Vashawn Mitchell: The Interview, Part 1

The wait is finally over! Vashawn Mitchell has released his highly anticipated third CD entitled “Triumphant” and it is already on the verge of being #1 next week. Root Magazine correspondent, Racquelle Proctor caught up with the rising star in Cincinnati, Ohio during the GMWA conference. The interview was so long that we had to break it up in three parts. lol. Talk about an easy interview. Here is Part 1:

By Racquelle Proctor

Root: Where are you from?

Vashawn Mitchell: Chicago, born and raised. I was Lonnie Hunter’s assistant as a teenager then I joined Bishop Trotter’s Sweet Holy Spirit Church and in early 2000 I became minister of music there. That’s where I started writing, producing and writing.

Root: This has been going on for 10 yrs now?

Vashawn Mitchell: Probably longer. The first song I put out was “It’s Only a Test” in the 90’s- around 1996 or 1997. I was a Choir Director then. I wrote two songs for the church not knowing it was going to get out like it did. Tyscot Records picked up the church choir. From their I just started a writing career.

Root: I think to transition from a songwriter to the artist, says a lot about you. Did you find it easy or was it more difficult to make that transition?

Vashawn Mitchell: It was easy to make the transition only because I was a Minister of Music at a pretty musical church. The Pastor was pretty musical himself too but he couldn’t go like he wanted to go to promote the CD. So most of the time it was me. The easy part was my practice on Sunday morning and Thursday nights and mid-day services and also going on the road with the church choir. Although I was in front it was still a training ground for what God was preparing me for as a solo artist.

Root: How did you make the transition from The Sweet Holy Spirit and the choir to being VaShawn Mitchell?

Vashawn Mitchell: It was evident that God was giving me a ministry that was for the world and not just my local church. I met with my pastor and told him I believe it’s time for me to do something on my own and I just wanted his blessing. He said “You Got It”. So from there, I recorded and spent my own money. I did my first project entitled: “Believe In Your Dreams” and Tyscot picked it up. I let Bryan Scott hear it and he knew what I could do as a writer so now he got to hear what I could do as an artist. That’s how it all got started.

Root: You recently signed to EMI Gospel. Congratulations! How do you think that will affect your music ministry and what you present moving forward?

Vashawn Mitchell: Over the last 4 years, God has transitioned me and my ministry. I moved to Atlanta Georgia and I began to realize my purpose and come out of my comfort zone. So many people are under a church ministry and they stay stuck because its easy. Its comfortable. God had to stretch me. Atlanta ministry is totally different, like night and day from where I come from and how I was raised. It stretched me and my relationship with God. And in this era of praise and worship, God has given me a mandate, a sound that is not too CCM or too traditional. That mixes the sound for our Sunday morning experience to be a holistic experience. Regarding the transition to EMI, it’s a partnership. God has put me in a place where I can put a certain sound in the earth. Also, in the message that he wants to put into the earth. A mainstream message as well. This partnership is going to me and my ministry that God has given me to the masses. People talk about levels and all that but I believe the gift God gives us is for the masses and the vehicle right now to get there is EMI Gospel.

Root: What can we expect from “Triumphant“?

Vashawn Mitchell: I purposely sought God to find out what he is saying in this time for his people and this project is probably the mark of a turning point for not only what God is doing in my ministry, but in the lives of people. It is entitled “Triumphant” and there are undertones in the title and in the entire project to encourage the body of Christ. Regardless of what we are going through, regardless of the economy, regardless of anything else, God is still our source. We have been depending on resources too long and when the resources dry up, we get into a mood and we start to get depressed and we forget that God already shed his blood for us and his blood still works. Greater is he that is in us than he that is in the world. We start to forget that we are champions we are conquerors, we are triumphant and that there is nobody greater than God. He gave me a crazy song. Sometimes when He gives me a crazy song I say “ok God how do you want me to get this across”? The song is called “Be Fruitful” and God just told me to tell people in a nice way, don’t get so caught up in your time because it can always be time for something. It can be time to eat when you are in college and in line but you can’t eat until your turn comes or until you get to the counter. So from “Conqueror” to “Be Fruitful” to “His Blood Still Works”, every song on this project is for somebody to get through whatever they are going through in this season. I ask God to purposely give me songs that will out-live me.

Root: You brought up “Nobody Greater”. Everywhere I go, I hear it. That song has become an instant classic. Were you expecting that?

Vashawn Mitchell: I was not. Its kind of amazing because I didn’t write the song. People think I am really young but I am in my 30’s and some younger cats in their 20’s look up to me like a mentor like I did with Donald Lawrence. One of my mentee’s (Darius Paulk) wrote the song “Nobody Greater”. He has been singing it around Atlanta and some of the choirs have been singing it and it was on You Tube. I asked him would he mind if I recorded the song and he said “Would I mind”? This would be my first song.” So we sat down and I decided to give it an arrangement that I felt would hit the hearts of people. There are different versions that people sing around the world. I believe people need to go back to the source. I believe that there is nobody greater than God. I did not know it was going to take on the platform that it did. But as I study songs and some of my greatest inspirations have been Andrae Crouch, Walter Hawkins, Edwin Hawkins, Donald Lawrence and Kurt Carr. There is always that song that kind of speaks to where the nation is right then and there. I believe that where the nation is, not just the body of Christ, that people need to understand God is the greatest and there is no one greater than him.

Check us out tomorrow for Part 2!!!!