Gregory Porter Fern Britton Meets...

Soho in central London.

An unusual setting for the start of my series of interviews leading up

to Advent and Christmas.

It was here just six short years ago that a man little-known outside the

jazz world made his first appearance on the British stage.

# If you're blue and you don't know where to go to

# Why don't you go where fashion sits

# Putting on the ritz? #

Since then, Gregory Porter,

famous both for his signature black hat and for his golden voice,

has become a worldwide star...

# Take me to the alley... #

..a far cry from his humble beginnings in small-town America...

# ..Take me to the afflicted ones... #

..where he was raised by his mother, Ruth, a preacher.

First and foremost, I am a child of God.

Secondly, I am a child of Ruth,

and you better watch out for her.

# ..Lost their ways... #

That's what it feels like when Gregory's singing,

like my mother's up giving her sermons that she often did.

# There's some people down the way that's thirsty

# So let the liquid spirit free... #

Even though Gregory's mother was a woman of God,

that didn't stop the Porter family facing terrifying racism.

They were looking for somebody black to hurt that night,

and they found my brother. They shot him twice.

-Thank God, survived.

-Yeah. Yeah.

One of eight children,

Gregory Porter was brought up in a single-parent family

and he didn't sign his first record deal until he was almost 40.

Stardom was a long and sometimes difficult journey.

# Boy, you hear me calling your name... #

Gregory spent years struggling to support his family.

I kept waiting for somebody to come

and make me, and that wasn't happening.

We were so broke.

We didn't have much but whatever he had, he shared it with me.

# He ruled the land... #

His life story echoes some of the themes of Advent.

It's a tale rich in hope, love, joy and peace,

as he resolves his troubled relationship with his father.

I went to a therapist. "So, tell me about your father." "Agh!"

"Tell me about your father." "Agh!"

And I just couldn't contain my tears.

# ..To pull their lives from the brink... #

I want to find out what kept him going through those long years of

struggle, and whether he lost faith

not only in himself and his music, but in God as well.

There is one particular Soho jazz club...

-Here we are, in Dean Street.

-Yes, we are.

..that has a special place in Gregory's affections.

This is the showbiz star entrance, is it?

It was here on 4th July 2011 that a British audience

first fell in love with that incredible voice.

It's tiny.

-Yeah.

-It really is tiny.

You know, it's relative to where you are in your career.

There's some places that if there was 15 people there,

-it would be packed.

-Then you play this

and then play the Royal Albert Hall

with...I don't know how many thousands of people are in there.

Yeah. I bring the Royal Albert Hall here.

I want the Royal Albert Hall to be as intimate as this space.

On that first night, can you remember anything from the set list?

Yeah.

# I've been searching all the corners of my room

# Sweeping dust and memories beneath the carpet

# That we purchased somewhere on some cool retreat

# Somewhere in Africa

# Somewhere... #

I could almost feel your chest vibrating as you sang.

-Yeah.

-That's incredible.

-Let's go and talk about other things.

-Wonderful. Yeah.

SLOW JAZZ MUSIC PLAYS

Gregory Porter was born in Sacramento, California,

in November 1971.

When he was seven, his family moved to the small town of Bakersfield,

100 miles north of Los Angeles.

The Porters eventually settled in this house on Christmas Tree Lane.

Tell me about life growing up in Bakersfield.

Growing up in Bakersfield was...

many things.

It was a very small town, comfortable, familiar,

but at the same time there were racist elements that existed

but my mother, she was so beautiful.

She was like a fireman...fire woman for our family.

Any time there'd be some issue or somebody would put something on us,

she would be right there to just... put that fire out

and let us know that we were her children,

children of God, and worthy of respect,

and should always demand it.

So, your mum has eight children,

five boys, three girls

and a husband who was AWOL quite a lot.

That's a way to put it!

-Yes.

-Without leave.

Did you ever know where he was, what he was doing?

Erm, he was in Los Angeles and...

..and didn't raise me.

In the absence of his father,

it was Gregory's mother Ruth who was the keystone of the family.

Gregory might say that he was number one special, and you might hear

another one say, "I felt like I was the special one,"

but, definitely,

she gave you a personal heart connection to her love.

And Gregory's mother didn't just share that love amongst

her eight children.

She also became a spiritual rock for the whole community.

When you walked into her home, she made you feel like you were family.

And the greatest thing I could say about Ruth

is that she instilled that love for music,

she instilled that love of God in their heart,

and what a pillar she was

to this community of Bakersfield, California.

-Your mother was a preacher as well, wasn't she? A pastor.

-Yeah.

And so, most Sundays you would spend hours at church singing...

There's Sunday school,

regular service, and then somewhere there's a three o'clock service

and there's the evening service. So that's church all day long.

