Brown Bannister, alumnus and music producer.
|
Three decades ago-before
the awards, the accolades and the platinum albums that would
come with discovering a young singer named Amy-the man who
would eventually stand tall as one of Nashville's biggest
producers was kneeling. The next day, my dad got home from
work and said, 'I think you should go to Nashville."So
he went, and Christian music was never the same.Bannister
made his name in Nashville by helping discover Amy Grant and
producing her albums, thereby becoming one of the most-sought
producers in Christian music-having worked with Steven Curtis
Chapman, Michael W. Smith, Twila Paris, Petra and others.
|
Bannister spent nine months in Nashville, working at an inner-city
camp. While there, he met Chris Christian, who worked for
the fledgling Word Records.
Christian remembered Bannister several months later when a
position at Opryland opened soon after Bannister graduated
from ACC with a mass communication degree.
"We moved out to Nashville largely to
try to get into the music business," Blanton said. "I
couldn't play anything, and neither could he, but we tried."Bannister
wrote and sold jingles and played a variety of instruments
he hadn't known how to play at Opryland before landing an
engineering gig with only a weeklong course as experience.
Sitting at the controls, Bannister had no idea what to do
when the drummer turned and said: "Brown, this snare
drum sounds like [expletive]. Can you put some 10 k on it?""
I looked at him, leaned down and prayed," Bannister said.
Meanwhile, Bannister and Blanton took charge of the Belmont
Church's youth group. At a retreat, 15-year-old Amy Grant
asked the 21-year-old Bannister to listen "to songs I
want to play in school."
"I was struck by her charisma, by the engaging aspect
of her personality," Bannister said. When he gave the
tape to Chris Christian, Christian convinced Word to sign
Grant, then suggested Bannister-who had no producing experience-produce
her first album.
In 1977, the 17-year-old Grant's self-titled album was released,
and four years later, Age to Age became the first Christian
album to sell 1 million copies. "Nobody expected that,"
Bannister said. "We didn't expect it."
Blanton had returned to Texas before Christian called him
to ask that he also work with Grant, reuniting Bannister with
his best friend for good.
In the 28 years following, Nashville became Christian music's
capital, the focus shifting from the West Coast. Christian
music itself became a full-fledged industry-in which Bannister
has been named Producer of the Year four of the last six years.
Such success seems strange to Bannister, who in college had
thought an aptitude test telling him to go into musical production
was "a waste of money. "It's just by the grace of
God." Blanton also expresses disbelief, especially listening
back at Grant's first albums, which contained such songs as
"Grape, Grape Joy." The two recently had a chance
to look back at the shared beginning of their respective careers
as they considered releasing a collection of Grant's faith-based
songs. "We were both kind of laughing," Blanton
said. "For he and I, we just consider it a rich blessing
after 25 years to still be working and doing this stuff."
|
