Donnie McClurkin to perform at Namboole

Awards
Donnie is a celebrated American gospel artiste who has over the years won numerous prestigious musical awards, including the 2010 Grammy Award for Best Gospel Performance. He has won three Grammy awards, 10 Stellar awards and two BET awards. He also won two Soul Train awards, one Dove award and one NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of coloured people) Image award for his work.

Music
The artiste is mainly famous in Uganda for his Stand, Days of Elijah and We fall down singles. Other songs include Great is your mercy, Walking in authority, I call you faithful, Church medley, We love you lord and many others off his 12 albums.
McClurkin was born in Copiague, New York and raised in Chester, South Carolina.

Background
The artiste has inspired numerous people through his music because his story is a typical Beauty for Ashes tale. When he was eight years old, his two-year-old brother was hit and killed by a speeding driver and the night of the funeral, McClurkin’s uncle raped him. Domestic violence and drug abuse took hold in the family.

At the age of 13, McClurkin was raped again, this time by his cousin, his uncle’s son. McClurkin found comfort through an aunt who sang background vocals with gospel music musician Andraé Crouch.

After staying close to Christ throughout his boyhood, he began to play piano and sing with his church youth choir. He formed the McClurkin Singers by the time he was a teenager, and later formed another group, the New York Restoration Choir. McClurkin led the group in performances where gospel music could have a direct impact. The group appeared in prisons and sang on the street.

In 2004, he sang at the Republican National Convention. The appearance generated criticism for the event organisers and McClurkin for his statements on homosexuality. He claims to have struggled with homosexuality during his youth for several years, but states that he is now “delivered” from the condition.

McClurkin wrote that homosexuality is a spiritual issue and that one can be delivered from it but by God; He also speaks openly about sexual issues since becoming the biological father of a child with a woman to whom he was not married. Donnie makes reference to his childhood abuse and speaks of how such adversity has shaped him as a Christian.

His ministry started when he was hired as an associate minister at Marvin Winans’ Perfecting Faith Church in 1989. McClurkin served as an assistant to the Winans for over a decade.

He was ordained and sent out by Winans in 2001 to establish Perfecting Faith Church in Freeport, Long Island, where he is now a senior pastor. He has also been featured in movies like The Gospel, The fighting temptations and television shows Girlfriends and The Parkers.

People celebrating their 50th birthday or 50th wedding anniversary will also be celebrated at the concert. Uganda’s own like Wilson Bugembe, Judith Babirye, Julie Muteesasira and many others will also be there.

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