# Some black morning

# When this life is over... #

Being steeped in the rituals of the Church allowed Gregory to

tap into a rich musical heritage.

The African-American traditions of gospel music are one of

the biggest unsung influences on Western music.

Everybody knows, oh, the blues has an influence

and early rhythm and blues has an influence,

and jazz, but gospel is actually one of the most important ones,

which doesn't get spoken about so often.

I have hung out with a lot of musicians

that have come through church

and they're nearly always the best musicians in the room.

It's an incredible training ground for musicianship.

Music was a massive part of family life at home too.

We had a lovely high-fidelity stereo

and we'd listen to the records quite a bit -

country music, gospel music, of course.

We listened to everything.

It's probably why Gregory is such a good songwriter now.

We started young, you know?

# Roll out those lazy-hazy-crazy days of summer... #

One of Gregory's favourites was the legendary Nat King Cole.

# ..Lazy-hazy-crazy days of summer

# You'll wish that summer... #

Nat's music was in the house...

-From little?

-..so Nat was, like, my guy. From about five or six,

I was listening to Nat's music.

Me too. Lazy-Hazy-Crazy Days Of Summer was the album we played.

-Yeah.

-That's the one album...

That's like, "Wow, sausages and weenies?!"

That's a hell of a lyric.

It's a great song.

-Yeah. It's a fun song.

-So you were growing up with that,

not knowing that you were absorbing this?

I knew I was absorbing it,

I just didn't know where it would come in handy.

But Gregory's mother Ruth had more on her mind than just music.

Driven by a deep spiritual conviction,

she decided to set up her own church in a rundown area of town.

In my childhood, it was called "the road".

It's Lakeview Avenue in Bakersfield,

California, and there was a lot of alcoholism,

a lot of drugs, even prostitution on this street,

and this is where my mother set up shop. She was like,

"I want to go to the alley, I want to go where it's bad.

"I want to go where I can make some effect."

So we had a little storefront church on Lakeview Avenue.

What is a storefront church?

It's a church. It wasn't purpose built.

It wasn't built as a church.

I think our church maybe was a cafe at one point,

and we just cleared the building out

and put some chairs and built the pulpit and...you know?

And we made a church.

And she used to pull the PA system out onto the street

and I would sing to the drug addicted,

to prostitutes, street people.

That was my first audience.

A tough audience or an easy one?

It was a tough audience!

You know, they know the blues.

-So you have to come with something.

-Mm-hm.

You have to get their attention. They know good music.

Those days are more than just a musical boot camp.

They were a chance for Gregory to learn first hand from his mother

the power of faith in action.

I've read somewhere that you would even be in the car with her

and she'd see someone and stop the car and help people there and then.

Absolutely. My mother would see somebody who was in trouble,

probably had overdosed or done something,

and many times we'd stop the car. There was one time she stopped.

This woman had...was in a park,

she had taken off all her clothes and she was just screaming.

Myself, my sister and my brothers were in the car,

she stops the car. "Get out!"

And just... We were her team.

"Take the towel out of the back of the trunk, go put some water on it,"

and she stayed with this woman for hours,

and she was just rubbing her head.

Rubbing her head

and telling her it was going to be all right,

and she stays with this woman until the effect of the drugs calm down.

At the time, I was like,

"Why does my mother have to be this kind of woman?"

But now, I promise you,

she was teaching without saying a word,

and so when I sing a song like Take Me To The Alley...

When I sing a song like Take Me To The Alley...

# Take me to the alley... #

This action that happened in the park...

# ..Take me to the afflicted ones... #

..this covering of this woman, this wiping of her face...

# ..Take me to the lonely ones... #

..patting her head for hours.

# ..Have somehow lost their ways... #

..that experience is what wrote that lyric.

# ..Let them hear me say... #

I wrote the lyric but she did the action,

and put that inside of me.

# Oh, I am your friend... #

And so, the idea of taking something from my life

and an experience of selflessness

and giving and being thoughtful,

Christ-like, in a way,

if the record and if the song is successful,

then my mother is still alive

-and she is successful. Do you understand what I'm saying?

-I do.

# ..Let them hear me say

# Oh-oh, I am your friend

# Come to my table

# Rest here in my garden... #

Ruth's deep spirituality had a profound impact on Gregory

and the rest of the family.

# ..Sister, you will have a pardon... #

One of your brothers is still in Bakersfield.

-Yes.

-And he is a pastor,

with his church named after your mother, Ruth.

Yes. It's called the House of Ruth.

It's a small operation, and he's doing the same thing.

He's going and finding those people that are in trouble,

maybe addicted, maybe...you know, and I give him some support.

# Rest here in my garden... #

But he's doing his thing. He's doing what my mother used to do.

