Voice shift hews path for Jonathan Blanchard

Allen Cooley

As Jonathan Blanchard's voice deepened, so did his feeling for the traditional music that suited his sound.

Like many kids growing up during the 1980s, Jonathan Blanchard wanted to sing like Michael Jackson or Prince.

It was never to be.

The summer before 11th grade, his singing voice took a nosedive.

"I knew every tenor part that was sung by Take 6," he said, referring to the Christian a cappella group. "Suddenly, I could only do the bass parts."

Some people, he says, are still surprised that such a slender, 5-feet-9 singer makes his living in the lowest register.

While it's not a voice tailor-made for covers of "Thriller" or "Purple Rain," his bass is naturally suited for an older genre of music that Blanchard has, since 2003, been adapting for contemporary ears.

This weekend at the Buckman Center at St. Mary's School, Blanchard sings his personalized concert of Negro spirituals. The first half of the show is performed recital-style -- just him and a piano. He keeps it strictly traditional, singing tunes such as "I Stood on the River of Jordan" and "He Never Said a Mumblin' Word." Blanchard says his voice has been compared to Paul Robeson, whose signature tune "Old Man River" is also on the program.

During the second half, he brings out a band and gives spirituals a contemporary feel. He gets "in the mindset" of Marvin Gaye for a version of "Let Us Break Bread Together" and puts a Bob Marley spin on "Go Down Moses." Here, Blanchard flavors his vocals with the jazzy stylings of Al Jarreau and Bobby McFerrin.

"I wasn't one of those kids groomed in the gospel tradition," Blanchard said. "I think what put me on my musical path was the stuff my parents exposed me to outside the church. I knew I wanted to be a singer after seeing (the all-female a cappella vocal group) Sweet Honey in the Rock. I knew I wanted to be on stage after I was taken to (the August Wilson play) 'Ma Rainey's Black Bottom' at the Orpheum theater. At home, my parents would play the records of James Brown and Beethoven on the same day."

A Memphis native, Blanchard, 34, started Tennessee State University as a molecular biology major and finished a singer. He has degrees in commercial music and music education.

"There are things that are part of your life that you can't do without," he said. "Music isn't an easy path, but sometimes you don't have a choice."

His opera credits include touring North Dakota in the role of York in "Corps of Discovery," written by Opera Memphis' former artistic director Michael Ching. He has additionally been a part of Opera Memphis' educational outreach program, taking the Robeson songbook into Memphis schools.

He says that his focus, at least the past several years, has been spirituals.

"It wasn't anything against opera so much as wanting to preserve the history of my culture," he says. "Within the spiritual I can explore any genre of music and still maintain the integrity and history of it. That's not to say I won't do opera again, but as far as what I want my legacy to be, it's not going to be in opera."

Blanchard gives the historical backgrounds to the songs, explaining the coded language and the metaphors of freedom that would have been deciphered by a race still locked in slavery.

"People used these songs to communicate to one another," he says. "'Swing Low, Sweet Chariot' and 'Follow the Drinking Gourd' were directions to travel north. Spirituals are like early hip hop in some ways. It's a people talking about oppression. They're not there to make you comfortable. They're meant to show the reality of the time. They're about injustice, which is still alive and well in the world. That's why spirituals are still relevant, why folk music is still relevant."

Jonathan Blanchard

The show is at 8 p.m. Saturday at the Buckman Center at St. Mary's School, 60 Perkins Ext. Tickets are $20. Call 239-4213 or 527-1486.

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