::ALBUM REVIEW::

Dionne Warwick really needs no introduction. The acclaimed international pop star, famous for her smooth silky and well polished voice, made it big for hits including Burt Bacharach/Hal David’s “Do You Know The Way To San Jose,” “Anyone Who Had A Heart,” “Don’t Make Me Over”, “Walk On By” and “I Say A Little Prayer.” Her vast career stretches from her popular recordings on Scepter Records from 1962 to the comeback recordings on Clive Davis’ Arista Records in the 1980s - yielding her bigger hits such as the Barry-Gibb produced “Heartbreaker,” “I’ll Never Love This Way Again” and the inspiring charity song, “That’s What Friends Are For.”. And she has enjoyed a longevity in the music industry that few artists would dream to possess; earning her an impressive five Grammy-awards and is second only to Aretha Franklin as the female vocalist with the most Billboard Hot 100 chart hits from 1955 to 1999. Yet today’s generation - powered by the present age of the tabloids, gossip columns and celebrity-fueled blogs - may not easily remember Warwick’s lasting and groundbreaking success, but may only remember the images of her controversial support of the Psychic Friends’ Network in the 90s, her tax delinquency woes and the 2002 arrest for drug possession at an airport (the charges were eventually dropped). But Warwick shines as a consistently morally-fit superstar and one of the majestic angels to ever grace the pop music world. Yet Warwick makes a big transition to return to her gospel roots after all these years on her sophomore project on Warner’s Rhino record label and her sophomore gospel project - Why We Sing. Some may be shocked at such a feat, but Warwick’s closest followers shouldn’t be. Her gospel roots are glorious to the tee: having a gospel promoter as a father, being raised at the New Hope Baptist Church in East Orange, New Jersey and routinely sung with the renowned family gospel group The Drinkard Singers. In 1968, the legendary singer recorded The Magic of Believing - which would be her first and last gospel project...until now.

Warwick surrounds herself around a good set of well capable musicians and notable talent, for the most part, and is graced with covers of classic hymns and gospel favorites along with a few originals. Two revisits from the Magic of Believing album resurface - the majestic update of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” and “Rise Shine and Give God the Glory.” The latter, lacking the fast rhythms and spunk of the original version, is arranged to the style of quartet gospel - or a matching Dorothy Norwood uptempo number - and fits well on Warwick’s aged and distinctive voice. The smoothed-down version even allows Warwick space to keenly ad-lib a bit. BeBe Winans duets with Warwick on the ol’ skool R&B-flavored “I’m Going Up;” strangely matching the kind of male-female pairing of the Spinners duet with the seasoned singer on the ‘70s pop hit “Then Came You.” “I Lift My Heart” finds Warwick tackling a contemporary gospel groove that may have been found on a Vickie Winans or CeCe Winans record, but Warwick impressively - with no signs of difficulty - delivers a solid performance on the modern, yet insipid sounds. The beautiful lush sounds of the Nashville String Machine on “With All My Heart,” another BeBe Winans composition, definitely fits the adult contemporary sound Warwick is known for and is, without any doubt, one of her greatest convincing ballads ever created. Why We Sing surprisingly wonders through a batch of styles that best describe modern gospel and easily fits on Warwick’s delicate voice, but it is the more traditional-flavored offerings that grapple listeners’ attention the most. The lounge-soul arrangement of “Jesus Loves Me” and the Sunday-morning friendly “Old Landmark” are best examples of Warwick’s magic on the classics, while her passionate ad-libs embrace the remake of her aunt - Cissy Houston’s “The Lord Is My Shepherd” - first heard on The Preacher’s Wife motion picture soundtrack.

While most of Why We Sing is well paced and executed, there are some moments where the subdued nature of the album’s production overtakes Warwick’s efforts and giving the album a dated amateurish presence. Her son, Damon Elliot (Mya, Pink, Bone Thugs N Harmony) produced most of the project and contributes a couple of numbers that lack significant amounts of instrumentation for today’s world of gospel. Then there is the song's obvious omissions of delivering the lyrical characteristics Warwick’s finesse is used to singing from her Bacharach/David songbook. “The World Needs Jesus,” though arranged with calming strings and with a praise-and-worship posture, strangely shifts from a prayerful and personal first-person narrative to a first person plural narrative on the highly repetitive chorus. The title cut, taken from the 1991 Kirk Franklin classic, features her sister Dee Dee Warrick (another member of the Drinkard Sisters) but fails to match the powerful original - mostly due to a lack of instrumentation. While “Seven” incorporates modern pop sounds into a lyric tucked in the biblical storytelling of Joseph’s dream dealing with world hunger and features a convincing guest vocal from her son David Elliot, secular audiences will find it very hard to interpret the song.

Even though Warwick’s mezzo-soprano has been reduced to a calming alto and with over forty years in the music business, she shows no sign of stopping and excels over her peers as one of the only artists in their late sixties to sound so timeless. Her performances alone on Why We Sing are breathtaking and proves to be a worthy follow-up to her debut gospel project - recorded precisely forty years ago. It would have been nice to hear more of the style that Warwick is accustomed to singing to; set in the style of her sophisticated brand of adult contemporary R&B and pop. Hearing Warwick singing overly-repetitive lyrics isn’t what music lovers are accustomed to and it’s quite uncomfortable knowing that the stereotypes of gospel music prevails for the most part on this record, but Why We Sing is still a joyful sound to the ear and a breath of fresh air to the assembly-line world of gospel music. Not a perfect project, but an easy-listening experience that is bound to pick up a Grammy nomination.