We've got to keep loving them, we've got to keep encouraging people,

we've got to keep lifting them up, building them up.

That's what this ministry is about.

We've got to love people, no matter what their condition is,

their nationality, race, whatever. We're going to love 'em.

People told me, coming in this area, there was too many prostitutes,

too many drugs, too many gang members.

We've been here two years and when you look around now,

the prostitutes are gone, the gang members are gone,

we've got the drugs off the corner.

There's still a few homeless people sleeping in front of the church,

but they know it's safe. They know they can lay in front of my church,

I'm not going to run 'em off.

These are the things that my mother instilled in us as a child,

that you don't put them down, you don't judge them.

You love them and you understand them.

# ..Take me to the alley... #

But in the Bakersfield of the early 1980s,

understanding was sometimes in short supply.

The town was divided along racial lines...

# ..Take me to the lonely ones... #

..and living in a predominantly white area

put the Porter family on the front line,

whilst confirming their faith in God.

You were victims of racist abuse.

I think people were throwing bottles of urine into the house

through the windows, you had a burning cross on the front lawn.

Those things are frightening.

Yeah, yeah.

How did she handle that?

One night one of those, you know,

bottles of urine came through the window,

and myself and my brother's bed was near the window,

and the glass came down on us.

And I remember, I'm still kind of... I remember it happening,

but I was still kind of sleepy.

And I remember the flashlight of the police, police were there,

they came in, and I remember just going to another place

and going to sleep, and somebody putting a blanket over me.

My mother was always, you know, she was like,

"Oh, the demons came and threw something through the window,"

-you know?

-Make it OK.

-She would make it OK.

She would make our baloney sandwich and send us off to school and...

You know, we had been called names so many times.

She was always getting in our face in a good way and, you know,

letting us know, "Son, you are beautiful.

"Your blackness is beautiful, your hair is beautiful."

And it's fortified with, "You're a child of God."

And that's like, you know, "You've got to back up off me,

"I'm a child of God," you know?

None of that really sticks, because I'm a child of God.

-Wow.

-And...

-That's a powerful inoculation.

It's a powerful, powerful thing.

Not only... OK, first and foremost, I'm a child of God.

Secondly, I'm a child of Ruth,

and you better watch out for her.

-I know that one of your brothers was shot on his way home.

-Mm-hm.

-Thank God, survived.

-Yeah.

Your mother must have found that SO painful.

Yeah. Yeah.

Um...

The court case, they found out it was these young guys,

young racists. They were in some group,

but it wasn't an official group,

but they were looking for somebody black to hurt that night,

and they found my brother. They shot him twice,

and he ran to a house.

Blood all over him. The people just let him in,

they got a towel, you know, just did what my mother would do.

When I think of Sister Ruth, I think of her love, her compassion.

She instilled, first, Christ,

then she instilled that love, and she was an awesome mother.

And you know what?

That's the start that I think all children need to become great.

On graduating from high school in 1989,

Gregory moved away from Bakersfield.

A talented American footballer,

he won an athletics scholarship to study at San Diego State University.

But just a few months later, disaster struck.

-I injured my shoulder.

-Which one?

-My right shoulder.

I can still feel it. Click, click, click, click, click.

And I wasn't able to play and, for me, it was an interesting time.

It was difficult. I was very sad about it.

I called my mother. And she said, "OK, can you move your shoulder?"

And I was like, "Not really, not right now,

"but they say I'll be able to move it at some point.

"Maybe I need surgery." This is, you know, devastating.

She's like... I'm crying.

And she was like, "OK, son, this scholarship, what happens to that?"

"Yeah, I keep my scholarship. That carries on."

"OK.

"Son, everything is OK.

"The scholarship is still in place.

"Your shoulder will heal.

"You won't be able to play football, but you're going to be all right,"

and hangs up the phone.

And I was like, "Huh?"

I need more than... She's like...wonderful.

And then so I start this transition

of the change of your self-identity.

I went to my first love, which was music.

I started to engage myself in music.

Gregory started sneaking into music lectures,

leading to a chance meeting with the man who was to give him fresh hope

and a new direction.

First time I met Gregory,

I was substituting at the University of California, San Diego,

and I just took this class

and someone was singing horn parts

more brilliantly than the horns were playing them.

HE SKATS

You know, I was just another trombone or trumpet.

He heard the tone of my voice and he was like, "Oh, wait a minute."

I was convinced that I was in the presence of a star.

Aside from being a capable musician,

he seemed to have the charisma and intellect to make everything happen,

and that's what moved me, more than just his singing.

-The whole package.

-And he arranged for me to sing that at jam sessions

and that's how I jumped into my first times performing.

Whilst Gregory was still at college,

his father Rufus became seriously ill.

Now seemed the perfect moment to try to make peace.

