The Southern California Community Choir

Formed under the direction of late gospel pianist and singer Reverend James Cleveland (1932 — 1991), the Southern California Community Choir is one of the world's foremost gospel groups. In addition to singing for the Lord, the choir has lent their inspiring harmonies to albums by Kansas, Elton John, and Arlo Guthrie. Their collaboration with Aretha Franklin, Amazing Grace, recorded during two live performances at the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles, reached the pop Top Ten and remains one of the best-selling gospel-pop crossover albums of all time. In a review of the album, the Rolling Stone Album Guide described it as "Franklin transcendent, returning to the source of her own — and soul music's — earliest inspiration." The Southern California Community Choir joined with the Cornerstone Baptist Choir to provide harmonies for Elton John's ultra-funky tune, "Bite Your Lip (Get Up and Dance)" on his Madman Across the Water album. The group's performance in Jerusalem was filmed for a documentary video, Gospel From the Holy Land.