One of our favorites and friend of UB, Pastor John P. Kee has a new Tiny Desk, for Black History Month.
Pastor John P. Kee was born the 15th of 16 children to John Henry and Lizzie Shannon Kee, and he affectionately describes his childhood home as “outside the county line” in Durham, NC.
Mrs. Ethel G. Shannon, John’s maternal grandmother, also played a pivotal role in his upbringing and remains a consistent source of spiritual guidance today.
Music in the home and attending church highlighted the family’s weekly activities. John exhibited extraordinary talent at an early age; vocally, harmonically, and instrumentally.
When John was 8 years old, a piano was purchased for two older siblings to take lessons in the home.
While they were both totally disinterested in it, John was fascinated by the instrument.
John began mimicking a young pianist from Cleveland, Daryl Bailey, who was the church musician at the time.
Drawing inspiration from the music he heard in church Kee began to play and write his own material by age 9. At age 13 John and his best friend at the time, jazz bassist Clinton “Chip” Shearon, started a jazz trio and a gospel community choir in the city of Durham.
He would later be graced with the opportunity to study piano under the tutelages of the late Margaret Shearon, Yusuf Salim, and master of jazz Mary Lou Williams.
An outstanding student, John was placed in a school for musically gifted children; The North Carolina School of the Arts, in Winston-Salem, NC. He went on to study further in Northern California with his older brothers at Yuba College in Marysville, who shared their tactical knowledge of writing, singing, and music production with their young sibling.
As a very young man in of the late 70’s early 80’s, he was privileged to work with some of the Nation’s greatest Pop, Jazz and R&B groups. He landed a job as National Musical Director with Miss Black Teenage Pageants, a position that would bring him back to North Carolina.
In his late teens, he drifted into a street lifestyle that brought him to Charlotte, NC.
Once in Charlotte, he moved to the Double Oaks Community and began a life of corruption. The senseless violence that encompassed him became insufferable until material possessions offered John no consolation. After witnessing an untimely death to a very close friend, John knew it was time to change course.
In his early twenties John found himself working at the PTL Network’s Buffalo Park. It was there where the young man initiated his transformation from a street thug and drug dealer named John, to gospel legend John P. Kee, and ultimately to Pastor Kee.
He had gained foundational principles that gradually and eventually propelled him into victorious living. He returned to active involvement in his community as a musician, clinician, and in the end an internationally recognized writer.
In the mid 1980’s he started a community choir in Charlotte. This choir, which got its rise from a “feed the hungry” street ministry, achieved rapid success and eventually grew to become the renowned and much awarded New Life Community Choir.
In the late 1980’s he was crowned the Prince of Gospel, which is a title he laughs at because his given middle name is Prince. “If they’d never given me the title, I would have always been my Grandmother’s John Prince”, he often says.
In 1989 he released his debut solo album, “Wait on Him.”
Kee continued to balance solo albums and recordings with the choir.
The early ‘90s brought the beginning of what became a flood of awards, including more than a dozen Stellar Awards, 20 GMWA Excellence Awards, a Soul Train Award, and two Billboard Music Awards.
Since its inception in 1995, Pastor Kee has been the full-time pastor of the New Life Fellowship Center.
Through non-traditional outreach that transcends the four walled structure, the church’s unique approach to ministry has resulted in a rapidly growing, thriving congregation.
Pastor Kee’s ability to personally relate to the urban lifestyle allows him to reach those who would not typically attend church and further are not welcomed by many assemblies.
He has received hundreds of proclamations from our Nation’s cities, and in 2005 he was inducted into The Gospel Music Hall of Fame.
Over the course of his professional career that spans four decades, he has written music for Hallmark, Inc., Stephanie Mills, Jonny Lang, The Hawkins Family, Daryl Coley, Billy Preston, Dorinda Clark Cole, Joe Walsh, Rev. James Cleveland, Florida Mass Choir, Mississippi Mass Choir, Vanessa Bell Armstrong, and made History in 1982 as one of the first writers to ever write more than one song for the legendary Dr. James Cleveland’s Gospel Music Workshop of America.
His music has been featured in film and on television in commercial advertisements and even on Saturday Night Live. His Music catalogis said to be one of the largest in the world today by an individual Publisher/Writer.
Kee and the New Life Community Choir reached their first commercial peak with the gold award-winning album “Show Up,” which was also nominated for a Grammy, as was his 1999 album “Strength.”
The same decade, Kee added a full-time ministry to his list of accomplishments, balancing work in the New Life Community Church with his music career.
In addition to his own recordings, Kee produced albums by the Victory in Praise Mass Choir, Shawn McClemore and New Image, and Drea Randle.
During the 2000s and 2010s, Kee frequently returned to the recording studio with the choir.
He consistently produced albums such as Not Guilty…The Experience (2000), Blessed by Association (2002), and Life & Favor (2012), that used passionate praise & worship music mixed with contemporary R&B and hip-hop to deliver the message of redemption through Christ.
In 2015, through Motown Gospel, he released the solo recording “Level Next,” his 25th album overall. It peaked at #4 on the Billboard Gospel chart.
“I Made It Out” arrived in 2019 and earned a GMA Dove Award nomination
As a solo artist as well as with the NLCC, John P. Kee has received a flood of awards and nominations.
UB spoke ot the legendary John P. Kee in 2020 and he told us then, about some of his upcoming projects; “One cool thing about John P. Kee, he never stops working. So I’ve got records in the can. I’ve got a project called 10 women 10 victories, I started with Whitney Houston before she died, and I’m gonna finish that project.
I’ve got a choir project that we’re working on now actually.”
Performing here with a four-piece band and a seven-person choir, Pastor Kee‘s set journeys through both his traditional and contemporary gospel output.
“I Believe” and “Lily in the Valley” transform the Tiny Desk into an old, wood-floored country church.
“Life & Favor” and “Standing in the Need” aren’t just notes and melodies — the testimony inspires.
The up-tempo “Oh How Wondrous” and “Mighty God” joyfully proclaim, with reverence, the power of God.
Check Out The John P. Kee & New Life: Tiny Desk Concert!
Set List
“Jesus is Real”
“Life & Favor”
“Oh How Wondrous”
“Stand!”
“I Believe”
“Lily in the Valley”
“Clap Your Hands”
“Standing in the Need”
“Mighty God”
Musicians
Pastor John P. Kee: vocals, keys
Leeland Thompson: guitar, music director
Dominique Britt: keys
Josiah Farrar: bass
Christopher Darden: drums
Jeanette Taylor: background vocals
John P. Kee III: background vocals
Tianna Roberts: background vocals
Shawna Dominique Harris: background vocals
Tallie Rogers: background vocals
Dell Kee: background vocals
Zakeya Stewart: background vocals