He had become ill

and he was in his hospital bed, and it looked bad.

It looked like he wouldn't live much longer and so I just...you know,

you want to have those life conversations,

and so I wanted to give him an easy question that he could answer

and it would dissolve all of that pain,

and I would forgive him for all of the back stuff.

I just wanted... I wanted to say to him, "One plus one is what?"

I wanted him to say two.

So I came to him and I said... I sang for him.

-I sang Amazing Grace for him.

-Around the bed?

-Yeah.

And I sang it to him.

# Amazing grace... #

He said, "That's really good.

# ..How sweet the sound... #

I told him, "I think I want to be a singer."

# ..That saved a wretch like me... #

He said, "Well, I don't know.

"There's a lot of good singers out there.

"I don't know. I don't know.

"I don't know if you'd want to do that."

It's like, you know, when you throw a child a soft ball really slow,

"Surely you're going to hit that?

"Oh, you missed it."

And that's what happened.

And he passed,

you know, shortly after that,

but I learned so many things about him.

At his funeral, people got up and said he was a great singer,

a great carpenter, you know, he wrote poems and,

you know, basically he was the life of the party.

Why was he absent and not the life of the family?

I don't know. I don't know exactly.

# ..My fears relieved... #

His father's absence throughout his childhood

troubled Gregory for many years.

I was 30 and I had a pain in my chest that I thought was something

physically wrong, a valve had gone wrong, I had a pain in my chest,

went to the doctor. "Nothing, it's all clear, everything's fine here."

Somebody suggested I go to a therapist.

I went to a therapist.

"How's your relationship with your girlfriend?" "Wonderful."

"Your relationship with your mother?"

"Love her, love my mother, she's just the sweetest."

"So, tell me about your father?" "Agh!"

"Tell me about your father." "Agh!"

And I just couldn't contain my tears.

I thought the therapist was going to say,

"OK, we're going to make a programme,

"so we'll talk about these things, work through..."

The therapist said, "You need to work that out."

And I did work it out, in music.

Gregory's career was to take an unexpected turn in 1998,

following a studio recording session at which the renowned jazz singer

Eloise Laws had happened to hear him sing.

I thought, my God, I'd never heard anything

so raw, so pure, unadulterated,

and this person had no material things

but his talent.

He walked in that room with nothing but talent.

And so I told him to audition for the show,

It Ain't Nothin' But The Blues.

They brought him in for the audition,

and he'd never done theatre.

He blew their minds.

And next thing I knew, a few days later,

when I showed up for the rehearsal,

Gregory Porter had the role.

-# One and one is two

-Yeah

-# Two and two is four

-All right

# I'm all packed up, girl You know I've gotta go

# Come on, baby Don't you wanna go? #

Following a successful national tour,

the decision was made to transfer the production to Broadway.

They were like, "OK, this show's good enough for Broadway,

"Let me see who's good enough to stay in the cast."

# ..Baby, don't you wanna go? #

And the cast was strong, so the whole cast stayed, you know,

and I was one of them, and that was the start of me, you know,

being in front of a couple of thousand people at a time.

And your name, Gregory Porter, starts...

My name, Gregory Porter, and just connecting with people with music,

night after night, you know?

So, who then found you and said, "Yeah, recording artist"?

I kept waiting for, like,

a Quincy Jones type to... or, you know...

-Discover you?

-I kept waiting for somebody to come and make me.

-Ah!

-And that wasn't happening.

It would have been easy for Gregory's faith to waver.

But if there was one thing a child of Ruth wasn't going to do,

it was give up.

You know, I knew there was something special about Gregory.

My mother would say that. She was like, you know,

"One day, you're going to get the golden slipper,"

and I didn't understand that, as a kid, but she was like,

"There's something special about him."

Her faith was huge that, if you believe it, you can receive it,

that you can't be afraid of what's around the corner,

but I know that you have to keep your faith in the Lord,

and that he's going to open up the doors for you to have it.

Such was Ruth's belief in Gregory that even in her final hours,

she was still giving him the strength to pursue his dreams.

I knew she knew she was dying.

I knew she was dying. We didn't talk about it.

She stopped that conversation.

She was like, "Gregory, turn the oxygen up."

The oxygen was already on maximum.

So I act like I turned it up, I just twisted my hand and I said,

"Is it better now?" She said, "Yeah, oh, yeah, it's much better."

I didn't give her any more air, it was already on maximum.

She's like, "Wait a minute, don't forget about this.

"The risky thing that can cause you great poverty,

"don't forget about music.

"Don't forget about music.

"Don't forget about your music, son."

And it's...

She said, "It's the best thing you do."

-That was one plus one makes two.

-Yes!

-Bang on it.

-Wasn't it?

-Bang on it, bang on it.

