Dante Bowe Reflects On Five Grammy Nominations: ‘I Was Shocked, I Was Emotional’
By Movieguide® Staff
Christian artist Dante Bowe reflected on his five Grammy nominations ahead of the awards show on April 3, 2022.
“I found out it was five nominations and I was shocked — I was emotional,” Bowe told Billboard.
Bowe earned nominations across both Billboard’s gospel and CCM charts. Bowe, who first garnered recognition as one of the founders of the now immensely popular worship music collective Maverick City Music.
Billboard reported:
Bowe, a Rockingham, North Carolina native and now Nashville resident, is nominated three times in the best gospel performance/song category, for his solo tracks “Joyful” and “Voice of God” (the latter featuring Steffany Gretzinger and Bowe’s MCM cohort Chandler Moore), as well as for the Elevation Worship & Maverick City Music hit “Wait on You.” The best gospel album nominations include Maverick City Music’s Jubilee: Juneteenth Edition. In CCM categories, the contemporary Christian music album nominations include Old Church Basement, the collaborative effort from Maverick City Music and Elevation Worship.
Over the past two years, the worship collective Maverick City Music’s organic, raw songs such as “Promises” and “Jireh” have topped both Billboard’s Christian and Gospel charts, and in the process, have helped elevate marginalized voices and created a collaborative space intentionally inclusive of women and artists of color.
Bowe reflected on the 2018 conception of Maverick City Music and their rise to center stage in the CCM world.
“I think it really took someone on the CCM side to affirm what me, Naomi, Chandler, Aaron and Joe were doing,” Bowe said. “Finally, having some gatekeepers on our side, that changed everything for us. And then having Bethel [Music] being a part of ‘joyful’ definitely helped break down laws of systems and things are in place that, are kind of now fading away.”
“I think worship is worship,” he added. “We all have stories to tell. Our testimonies are just different. I think it comes across in our music and people hear soul and pain and hope. It comes across in everything that we try to do. We all kind of write the same and we all kind of come from some of the same places.”
Bowe said that he and Maverick City Music wanted to connect gospel and Christian artists.
“I feel like in gospel and Christian music, there has always been this divide, ultimately,” Bowe said. “Maverick, we just used the gifts God gave us and at this point in our careers, we felt like it was our due diligence, our obligation to bring awareness to Juneteenth, and that everyone wasn’t freed on the Fourth of July. And then there are gospel artists who have never packed arenas, ever. We want them to be seen and heard.”
Bowe won Best Contemporary Christian Music Album alongside Elevation Worship and MCM.
“I give God all the glory, and I feel like this win is for every black kid that feels misunderstood because of where they come from and what they’ve gone through,” says Bowe on his GRAMMY win for Best Contemporary Christian Music Album with Elevation Worship & Maverick City Music. “This is bigger than me, it’s for the culture. Breaking records is the new norm. Now I feel like I can accomplish anything!”
But Bowe’s rise to fame was not without hardship.
Movieguide® previously reported:
After seven years of singing with seemingly no results, Bowe said he became “depressed and miserable.”
Bowe also shared his experience living in a trailer after moving to Columbus, Ohio, where he wrote many tracks on his solo album, “Circles.”
“I wrote a lot of my songs in that trailer,” he said. “I was so depressed, so miserable because I was like ‘this is never gonna happen for me.’ Because I’d been singing for like six years prior, seven years prior, trying to do music.”
The title song’s lyrics also address his experience with sexual abuse as a child.
The chorus reads: “He’s a God of the circles / He’s a God of the ups and downs / Ain’t nothing new under the sun / Ain’t nothing new to the Son / He’s a God in the trials / He’s a God in the meltdowns / Ain’t nothing new under the sun / Ain’t nothing new to the Son / We all go through circles / ‘Round and ’round we go.”
However, Bowe is thankful for God’s provision, noting that, “even up until the Grammys, it’s just the Lord showing me that ‘you’re not in control, I’m in control and whatever I want for your life will happen.'”
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Now more than ever we’re bombarded by darkness in media, movies, and TV. Movieguide® has fought back for almost 40 years, working within Hollywood to propel uplifting and positive content. We’re proud to say we’ve collaborated with some of the top industry players to influence and redeem entertainment for Jesus. Still, the most influential person in Hollywood is you. The viewer.
What you listen to, watch, and read has power. Movieguide® wants to give you the resources to empower the good and the beautiful. But we can’t do it alone. We need your support.
You can make a difference with as little as $7. It takes only a moment. If you can, consider supporting our ministry with a monthly gift. Thank you.
Movieguide® is a 501c3 and all donations are tax deductible.
