Her voice has been described as the Ella Fitzgerald of this time. Beyonce and Jessica Simpson both said in an MTV interview, she’s influenced their music.
singer Kim Burrell was recently at Greater Community Temple here in Memphis. She sat down with Local 24’s Katina Rankin for an exclusive interview. It’s Local Good News.
Vocalist and Evangelist Kim Burrell is no stranger to Memphis. She recorded a live album here in 2001.
“I said why not. Let’s do the memorable moment of a live recording during what I love to do — that is come to Holy Convocation. And, why not do it at the spot with the man, the great, late Bishop G.E. Patterson? And, I had to do it there. And boy what an experience,” said Evangelist and Singer Kim Burrell.
More than 5,000 people attended. And G.E. Patterson is not the only preacher she’s performed for. She and Harry Connick, Jr. performed for the Pope back in 2007.
“We were together during the Katrina floods, and we did all kinds of things to honor these people. But, why this? This is so huge. It’s 65,000 people out here. He says, ‘Kim, I look at myself as the jeep that’s going to till the ground for the Cadillac. You are it. And, I see you as that’. And, he has invited me on so many of his stages,” said Burrell.
The two also recorded a jazz song together.
Burrell sang her first solo at just age one. Then, for eight years straight as a child, she battled double pneumonia.
“My lungs collapsed every year, and they sent me home to die. I’d have a 107 fever and talking all out of my head,” said Burrell. “Age 6 to 14, every year the doctors sent me home to die.”
But Burrell didn’t die. She lived and she has vowed to carry the good news of the gospel around the world through ‘the word’ and song.
“That’s my message to God’s people, to the one that doesn’t believe in Him, try Him and see want He prove himself to be the God of all things,” said Burrell. “Whatever my lot, thou has taught me to say, it is well. It is well with my soul.”
Burrell tells us she will make a guest appearance on the Harry show that will begin airing on Local 24, September 12th.
