It has been 10 years since the death of Andraé Crouch. It has taken Robert F. Darden and Stephen M. Newby nine of those years to create their biography on the life of groundbreaking gospel singer and composer.
Those years of research and writing are a lifetime highlight and honor, both said. The result is Soon and Very Soon: The Transformative Music and Ministry of Andraé Crouch, which was published March 31.
Crouch, a seven-time Grammy winner, was born in 1942 and died in 2015. He is remembered for many songs still sung today, including “The Blood Will Never Lose Its Power,” “Through It All,” “Jesus is the Answer” and “Soon and Very Soon.”
He was lauded as “the foremost gospel singer of his generation” by Barack and Michelle Obama upon his death in 2015.
The task of writing about Crouch’s life and influence fell to the two Baylor University professors — Newby and Darden. Baylor is home to the Black Gospel Music Preservation Program.
Newby holds the Lev H. Prichard Endowed Chair in the Study of Black Worship as professor of music at Baylor, and Darden is emeritus professor of journalism at Baylor. Darden was the founder of the Black Gospel Music Preservation Program, which Newby now directs.
The two spent years interviewing 200 people for the book, one of them being Crouch’s twin sister, Sandra, who was known not to give interviews. Newby knew it was essential to get her thoughts on the project before she died last year.
“She found out we were serious, we weren’t interested in dirt, but we both wanted to tell Andrae’s story through the lenses of both history and journalistically,” he explained. That got them in the door.
The authors also sought interviews with other key people who spent time with Crouch. One significant person is Bill Maxwell, who was the singer’s manager and road warrior.
Of Sandra Crouch and Maxwell, “Maxwell had a greater influence on his musical life,” Newby said. “The two of them together helped shape Andrae’s raw talent that would have him go on 48-hour songwriting binges. He would get in the studio and spend 48-hours on a single song. Andrae needed these two people to help him. He was so mega-focused, he could be obsessed, and these two people gave him the parameters to be the great creative artist he was.”
Apart from that musicality, Newby and Darden wanted to explore the personal and creative side of his life, even controversial parts. They address the time Crouch was arrested for possessing cocaine. Both men believe there was very little evidence presented to corroborate that charge. However, Crouch would allow people in need to stay at his home, from the homeless to recovering drug addicts.
“His manager never saw any drug use, and they were together all the time,” Newby said. “The police report, the newspaper reports, were all front pages. However, by the second day of the story, they dropped the charges saying there was insufficient evidence. That was buried on page 38 in the bottom of a column of the same newspaper that featured it the day earlier on the front page. It was too late by then, and we shoot our wounded in the Christian community.”
Stephen Newby
Newby wants to make two things clear: “We knew we were getting the truth and the real deal because people were very transparent with us. And there were these pastoral moments.”
Crouch’s pastoral moments are most visible in the Addicts Choir Crouch started before he was famous for Andraé Crouch and the Disciples. Working with Teen Challenge in Los Angeles, Crouch formed a choir for teenagers and gang members, people who were marginalized by the church. The choir eventually recorded an album with Word Records.
One of the most incredible aspects of the authors’ research was learning how Crouch “was shaped and formed as a composer while he was with the Addicts Choir.”
Robert Darden
Darden explained: “I think it took me about three or four months to do a deep dive just into the Addicts Choir, listening to those pieces over and over and over again. I was pulling out nuggets and while we were looking at it historically, what he was doing during that period, it really made sense to me that this man was a composer.”
Newby said Crouch became a composer and pastor in a time when the church didn’t want anything to do with the people that he was singing with.
Financially, the Addicts Choir project “was a flop big time, because he dared say that Jesus loves the leper, Jesus loves the AIDS patient, and we should too, if Jesus can.”
But those early experiences shaped Crouch’s music in the years to come. The son of a preacher formed “The Disciples” as the first biracial musical ensemble in gospel music. They not only sold millions of albums but performed at Madison Square Garden and Carnegie Hall, on Soul Train and The Tonight Show and Saturday Night Live.
Crouch and his Disciples introduced jazz, funk, classical, calypso, Latin and other musical elements into gospel.
Crouch never married, but Newby and Darden discovered he came close to proposing to gospel artist Tremaine Hawkins. That fell through, though, due to her leaving the group, which broke Crouch’s heart and led him to write the hit “Through It All.”
That song begins: “I’ve had many tears and sorrows; I’ve had questions for tomorrow. There’s been times I didn’t know right from wrong. But in every situation God gave me blessed consolation that my trials came to only make me strong.”
The chorus declares: “Through it all, I’ve learned to trust in Jesus, I’ve learned to trust in God.”
Crouch died younger than he should have, likely due to his “horrible lifestyle,” Newby said. “He was just so prolific he worked all night, every night. He slept late would get up and go in the studio where he recorded all the time. … He didn’t eat right and didn’t sleep right. The music and message consumed him.”
Yet one other thing defined the man as well, the author said. “Crouch carried a Bible with him everywhere, and when he wasn’t sleeping or eating or making music, he was in the Word. Bob and I traced every one of his songs to one verse or another.”
Darden surmised: “He is as close to singing the Bible as anybody we’ve ever met.”