Mervyn Warren

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Mervyn Warren (born February 29, 1964) is an American film composer, record producer, musician, music arranger, lyricist, pianist, and vocalist.

Warren is a five-time Grammy Award winner and a 10-time Grammy Award nominee.

Warren has written extensively for several feature and television films, as well as writing for numerous successful recording artists, including extensive work on Jones' Back on the Block, Q's Jook Joint, and Q's Soul Bossa Nostra. Warren has also produced numerous jazz, pop, R&B, contemporary Christian, and gospel artists, many of whom performed on them (on piano, keyboards, or vocals), as well as often writing or co-writing the melodies and lyrics.

Warren is best known for his contributions to the top-selling Gospel album of all time, as well as creating and arranging much of the soundtrack to the 1996 Whitney Houston film The Preacher's Wife.

Early life and education

Warren was born in Huntsville, Alabama, on a leap day (February 29). He is the son of Mervyn A. Warren, a university administrator, researcher, and author, as well as Barbara J. Warren, a university professor who specialized in early childhood education. When he was three years old, his mother taught him reading and math, which enabled him to complete the first and second grades in a year. His classmates, who had been "skipped" a grade, taunted him and ostracized him for the next three years as he began the third grade. He began playing the piano during his childhood, when he was five years old. He took piano lessons from six to ten years, but after that time, he lost interest, preferring improvisation to memorization. Since his parents are Seventh-day Adventists, he was forbidden from listening to pop music or rhythm and blues. He was banned at the age of twelve for holding a copy of the album Gratitude by Earth, Wind & Fire. Instead, he listened to easy-listening, contemporary Christian, classical, choral music, Mantovani Orchestra, Edwin Hawkins, and the Swingle Singers. He grew up near Oakwood University, where he saw ensembles perform. He enrolled in a summer program at Alabama A&M University for high school students who excelled at math and science at fifteen years old. He was valedictorian at Oakwood Adventist Academy in 1981 and then enrolled Oakwood University a few months later. He earned his degree in 1985 with a major in music. After studying with Steve Sample Sr. two years ago, he earned a master's degree in arranging from the University of Alabama.

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Early musical career

After being told a few songs by his mother, Warren began playing the piano by ear at the age of five. He remained at the piano for many years, learning to play various ways by ear and designing new versions of existing pieces. He was accompanying vocalists on the piano for their performances at school or church as early as seven years old. He landed as an accompanist in the community and continued to do so regularly throughout college and graduate school.

Warren became the regular accompanist for a vocal group made up of five of his female coworkers, and the two groups performed regularly at school and community functions. Warren began making original plans for the company within weeks of being their accompanist.

When he was 12 years old, he was asked by a classmate if he'd ever considered writing an original song. Despite Warren's fact that he had never considered doing so before, but the suggestion prompted him to start writing original songs and lyrics, which he taught to the aforementioned vocal group and which they began to perform publicly.

Warren had an innate inclination toward jazz and complex harmony, as demonstrated in both his original songs and arrangements of existing songs. Some of the more conservative, Christian members of the Oakwood community were greeted with suspicion, sparking a simmering competition between figures of power and Warren as he attempted to articulate his musical beliefs. Warren, a 13-voice female vocal group, was converted to a nine-voice mixed vocal group at the age of 13. This group, now known as The Symbolic Sounds, performed his compositions and compositions exclusively, and was highly popular in the school and community through 1981.

Warren's first, professional recording session was for a new iteration of "The Lord's Prayer," set to an original melody co-wrote with his buddy Eric Todd. Blessed Peace, a famous gospel choir at Oakwood University, was captured at the Sound Cell Recording Studio in Huntsville, Alabama. Warren created the vocal set, played keyboards, and helped Todd with the overall production. Warren Warren's abilities were noted during the meeting. Warren became a regular session performer at Sound Cell, contributing to keyboards, playing keyboards, and performing on various radio and TV jingles, as well as pop, rock, country, and contemporary Christian recordings.

Many of Warren's sessions included Mark Kibble, also an excellent arranger, pianist, and vocalist (and future Take 6 member). Warren and Kibble, who were born five weeks apart, appeared in concerts together, both solos and duets, while taking turns at the piano. Warren and Kibble began at the piano, and halfway through the performance, Warren would leave the stage and take over at the piano, and Kibble would take the spotlight for a brief period of time.

Warren and Kibble joined a preexisting, male cappella vocal quartet at Oakwood University in 1980, and the resultant sextet was named Alliance. Alliance is best known for its highly layered vocal arrangements, mainly of well-known negro spirituals but also a few newer songs. The bulk of Alliance's stunning designs were made by Mark Kibble, but Warren later contributed a few more. Alliances were extremely popular and performed not just on Oakwood University's campus but also in a number of cities around the country. Alliance released Something Within for Legacy Records, a custom label started by Henry Mosley, then-professor at Oakwood University, in 1983. Mosley's manager was also in charge of the company. Michael Martin Murphey, a recording artist, sent Something Within to Jim Ed Norman at Warner Bros. Records in Nashville, Tennessee, later. Norman loved the album, but Murphey and he didn't know who the artists were. Norman finally figured out the group's identity in 1987 and signed with Reprise Records, a Warner Bros. Records affiliate. The vocal group Alliance was renamed Take 6, released the album Take 6, and went on to receive worldwide recognition after discovering that a rock music band had already been under the name "Alliance."

Warren descended on Oakwood University in 1981 and joined the highly regarded touring choir The Aeolians, led by Professor Alma Blackmon. Warren continued to be a member of The Aeolians throughout his four-year career, later becoming the ensemble's stage director, assistant conductor, and alternate accompanist. Warren Warren toured extensively around the United States, Bermuda, The Bahamas, The Virgin Islands, England, Scotland, and Wales with The Aeolians.

Warren created "I Ain't Got Long To Be Here" in 1985, a negro spiritual piece. Warren was allowed to show the piece to the Aeolians, and it became part of their regular repertoire. When they did it, Blackmon introduced Warren, who would then conduct the demonstration. The Aeolians' "I Ain't Got Long To Be Here" is said to be the first student composition to have been performed.

Blackmon was a pivotal figure in Warren's musical evolution. She studied music theory, piano playing, and choral conducting methods. Warren lived in his parents' house, just across the street from Blackmon and her daughter Brenda, now Brenda Wood. Wood is a NBC news anchor at WXIA-TV in Atlanta, Georgia, as of 2010.

Music career in Nashville

Warren wrote and performed songs and arrangements for other musicians during his recording sessions and tours with Take 6. Greg Nelson, a filmmaker, became a mentor to him. Warren continued to Nashville, where he spent time with Yolanda Adams, Larnelle Harris, Babbie Mason, Sandi Patty, Sandi Patty, Thomas Whitfield, and Bebe & Cece Winans after leaving Take 6 in 1991. He had two albums on Donna McElroy's album Bigger World in 1990. The whole production of "Come Sunday" was a result of Cedric Dent of Take 6. Warren and Dent received a Grammy Award nomination for their performance.

Film and music career in Los Angeles

Warren was hired in 1993 to compose music for the film Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit. Despite planning to return to Nashville, the employer's job required him to remain in Los Angeles. He has written and produced orchestral scores for film and television; written, produced, and arranged songs for film and television; and for Ron Fair, David Foster; and Quincy Jones; and has performed and recorded as a musician. For the It Gets Better group, he collaborated with Jeff Marx on "You Have More Friends Than You Know." The song appeared on television show Glee on April 18, 2013.

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