THE BLIND BOYS OF ALABAMA AT SIU

CARBONDALE -- The Blind Boys of Alabama featuring Clarence Fountain bring their electrifying gospel music to Shryock Auditorium at 8 p.m. Saturday.

Fountain and company's "Deep River" earned a Grammy nomination for Best Gospel Album last year.

The Blind Boys of Alabama have been performing for more than 50 years, and are recipients of the NEA's Heritage Fellowship for Lifetime Achievement.

The group got its start in 1937 at the Alabama Institute for the Deaf and Blind in Talledega. The original singers, which included a pre-teen Clarence Fountain, were members of the institute's glee club and all but one were blind.

Originally they sang for the troops stationed nearby as the Happy Land Jubilee Singers, later the Happy Land Gospel Singers when they made their record debut in 1948. By 1950 they were The Five Blind Boys of Alabama, and soon competing with a group called the Five Blind Boys of Mississippi.

Blending blues and gospel, they have performed at the Montreaux Jazz Festival and at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.

Their new life album, "I Brought Him With Me," has just been released by the new record company formed by The House of Blues, the chain of nightclubs owned in part by Dan Akroyd.

Tickets are $12.50. Phone (618) 453-ARTS for information.