The Inspirations’ upcoming album highlights 250 years of gospel music

“As America celebrates 250 years of freedom and liberty,” says The Inspirations’ Roland Kesterson, “we have to ask ourselves the question, what is American culture? From our nation’s humble beginning, music has always played a part of our American culture — from the fife and drums on the revolutionary battlefield, to the piano and guitar in the parlors of early America, to the violin, guitar, piano and pump organ in the mountains that laid the foundation for the music that we all love.” “And what would American culture be without Gospel music?” he adds, making the final connection to the music contained on the storied quartet’s upcoming July 24 collection for Horizon Records, Songs For Our American Culture — a connection also underlined by Duane Allen of The Oak Ridge Boys, Country Music Hall of Famers who spent the first decades of their lengthy career as a Southern Gospel quartet and who join The Inspirations on the new set’s memorable “Jesus Is Coming Soon.” “When Isaac, Roland, Luke, and Wyatt sing,” the legendary singer notes, “it feels like every song was written just for them. Each member ‘owns’ his lead, and within their harmony is the Inspirations’ sound — one that has created its own identity in the history books of Gospel Music. It’s a ‘Culture of Music’ that is as warm and satisfying as mama’s home cooking, and their love for Jesus is embedded in every song and in every note.”

A Celebration of American Culture and Gospel Music

And indeed, what shines through from the opening notes of their new take on “O How I Love the Lord” to the ringing affirmation of “I Mean To Be There”‘s final line that closes Songs For Our American Culture is the embodiment of that culture in songs that have stood the test of time. For whether they’re beloved favorites or new to a listener’s ear, each song in the project carries that fundamental Gospel message that’s been woven into the fabric of American life since the country’s earliest days. Whether it’s the lilting waltz time of numbers like “Eye of the Storm,” “In the Shadow of the Cross” and “Lord Walk With Me,” the country flavor of “One More Valley,” “Resting In the Arms of a Never Failing God” and Jewel Kesterson Scott’s powerful new “Home Sweet Home,” or the classic-sounding quartet arrangements of “Then We’ll Be Glad” and the album’s opener and closer, these are sounds that can trace their origins through the long arc of American music and culture. Serving as the final touch on the project is the revelatory “classic quartet times two” performance of “Jesus Is Coming Soon.” “Two hundred and fifty years ago,” notes Kesterson, “this country began with ministers such as George Whitefield thundering the message from pulpits in the colonies: ‘Jesus Is Coming Soon.’ And now today, that title embodies the message and mission of The Inspirations. How fitting that this song — first recorded in 1967 by both The Inspirations and The Oak Ridge Boys — now, so many years closer to His coming, has served to bring us all together, proclaiming the same message louder and stronger than ever before. “This album, which pays tribute to our American culture, is a reminder of where we came from. But it is also a statement of where we are going: ‘One Nation, Under God, Indivisible, with Liberty and Justice For All!”