# What'll I do when you...? #

Having successfully performed other artists' music,

Gregory decided to write a musical of his own,

drawing on the work of his childhood idol, Nat King Cole,

for inspiration.

I used to listen to Nat's music, and when he would sing a song

of love lost and love longing,

I adapted it to the understanding of love lost that I understood,

which was the loss of love, you know, from my father.

A song like What'll I Do?...

# What'll I do when you are far away

# And I am blue, what'll I do?

# What'll I do with just a photograph

# To tell all my troubles to? #

You know? That's the way I would think of the song.

# Smile though your heart is breaking... #

Nat "King" Cole & Me, a musical healing,

was a mix of original songs penned by Gregory, and covers.

He sang the music of Nat Cole so beautifully.

We were so, so...just enthralled.

-# ..If you smile through your fears and sorrows...

-#

The 2004 musical was Gregory's attempt

to finally resolve his troubled relationship with his father.

It makes sense, because this was one of his big influences in his life.

He goes back to his roots and he writes about that,

and that's what people love.

They like the real deal, and he is the real deal.

These were songs that were connected to me emotionally, and I could sing

them with great emotion once I stepped to the microphone,

and I've realised from theatre that I do best

when I'm connected to the subject matter emotionally.

Did you get your father's character on stage

being able to give you the one plus one equals two?

Absolutely.

And so I wrote an apology

from my father. I wrote an "I love you" from my father.

I said it straight, but I did it after he was dead.

-Yeah.

-Opening night, 800 people in the audience.

It was real.

It was real!

That was my father saying, "I'm sorry."

Pschaw! Just the weight,

it was just this cleansing, cathartic thing.

# Mona Lisa

# Mona Lisa men have named you

# You're so like the lady with the mystic smile... #

When he sings, you're hearing his experience, his life.

# ..Is it only cos you're lonely? #

And his love of humanity.

That feel, mixed with the technique,

is a thing that really connects with people.

So, instead of coming from here, it's coming from here

and it's going to the people's hearts and connecting with them,

because they hear in his voice a sincerity and a love

that you can kind of, you know...

and amazing pipes that deliver this that, you know,

you just don't see any more.

# ..Or just a cold and lonely

# Lovely work of art? #

It's easy to kind of stop at the voice because his voice is majestic,

but when you consider his work as a composer and as a lyricist,

then maybe that's where he gets even more impressive.

So, when you're writing, I mean, is it in your head? In your ears?

In...? I don't know. Where does it come from?

Can you hear the melody? Do the words come first?

-What happens?

-For me, the words and melody come together.

Yes, I have the idea, like, something will happen.

Our Love was written in London

when I was walking around the Tower of London.

This magnificent fortress, and love being protected by these gates,

and these ramparts, this fortress.

# Vultures are flying round

# The ramparts of the towers of our love... #

As I'm walking around...

# ..Forces of hate have stormed the gates... #

The initial inspiration came from me and my lady walking down the street

and somebody saying, "Well, that's a weird couple."

Why?

I'm tall, she's shorter.

I'm black, she's white.

Russian. They said it, and kept on walking.

But that stirred something in me.

# ..Forces of hate have stormed the gates

# Around the castle of our love

# Forces of hate have stormed the gates

# Around the castles of our love

# Don't it sound sweet?

# Our love... #

You met her when you were out gigging around Europe

and the world and...Russia, did you meet?

Yeah. Russia was the first place where I got any energy.

So, one of my first gigs in Moscow, we met,

and she spoke ten words

and...

Of English.

And that's all she knew.

I was just invited for some random gig in a jazz club in Moscow.

I didn't know what I'm going to see, who I'm going to meet.

I was amazed,

just probably like every person who ever heard him singing on the stage.

Shocked, amazed and intrigued.

So, this picture of our first date that we went to the restaurant

after Gregory's performance.

He was like an alien for me.

Looked different, sounded different,

talked different, acted different.

Everything different, like he just arrived from Mars.

I didn't speak English.

So I just knew maybe ten words that I would try to say.

So I couldn't even say anything, so I was just looking and smiling.

Kind of kept in touch, lightly, for years,

like four years.

Literally, it was really just a friendship.

She was coming to New York to sightsee, so I was her tour guide.

I looked at her and I was like, "Hmm."

And she looked at me and was like, "Hmm."

-So then we started a long-distance...

-Romance?

-Yeah.

Yeah. A romance.

In 2010, Victoria left Russia

and made the 5,000-mile journey to be with Gregory,

who was now living in New York.

When I moved to New York, I gave up my work and my life in Moscow.

It was not easy to settle down.

We were still a little bit of strangers to each other,

so it was a big risk to come.

You know, this is what was new for both of us.

My parents were worrying too, where am I going?

Who am I staying with?

