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I was raised on gospel. I remember hip-hop and rock music were secular, so basically, for my first ten years living in Detroit, I was on gospel. But when I moved to Houston, that's when I got to open up my musical horizons.

Like all soul singers, I grew up singing in church but sometimes I would leave early and sit in the car listening to gospel band, The Blind Boys of Alabama. Hearing their lead singer Clarence made me connect the idea of church and show business and see how I could make a career singing music that stirred the soul.

I grew up around a lot of church musicians.

Gospel music played a huge part of my life. I was too scared to audition for the choir, but through my own music, I was also able to find spirituality for myself.

I sang in church, but growing up in the neighborhood, music was more of an expression of relief or entertainment.

I had been raised on country and western in Missouri. But gospel was great.

I had experiences or exposure to music in church. I went to a church, it was very unique. It was a predominantly African American Catholic church. So they would have - one mass would be traditional church music, and then the other mass would be gospel music.

My childhood was limited to mostly gospel music. We didn't have, like, a lot of records in our house, you know. It was like my grandparents who raised me. They were pretty old-fashioned in their religious ways, so it was like church, church, church, school, school, school.

I grew up in the South and went to church a lot.