Gospel Music Star Kirk Franklin Goes Secular To Reach The World

Kirk Franklin, probably one of gospel music’s biggest stars, is launching a new record label with Sony Corporation’s RCA Records called “Fo Yo Soul” and he hopes that his popularity will increase sales of CD’s.

Although most types of music come and go, gospel music sales have held steady over the years and now Franklin is hoping to capture the younger and more secular market.

Following his successful arena tour last year, Franklin wants to try and boost his mainstream visibility and by launching this new record label, he is hoping to do just that. He will also be chairman and chief executive of the new “Fo Yo Soul” record label.

Franklin also made a deal this year with Sirius XM Radio Inc. to take over their gospel channel and he was also enlisted to revamp the House of Blues nightclub chain and its signature gospel brunch by Live Nation Entertainment Inc.

“It’s kind of hard if you have people running a label that don’t go to church,” said Mr. Franklin. “You don’t know what the choirs are singing.”

Mr. Franklin, 43 years old, will be chairman and chief executive of the new Fo Yo Soul Recordings, which will have an emphasis on younger and more secular acts than RCA’s existing gospel imprint. It is one of a series of interlocking endeavors designed to boost Mr. Franklin’s mainstream visibility, following a successful arena tour last year.

According to Nielsen SoundScan (the official method of tracking sales of music and music video products throughout the U.S. and Canada), almost 5.4 million gospel albums were sold in the U.S. last year with about 75 percent of those sales being on CD.

Gospel Album sales showed a slight increase from 2008 whereas album sales from all genres dropped from 486 million in 2008 to 316 million last year, according to SoundScan figures.

Although gospel fans tend to be slightly older than the average music buyer, they have recently become surprisingly attractive to the music industry because they tend to support participatory live shows and physical products.

Both the classical music and jazz music industry are bigger than the gospel music industry but Franklin believes that gospel music can do even better if he widens its scope to include secular pop culture.

In order to attract new talent, fans and corporate sponsorship, Franklin intends to use his live music venues to promote the new gospel music along with satellite radio channels and his new record label.