GREGOTA MUSIC GROUP
Gregota Music Group was founded in 1985 by Hayward Gregory. Through the course of the years, Gregota Music started to break into the music scene. In late 2000, Gregota Music has joined ASCAP, The Harry Fox Agency and The National Music Publishing Association as a music publisher. Gregota has been very busy these past 3 years in acquiring music catalogs for its company. The most recent is several Clarence Fountain of The Blind Boys of Alabama music co-owned by Gregota. Several other music catalogs includes Greg Kelly works of The Supreme Angels, Dwight Fields of the "Manhattans", Willie Johnson of the Morning Stars of Savannah Ga. and The Haywood Gregory Collections musical works. Gregota vast music catalogs are all available for licensing through the Harry Fox Agency. Gregota Music Publishing also has several music licensed out by major record labels such as Capitol Records, Philadelphia International Record/The Right Stuff (aka Gamble and Huff) for song titles "Holdin On" and "God Is Movin" performed by the Blind Boys of Alabama. Other labels include Compendia Music Group, Light Records, BMG Music, Summit Cross Records, EMI, House of Blues and many others. Beside running a publishing company, Gregota Music Group also signed a label/distribution deal with Alliant Music Group to release "The Blind Boys of Alabama with Samuel Butler Jr" CD entitled "Rare Classics" due on 6/27/06. Gregota Music representation of many writers has required the company to affiliate itself with BMI. Haygota Music Publishing a division of Gregota has been formed to enable the company to represent and protect BMI writers music catalogs. Gregota Music Publishing allows the company to take care of ASCAP writers catalogs. Gregota Music Group is a small company dedicated to bringing you good music of all genre and the protection of writers musical rights. Gregota & Haygota is steadily on the rise and is open to helping individuals who are focus and established.
CLARENCE FOUNTAIN AND THE BLIND BOYS OF ALABAMA WITH SAM BUTLER JR - RARE CLASSICS
For over 60 years, The Blind Boys of Alabama have delivered soul stirring “Rare Classic” to their fans on such songs as “Only Believe, I Can See Everybody’s Mother, and In My Heart”. Since forming their group at the Alabama Institute for the Negro Blind in 1939, they have kept alive the spirit and energy of pure gospel music.
In 1983 members were Clarence Fountain, Caleb Butler, Ollice Thomas and manager Sam Butler Jr.
Sam Butler Jr. hired Jimmy Carter, J.T. Clint Scalle, and Joe Watson who was members of The Blind Boys of Mississippi for production of “THE GOSPEL AT COLONUS.” Directed by Lee Breuer’s and composed by Bob Telson, Gospel at Colonus starred Morgan Freeman, Clarence Fountain and The Blind Boys of Alabama, The Soul Stirrers and Samuel Butler Jr. as music director and second lead singer. The play premiered at The Brooklyn Academy of Music ‘Next Wave Festival', and was performed on Broadway at the Lunt-Fontanne Theater in 1988 for which it received numerous awards, including a Pulitzer Prize Nomination (1988), the Obie for Best Musical (1984), and an Emmy Television Award. The Gospel At Colonus was also performed at the Theatre Du Chatelet in Paris, the Spoleto Festival, the Edinburg Festival, Moscow’s International Chekov Theater Festival and the Summer Festival in Barcelona, Spain. It was recreated for the 70th Anniversary of New York’s legendary Apollo Theater for two weeks in fall of 2004 starring Charles S. Dutton, The Blind Boys and Jevetta Steele, and a feature film is in development for world wide distribution.
Produced and sponsored by Clarence Fountain and Samuel Butler Jr., the project is a collection of several unreleased cuts featuring both Alabama and Mississippi Blind Boys who joined together to make the recording truly a rare classic.
HAYWOOD GREGORY - SINGER, GUITARIST, COMPOSER & PRODUCER
Haywood Gregory, a native of Savannah Georgia, began singing in churches and public schools at the age of seven, and it had been merely a few years before he became a professional singer at the age of fourteen. Some of his many accolades include having performed with Morgan Freeman, The Blind Boys of Alabama and The Soul Stirrers (1988) in the Broadway hit play "GOSPEL AT COLONUS" at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre in New York City, touring throughout the United States and Europe performing at various festivals such as the Newport Jazz Festival (RI), the 36th Montreux Jazz Festival (Switzerland), and the 20th Savannah Jazz Festival (GA)., and numerous appearances on the Joe Franklin Show. Haywood made his big screen movie debut, singing in the hit movie "THE KING OF NEW YORK" starring Christopher Walken. Haywood has recorded on numerous albums, some include the 1997 "LAST CONCERT CD" with Eddie Harris and Bernard Purdie in Cologne Germany, the Killer Joe CD, "SCENE OF THE CRIME", distributed by BMG Music, and HAYWOOD and JEANNIE GREGORY "SWINGING WITH THE ROMERO BROTHERS". Haywood has shared center stage with such notables as Bruce Springsteen, Carl Perkins, Dion, Bruce Willis, Freddie Jackson, Tony Bennett, Liza Minnelli, Lionel Hampton, Bobby Watson, Buddy Guy, The Oak Ridge Boys, Otis Blackwell, Ronnie Dove, Issac Hayes, George Coleman, BB King, The Drifters, The Marvelettes, The Blues Jumpers, and many more great stars. Haywood is a patriot, who has been awarded two resolutions from the New Jersey General Assembly, and the New Jersey State Senate, for being a world class musician and family man. This CD is dedicated to the late jazz legend Eddie Harris, for his motivation and support. On the front and back cover of this latest CD, is a portrait of Haywood, that was sketched by Tony Bennett. Thank you Tony, for the gift, and for your support and inspiration.