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Artist description
"The simple beauty of guitar and voice" quote Nov. 2001 from the producers at Sony Screenblast. |
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Music Style
Country |
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Artist History
1984 Marlboro Country Music Contest Simifinalest.
I hope you like my song's, because each one is a
little piece of my life. And if you were to
put them all together in the proper order, you
would have my life's story in my songs.
Gloria Jane
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Albums
MADISON COUNTY |
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Press Reviews
Back to the Basics With Gloria Jane Mattox-Farrar
By Billy Shaw
When the Good Lord wants you to know about something, you end up knowing about
it. In the three or four minutes a Gospel singer has to convey and reinforce the
message, you’re either taken it or you’re not. This is the hallmark of effective
Gospel, contemporary or otherwise. Recently, a group of musicians was sitting
around the stereo, listening to a rather random collection of recent Gospels
acquired off the internet; a woman started singing to the accompaniment of a
lone guitar, and what few of us left sitting on our chairs weren’t crying were
simply shaking our heads in disbelief.
Gloria Jane Mattox-Farrar can sing four minutes of Jesus in her own words, at
her own pace, as well as anyone who has ever recorded a song of personal pain.
And her own pain and vision is what she has chosen to share with the folks who
will listen to her music.
" ‘Sweet Jesus’ Is the way I see the world. And that song was my comforter. When
times have been the worst in my life when the pain in life was just too
overwhelming, I would sing that song to myself. Tears streaming down my face,
heart breaking inside; no matter what the pain that life had put on me, that
song healed it all. I'd sing it, feel it, and it would dry my tears and give me
the strength to carry the load.”
That said, you’ll find “Sweet Jesus” at once very personal, highly accessible,
and compelling in a simple style; a lonely midnight sound created with a single
acoustic guitar and her own simply replicated vocals. While this simple
description can be applied to much of her original Gospel, this one song is so
highly simplified, it might evoke images of Loretta Lynn singing to the family
well prior to her introduction to a recording studio. In fact, the profound
simplicity of this woman’s art in its current form is what hooked a number of us
more seasoned musicians from the first moments we were exposed to this unique
sound.
More than a few great musicians can walk into a recording studio and deliver a
fine glossy four minute rendition of the Great Commission. Gloria Jane can leave
the studio itself in tears. This is a special gift. Her song “There’s a Storm”
is a tearful obituary at her mother’s funeral.
“My Gospel songs come from the love of God that my Mother instilled in me from
as far back as I can remember. She was an ordained minister. The Rev. Collette
Jane Barker Pastor of The United Fellowship Christian Center in Galloway Ohio.
‘There's A Storm’ was written about my Mother. I wrote it as if I were seeing
the world through her eyes.”
The prevailing axiom “To find a contemporary Gospel artist, find a contemporary
artist” takes a twist with Gloria Jane. While she does have a modern Country
genre play list, her self-written Gospels are by no means contemporary. They are
so totally timeless, so classically steeped in the American tradition of the
genre, that it’s almost just plain hard to believe that she didn’t grow up a
coal miner’s daughter in the depths of a depressed early twentieth century.
Nobody simply copies this style. You must feel this depth of The Word.
So do you get famous being so retro-talented?
“I am an indie. Am I happy about that? I'm having a ball! I sat on these songs
for years because I had no money for recording studios. No money for bands to
back me up. But now, here I am with my computer software, recording my songs and
sharing them with the world! I love it!”
“What are my goals? God I would be so happy if someday a real star like Reba
would like one of my songs and want to sing it. Now that would be like the icing
on the cake. That's one dream. The other? That someday I could afford a band and
studio time. Would love to hear what I sounded like on all of my songs with a
real band behind me. But until then, I love what I've been doing on mp3.com! I
finally feel alive.”
In the meantime, her music is in fact available on CD and commercially viable.
Other artists have been tuning into her music and her message. As a group, they
aren’t prone to go out on a limb for marginal talent. But this woman has both
the charisma and the strength of song to create a following in this genre.
Whether or not she garners the ultimate attention within a secular industry to
become more grist for the mill, this artist will most likely forever have a home
within the Church on a Saturday night with a tearful following wherever real
strengths are measured in terms of the Message.
“ ‘Praise The Lord’ was written when I was 16 and it was the first song that I
ever wrote. ‘Teach Me To Pray’ had a life of it's own. Every time I sang it in
Church everyone would cry.”
" ‘I Count My Blessings’ is me. That is who I am. That is a mirror into all that
I am, and how I survived life’s hard times. No matter how bad things are I look
for something, no matter how small, that I can count as a blessing. God sends us
blessing's everyday. We just don't look at them. But when life gets me down I
look for them, and I find them, and that's what gets me through. Holding onto
God's little blessings.”
This is tear-streaked timeless Gospel music available from the artist without
benefit of production or gloss. This, friends, is the real thing. It’s been a
long time since I could say something like that about a spiritual artist.
Gloria Jane’s music is available through mp3.com. Personal CD recommendation
would include “At Home Country Gospel”, in addition to her other music available
there.
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Additional Info
I can also be found at soundclick.com 1sound.com & clearchanelnewmusicnetwork.com |
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Location
Galloway, Oh - USA |
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