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Gospel news this week contains the announcement that Shirley Caesar Re-Signs and Fantasia will lip-sync in new film. These stories and more for  Gospel News this Week.

Shirley Caesar Re-Signs with Light Records — Gospel music legend and icon Pastor Shirley Caesar has officially re-signed with her longtime label home Light Records. This capped off a huge week for Caesar as her latest album A City Called Heaven was nominated for 2 GMA Dove Awards as “Traditional Gospel Album of the Year” and “Traditional Gospel Recorded Song of the Year” for her single “Favor”. She was a recent recipient of the BMI Trailblazer of Gospel Music award in January 2011. The award show premiered on GMC on Feb. 19 with tributes from Arnetta Murrills-Croom, Beverly Crawford, Lucinda Moore, Ledisi, and Kim Burrell. Caesar is slated to record a new album later this year with Kurt Carr at the helm.

Top 10 Albums

#1 (1) WOW Gospel 2011

#2(3) “Church On the Moon”- Deitrick Haddon

#3(6)“Rehab: The Overdose”- LeCrae

# 4 (4) “Triumphant” VaShawn

#5 (5) “I Believe: Live”- James Fortune & Fiya

#6 (3) “Dominionaire” Canton Jones

#7(8) “As We Worship: Live”- William McDonnell

#8 (10) “Rehab” -LeCrae

#9 (7) “The Playlist The Very Best”- Marvin Sapp

#10 (9) ‘Here I am”- Marvin Sapp

On Film

Fantasia Barrino will not be singing when she takes on the role of gospel legend Mahalia Jackson in an upcoming biopic. Instead, producers will use the original recordings and Fantasia will lip sync. Producer Dave LaCouer Simien told the New Orleans Times-Picayune: “I really wanted to be authentic . . . We wanted to make sure if we do it, we do it right.” Simien’s company, Double Dutch Productions, has attained the rights to 18 of Jackson’s songs as well as the approval of her estate.

Mahalia! will tell the story of the singer’s rise to fame and civil rights leadership from an impoverished upbringing in New Orleans. The film production is based on the 1993 book, Got To Tell It: Mahalia Jackson, Queen of Gospel and it will begin shooting in April.

On the Record

THE FORMER worship leader for the renowned Lakewood Church, Derrick Horne has released the album ‘If I Had Not Been’. Horne has recorded and toured with such artists as Fred Hammond, Israel Houghton, Marvin Sapp and Chris Tomlin. Featuring such guests as David and Nicole Binion and Marvin McQuitty, the album is said to contain “genres ranging from gospel, Latin jazz, funk rock, contemporary Christian and even rockabilly.

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