Is it a good person?

Do you trust him?

My father kept asking me, "What's happening?

"What's happening? Are you staying or are you coming back?

"Are you there or are you here?"

The couple were living in a small rented apartment in Brooklyn.

Gregory spent his nights honing his vocal skills in small jazz clubs

across the city.

The gospel understanding that I had, you know,

singing in church with my mother,

the kind of country gospel blues that I'd learned in Bakersfield,

very Southern style,

that needed to go through the synthesis

of doing gigs and jam sessions in Brooklyn and Harlem, New York.

-It had to go through that...

-Yes.

-..in order to figure out who I was...

-Yes.

-..musically.

He sang for six hours for a couple of hundred dollars.

And, yeah, we were trying to survive on this.

We were so broke.

We couldn't afford to go to the restaurant,

we couldn't afford nothing.

We didn't have much, but whatever he had, he shared it with me.

He was buying me clothes, food, whatever.

He was taking care of me from the beginning. From day one.

# Mama, don't you worry 'bout your daughter

# Cos you're leaving her in real good hands

# I'm a real good man

# And the picture of this man is slowing coming into view... #

-Beautiful song, Real Good Hands.

-Yeah.

About a boy asking his future parents-in-law

-to marry their daughter.

-Yeah.

-Is that what that was written about?

Absolutely, yeah. People think of the song as...

You know, it kind of has a Southern feel and, you know,

they think I went and knocked on this man's door...

and the mother and father are just there.

It didn't happen that way. He beat me to it.

I was going to do it, I was going to go and talk to him,

but he beat me to it. He called me,

and he was speaking Russian,

so it was through a translation, and he was very tough on me.

He was like, basically, what every father...

"What are your intentions with my daughter?"

I was translating through this Skype conversation.

They were like talking to each other through me and,

"Yeah, yeah, we're going to marry," and I was like,

"I guess it's a proposal,

"happening right now, through me as interpreter!"

My dad was like, "Oh, OK, all right.

"OK, good. I'm happy to hear that, yes."

It stewed in me, and then I sat down and wrote Real Good Hands.

# Papa, don't you fret and don't forget

# That one day you was in my shoes

# Papa, don't you fret and don't forget

# One day, like me, you was shaking in your shoes

# Look at you Somehow you paid your dues

# You're the picture of the man

# That I some day hope to be

# Won't you listen, listen to me? #

In my mind, I was assuring her parents with this song.

-That she would be safe.

-Yeah, real good hands,

I'm a real good man, kind of thing.

Whether I am or not, I don't know, but that's...

That's what the song says.

And the song must have done the trick, because it wasn't long before

Gregory and Victoria tied the knot.

This is our wedding pictures.

THEY LAUGH

We had everything. Clearly, we had balloons, bubbles...

Bubbles. We happened to have everything we were supposed to have.

-Yeah.

-We are cute.

# ..Water pouring down the sidewalks

# Cleaning windows clear to see... #

Things had started coming together in Gregory's professional life too,

with the release in 2010 of his debut album Water.

It was received with great critical acclaim and a Grammy nomination.

-This was your first big opening of the curtains...

-Yeah.

-..in life.

Yeah.

And the night of the Grammys, were you there? Were you waiting?

Yeah, I didn't think I would win,

but I thought, hey, well, maybe I could.

I was there with my brother, we had suits made for us.

And we were like, you know, "We're going to the Grammys!"

It was very special.

Yeah, so I didn't win, but it didn't matter.

I mean, it was...

Well, the next night, I hear your brother was driving you

back off somewhere to some open-mic night.

-Yeah. That's what we did.

-That's great!

-In his mind...

My brother's such a funny guy.

My brother's like, "OK, we didn't get it, let's go back to work,"

you know, back to where I started.

I was asking to get up on stage just to sing.

Gregory might not have ended up with a Grammy,

but he was about to pick up something even more precious

with the birth in October 2012 of his son Demyan.

Gregory was the first one who was holding the baby.

He was there with me,

and I had a C-section because they didn't let me have

this giant baby - 9lb 5oz!

Gregory was next to me, he was covered,

everything, only his eyes were open.

So when the doctor gave him a baby,

I saw the tear coming out of his eye

and it was the sweetest moment to remember,

because he was holding his son for the first time,

and all I could see was just his eyes and he was crying,

so it was the sweetest moment.

# Un-re-route the river

# Let the dammed water be

# There's some people down the way that's thirsty

# So let the liquid spirit free. #

Life was about to get even sweeter, as Gregory's third album,

2013's Liquid Spirit, finally secured him that coveted Grammy.

# ..Dry land, clap your hands Come on, clap your hands... #

The names of your albums - Water, Liquid Spirit -

they're connected very much to your mother, aren't they?

