Article By Chris Riemenschneider // Star Tribune
Jovonta Patton of north Minneapolis has the No. 1 album on the Billboard gospel charts this week, and he got there largely by the grace of God and Facebook.
The 26-year-old singer — who performs most Sunday mornings at Shiloh Temple International Ministries on W. Broadway — joined a rare roster of artists to make it to the top of any Billboard chart without the help of a record label or national radio support.
He credited new-school social media shares for driving downloads of his self-released album, “Finally Living,” which he recorded live at Shiloh Temple. He also employed an old-school method gospel acts have used since the 1930s: selling records after church performances. “Facebook was literally a driving force,” Patton said, but he proudly added that “a lot of the sales have also been out-of-trunk, as they say in gospel music.”
Patton sang and sold CDs at a couple of well-attended church events in town during the past two weeks, including a unity service July 19 at Shiloh Temple in reaction to the Philando Castile shooting and violence plaguing the city’s North Side.
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soruce: EEWMagazine.com
