy, first approached Lee Warrick, mother of singer Dionne Warwick, at the Zion Hill Baptist Church in 1949 asking to join her family' singing group, the Warrick Singers.
He didn't get the job that day, but the Warrick Singers eventually took him in. By 1957, Roberts became a minister and, two years later, took over as pastor of the First Baptist Church of Nutley, which he once said he initially found to be a ''log cabin with a pot-belly stove for our heat."
With the financial help of attorney Marvin Fish and the support of his congregation, he rebuilt the old church, paying off the mortgage by traveling the country and singing with his Angelic Choir.
Funeral arrangements are still being made for Roberts in Georgia.
Gospel Legend, Savoy Records’ producer, Rev. Lawrence C. Roberts passed away on July 14, 2008 at 5:22 pm. We were advised by his granddaughter, Dawn Miles that Rev. Roberts was with his family at the kitchen table when he was stricken with a massive heart attack.
Rev. Roberts is credited with changing the course of Gospel music history by being the first to perfect the “Live” recording experience in the Gospel genre with The King Of Gospel Rev. James Cleveland’s “Volume I”. In a conversation with Rev. Roberts, he shared with me how he met with Rev. James Cleveland and advised him that he wanted to record him “live,” in church, in service and just let the machine run. He stated, “no one at that time could see how that could work because the industry was only use to studio recordings; take one, take two, go back and clean it up and if you have to clean up a song too much you lose some of the fervor that the original interpretation may have had.”
That historic recording took place in October, 1960. Rev. Roberts went on to produced 14 albums for The King Of Gospel, Rev. James Cleveland, which included the classics “Peace Be Still”, “I Stood On The Banks Of Jordan”, “Christ Is The Answer” and the list goes on and on.
Rev. Lawrence C. Roberts’ legendary career came full circle just as he and Malaco began to reestablish a working relationship before his untimely death.
In memory of Rev. Lawrence C. Roberts, The Malaco Music Group will release his final contribution to this historic label, a compilation he entitled, “Bridging The Past, Blessing The Present In Song.”
We've lost another legend!!!
To listen to clips of this Gospel Legend, visit www.malaco.com
Funeral arrangements are as follows:
Friday, July 18, 2008, 6-8pm (viewing) at Levitte Funeral Home N. Clarendon Ave. Scottdale GA.
Funeral will be held Saturday July 19, 2008, 11am at Victory Baptist Church 1170 N. Hairston Road Stone Mountain GA.
No comments:
Post a Comment