Yeah, she... She often had...

sermons about water, the cleansing effect, the renewal.

She believed that everybody could be renewed.

And that is connected to here faith and so, my song Water,

is a poetic musical manifestation

of her sermons. Just her idea.

Liquid Spirit is the same thing.

Again, using the water metaphor, the love metaphor.

I like the idea that my mother's sermons,

the ideas of faith are finding their way, still there.

The message is still there,

and it's still getting into the ear of people,

but, you know,

I'm not a person who enjoys beating anybody over the head

with peace and love and the idea of mutual respect.

I like for it to come to them in the right way.

# ..Getting ready for the wave... #

Gregory's fame and popularity

hit even greater heights with the release of his fourth album,

Take Me To The Alley...

# ..After it comes, it might come with a steady flow... #

..which earlier this year won him a second Grammy.

# ..Take a cup when your spirit's low... #

He can sing something really simple and make it connected

with the listener and connected with your heart,

and that's really the hardest thing to do.

# ..Get down, take a drink... #

It's a once-in-a-generation voice.

He worked hard at it with many years of small clubs,

small audiences, no audiences.

He's lived and he's using his life experience

to actually say something.

Now, of course, success brings its own issues.

You're working hard, you're away from home,

you're on the road constantly.

-How much of the year are you away, do you think?

-I'm...

-The better part of 300 days...

-Wow.

-..a year. But they travel.

Sometimes they travel.

My son has been to 15 countries, they travel a lot.

-How old is he?

-He's four, he's about to be five.

Is he? So he still able to travel, cos school isn't quite so...

Yeah, it's not so serious yet.

But even, you know, if this thing lasts, if I'm still travelling...

I think it might. I'm not sure, but I think it will!

We'll travel together, maybe he'll do, you know,

some schooling on the road, or in Europe, I don't know.

I don't know.

Maybe it'll be incorporated into our lives, this more...

this travel thing, I don't know.

Is he looking like he's a musician?

He is very into the drums, he loves singing,

he loves... His three favourite singers are me,

Michael Jackson and Bruno Mars,

and not necessarily in that order.

-So sometimes it's me.

-Mm-hm.

Did you score two times?

-Mm-hm.

-Yeah?

Were they long shots?

100 times.

GREGORY LAUGHS

I saw just two, but maybe he did something more I didn't see.

Demyan, he's musical and athletic and funny, just like his dad.

They can run around the house

after each other, and it's just lovely to watch them playing.

Did you catch the rebound,

or did somebody pass it to you first and then you started dribbling?

And you shot?

Cool, man.

You must think to yourself, the amount of time you're away,

-you're the absent father this time.

-Yeah.

-Horrible.

Yeah, I think about it.

But...

So, I make it my business to Skype

and have conversations

and to call when it's homework time. He has his little homework,

which is really colouring pumpkins and tracing L's and B's and P's,

and you know, I put the phone up close so I can be there

and so we do that a lot.

Awesome.

Hey, don't go far.

He has a routine of going round the pool...

Yo!

Sometimes, when Gregory is not around,

I'm filming on the phone

or he's sometimes calling on the Skype to see him playing.

He's trying to be there, even if he can't be physically there,

so he's still there through the internet, you know, somehow,

so he's try to encourage him

and say, "Yeah, I saw you, I'm proud of you, keep going."

He's been constantly working.

He's never stopping, that's the hardest part of it.

But he's working for us.

And I'm sending him messages in the music.

Take Me To The Alley, I wrote a song for him, Don't Lose Your Steam,

which is essentially the retelling of...

As I think about it now, it's the retelling of pick yourself up,

dust yourself off and start all over again.

# Boy, you hear me calling your name

# The bridge is your time Your engine rolls hot

# If bridges fall down

# Don't lose your head of steam

# Young man... #

I'm saying to my son,

if the bottom falls out and the walls fall down,

don't lose your head of dreams and don't lose your head of steam.

# ..Get me to the other side... #

So I'm speaking to him and...

And that's your mother speaking to you.

It's my mother speaking to me and...

right, legacy, giving him something that was given to me.

-Yeah, yeah.

-Yeah, I'm present and trying to be there.

# L is for the way you look at me

# O is for the only one I see

# V is very, very extraordinary

# E is even more than anyone that you adore... #

The latest album, again, Nat King Cole.

It is all covers?

Officially, yes, it is all covers.

I've actually covered one of my own songs.

When Love Was King,

it's a song that's in a way so important to me

and so much of who I am

and what I believe

that I wanted to do it again.

# When love was king

# Do you remember

# When love was king? #

I wanted people to rehear that message of equality...

# He rules the land... #

..and mutual respect.

# ..With his fist unfurled... #

..and to be thoughtful and loving.

