WBIR-TV's LaSaundra Brown wows with "How Great Thou Art"
Maestro Brian Salesky, executive director of the Knoxville Opera Company, grew up in New York City in a household that played two kinds of music: gospel and opera.
Therefore, he said Sunday it was a “dream come true” when he was able to team up with Jeanie Turner Melton, the choir director of East Knoxville’s Mount Olive Baptist Church – East Choir, to produce “Knoxville Opera Goes to Church,” an electrifying combination of the two musical genres.
The concert was Sunday at a packed-to-the-rafters Greater Warner Tabernacle A.M.E. Zion Church on Martin Luther King Avenue. It was free.
I felt almost as if I were back in my home state of Georgia when I entered the church and saw the audience was about equally divided between blacks and whites. And color mattered not at all once the music started. It was all good.
Some of the highlights were WBIR-TV noon news anchor LaSaundra Brown’s heart-stopping rendition of “How Great Thou Art,” and Maynard Elementary School teacher Michael Rodgers’ delivery of “The Toreador Song” from the opera “Carmen,” as well as his and Denisha Ballew’s delivery of “Bess You is My Woman,” from Gershwin’s “Porgy and Bess.” Amy R. Coleman of the Mt. Zion Baptist Church Choir had them shouting “Amen!” when she belted out “I am God.” And Evelyn Jack, also of the Mount Zion Choir elicited similar exclamations during her extended rendition of “Precious Lord, Take My Hand.”
We spotted two smart politicians working the crowd before they settled down to enjoy the performance: Duane Grieve and Charles Frazier, both of whom are running city-wide after having won their respective primaries. (Early voting ends Thursday. Actual election day is Tuesday, Nov. 3.)
Maestro Salesky said he hopes this is the first annual of such concerts. And we hope it is, too. Word to the wise: plan to attend next year. And get there early!
The church was packed!
Michael A. Rodgers and Denisha Ballew deliver big in "Bess You is My Woman"
Opera star Mary Costa, right, and her cousin Andrea Webster
Former UT Coach John Majors and his wife Mary Lynn arrived early
City Council candidate Duane Grieve greets Barbara Hill
Jonida and Theotis Robinson
Deanene and Tom Catani
Celeste Hart, left, from Knoxville Opera visits with Sandra and Monroe Trout prior to the concert
Dorothy and Caesar Stair, who was chairman of the event
Glass artist Tommie Rush is flanked by Melissa and Tom McAdams
Maestro Brian Salesky and Choir Director Jeanie Turner Melton
Opera Goes to Church was wonderful. I enjoyed being part of it, however, Mrs. Jeanie Turner Melton is the director of the Mt. Olive Baptist Church-East Choir.
Thanks! My bad! I’ll change it right away! Fabulous afternoon!
Thank you so much for attending and writing about this very special event! We appreciate it!
What an event! Maestro Salesky deserves a lot of credit for having this super idea; one only wonders, Why didn’t we do something like this years ago?!? Everyone who cares deeply about the arts in Knoxville surely must recognize the hugely positive impact Brian has had on our community since he arrived here five short years ago. He turned the Opera around, achieving three straight years of operating “in the black,” almost unheard of for a major cultural institution — anywhere. In the toughest of economic environments, he has consistently planned and delivered musical performances of the highest artistic merit, coming in under budget.. And, as exemplified by last Sunday’s concert, he has reached out and built bridges. I think we can all say, “Bravo, Brian!”
Thanks to Cynthia for providing such a great account of the “Opera Goes to Church” event, and a hearty thanks to the Knoxville Opera Company’s staff and Board for thinking about creative ways to engage our community. I had such a fantastic time, and I’ll have to say, watching others enjoy and react to the various types of music we heard was almost as fun as listening to the music itself!
Perhaps one of the reasons that I enjoyed the concert so much was that it felt personal to me on a number of levels: both my parents and my grandparents were married at Greater Warner, but back then it was McCalla Avenue Baptist Church and was a completely white congregation. On Sunday afternoon, I mentioned to my mother that I was headed to the concert, and she told me a story about attending McCalla as a young girl that I thought readers of this blog might enjoy.
Although my parents did not attend McCalla Avenue as adults, my grandparents were members there during the 1960’s. My grandmother, who is the pianist at the Orangery, was also the church pianist. My mother has an incredibly vivid memory of sitting on the second or third row at McCalla (up near the front so she could be close to the piano) and a very well-dressed African American woman coming to sit down beside her. Shortly after the woman was seated, several ushers came to the front of the church and escorted the woman out of the church simply because she was black.
This was, of course, my mother’s first vivid and personal memory of the Civil Rights era. Sunday afternoon was the culmination of a number of things for me – the marriage of two types of music that, like Brian Salesky, I grew up hearing. Further, those who were there can appreciate what I mean when I say that this was a moment that was just very – Knoxville. Sunday afternoon, quite frankly, was just plain fun; and it served as a pleasant reminder of yet another reason why I’m glad to call Knoxville home.
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