# ..And open arms for the world... #

He ruled the land with his fist unfurled,

with open arms for the world. I want politicians to hear that.

# ..He had respect

# For every man

# Regardless of his skin or clan

# Beside him stood his mighty queen... #

Beside him stood his mighty queen, an equal force, wise and keen.

These are things I think.

I think that. I feel that.

And when you were making this record,

did you feel the resonance of your childhood and the music you heard

in your house and your mother speaking to you?

Was there some spiritual experience as you recorded it?

Absolutely. I was... My sister was there, I flew her in,

because I knew it was going to be that.

-Yeah.

-And I knew it was going to feel my mother,

I knew I was going to feel the house that we grew up in.

I knew I was going to feel that energy,

and I wanted her to be there as well.

So when I sing the music of Nat King Cole,

the energy of my father is there, you know,

I came to Nat's music in the absence of my father.

My mother is there - that was one of her favourite singers.

There is an underlying theme that tells, again, my life story

and there's some foundational information

that's in the songs as well.

# ..To those who toil without a gain... #

And right at the very heart of both Gregory's personal

and professional life is his connection to God.

# ..So seek some place to call your own... #

He has always kept his spirituality

close to his music,

and I don't think he really separates them.

He just kept that spirit of kind of service

and the power of the African-American gospel

inside of his music.

# ..When love was king... #

His belief in God, it's a part of him.

Not questionable, it's not something that you wonder about.

It's just there.

# ..Though my past has left me bruised

# I ain't hiding from the truth... #

If my mother could see Gregory now, she would say, "I told you so.

"You will sing for kings and queens," she told him.

I know that my mother would be smiling and also influencing him,

guiding his footsteps, still getting her messages across.

That's what it feels like when Gregory is singing,

like my mother is up, giving her sermons that she often did.

# ..Holding on

# Love is holding on

# Holding on

# Hold... #

So, now it's nearly Christmas and you...

-Will you be going home for Christmas?

-Yes.

-Who comes?

What happens on Christmas Day?

Well, if it happens like it's happened the last couple of years,

the first year was maybe 35, 40 people

came to the house and we all had dinner.

And last year, I expected 20-something,

and it ended up being 100, about 115, 120 people.

-No!

-Yeah.

-Is your wife in the kitchen, thinking,

"I can't do any more roast potatoes"?

It was amazing. People were coming and coming and coming and coming

and coming and coming and coming.

We wanted to have something little for everyone, gifts,

you know, even just a piece of chocolate, or something,

so people kept coming, and I kept wrapping.

But it was great. You know, it was 20 people in the kitchen, there's,

you know, 30 people in the living room.

There's... You know, all of the little kids,

and nieces and nephews are in the basement.

I don't know if it will be 120 people this year, but we will see.

Let's hope not, for your wife's sake.

Yeah. But I cooked, I cooked for everybody.

I made, you know, lamb, steak, turkeys, chickens. It was great.

It was amazing, because Gregory was cooking dinner,

that's what he wanted to do.

And when he was done, we finally had a chance to eat.

Everything was gone after 20 minutes.

Everything.

Of course, church on Christmas Day, do you do that?

Yeah. We do.

In a way, also, we do...

You know, there's the thing that happens at the house as well that,

you know, we all gather and join hands,

and it can break out into something, you know?

We're just thankful.

When the family's together, we are thankful

for our mother, and really connecting us and making us and...

There we go, and making us.

Making us a family.

And...

Yeah, it's really just a thankful time

and an opportunity to share love.

That's what Christmas is.

It's not about that fat guy in the red suit.

-He's cool. That's a cool story.

-He's cool.

-It's cute.

-Yeah.

But it's about love, and the reason for the season, which is Jesus,

-so it's great.

-Well, thank you for sharing the love with us.

-Pleasure.

-Gregory Porter, so nice to meet you.

# Rest here in my garden

# Rest here in my garden... #

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Well, that's it. Gregory Porter has left the building and...

this room feels kind of bigger without him in it, you know?

A big man with a huge personality.

I wanted to find out at the beginning of this programme

where his faith lay after struggling for so many years

to find his success,

and his faith has been rock solid all the way, hasn't it?

All the way. Obviously, his mother instilled it into him

and all his brothers and sisters,

and through Gregory's music and his lyrics,

he's now delivering his sermon, if you like, to us,

the audience.

Maybe standing on stage is his storefront church for us.

Next week, Advent begins, and I'll be talking to Paralympian

and reigning long jump world champion Stef Reid

about how her faith helped her to over come a devastating accident

to become one of British athletics' brightest stars,

and a fashion model.

I remember being in that ambulance

and just really praying for the first time,

"God, please save my life.

"I have no hope at all right now except beyond what you can give."

# Through many dangers, toils and snares

# I have already come... #