"Hallelujah!" is a 1992 song from Handel's Messiah: A Soulful Celebration

Handel's Messiah: A Soulful Celebration

Handel's Messiah: A Soulful Celebration is a critically acclaimed gospel album by various artists, released in 1992 on Warner Alliance. Executive produced by Norman Miller, Gail Hamilton and Mervyn Warren, it is a reinterpretation of the 1741 oratorio Messiah by George Frideric Handel, and has been...

, a Grammy award

Grammy Award

A Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...

 winning Reprise Records concept album. The song is a soulful re-interpretation of the "Hallelujah" chorus from Messiah

Messiah (Handel)

Messiah is an English-language oratorio composed in 1741 by George Frideric Handel, with a scriptural text compiled by Charles Jennens from the King James Bible and the Book of Common Prayer. It was first performed in Dublin on 13 April 1742, and received its London premiere nearly a year later...

, George Frideric Handel

George Frideric Handel

George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...

's well-known oratorio

Oratorio

An oratorio is a large musical composition including an orchestra, a choir, and soloists. Like an opera, an oratorio includes the use of a choir, soloists, an ensemble, various distinguishable characters, and arias...

 from 1741. It is performed by a choir of all-star gospel

Gospel music

Gospel music is music that is written to express either personal, spiritual or a communal belief regarding Christian life, as well as to give a Christian alternative to mainstream secular music....

, contemporary Christian

Contemporary Christian music

Contemporary Christian music is a genre of modern popular music which is lyrically focused on matters concerned with the Christian faith...

, R&B and jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 singers, along with several actors. The song was arranged and produced by Take 6

Take 6

Take 6 is an American a cappella gospel music sextet formed in 1980 on the campus of Oakwood College in Huntsville, Alabama. The group sings in a contemporary style, integrating R&B and jazz influences into their devotional songs and has 10 Grammy wins, 10 Dove Awards, one Soul Train Award and two...

 alumnus Mervyn Warren

Mervyn Warren

Mervyn Edwin Warren is an American film composer, record producer, music conductor, music arranger, lyricist, songwriter, pianist, and vocalist. Warren is a five-time Grammy Award winner and a 10-time Grammy Award nominee...

, and conducted by Quincy Jones

Quincy Jones

Quincy Delightt Jones, Jr. is an American record producer and musician. A conductor, musical arranger, film composer, television producer, and trumpeter. His career spans five decades in the entertainment industry and a record 79 Grammy Award nominations, 27 Grammys, including a Grammy Legend...

. Handel's Messiah: A Soulful Celebration won the Grammy Award

Grammy Award

A Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...

 for Best Contemporary Soul Gospel Album

Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Soul Gospel Album

The Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Soul Gospel Album has been awarded since 1991. An similar award, the Grammy Award for Best Soul Gospel Performance, Contemporary, was awarded from 1978 to 1983...

 in 1992, as well as a Dove Award for Contemporary Gospel Album of the Year.

The vocalists performing on "Hallelujah!" are Vanessa Bell Armstrong

Vanessa Bell Armstrong

Vanessa Bell Armstrong is a gospel singer who released her debut album Peace Be Still in 1983.-Musical career :...

, Patti Austin

Patti Austin

-Life and career:Austin was born in Harlem, New York. She made her debut at the Apollo Theater at age four and had a contract with RCA Records when she was only five. Quincy Jones and Dinah Washington have proclaimed themselves as her godparents....

, Bernie K., Daryl Coley

Daryl Coley

-Early life:Daryl Coley was born in Berkeley, California in 1955, spending his formative years in Oakland, California. His parents separated when he was five years old, with he and his two siblings being raised by his mother in a solid Christian home. Musically, Coley was first influenced by his...

, Commissioned

Commissioned (gospel group)

Commissioned is an American Gospel group. The group recorded twelve albums over a period of seventeen years.-Group composition:Originally from Detroit, Michigan, the six original members were Fred Hammond, Mitchell Jones, Keith Staten, Karl Reid, Michael Brooks, and Michael Williams formed a...

, Andrae Crouch

Andrae Crouch

Andraé Crouch is a seven-time Grammy Award-winning American gospel singer, songwriter, arranger, recording artist, record producer, and pastor.-Early years:Born Andraé Edward Crouch in San Francisco, California....

, Sandra Crouch

Sandra Crouch

Sandra Crouch is an American Gospel music performer, drummer and songwriter.-Musical career:She won a Grammy Award in 1985 for "Best Soul Gospel Performance, Female"....

, Clifton Davis

Clifton Davis

Clifton Duncan Davis is an American actor, songwriter and minister. He has appeared on the television shows as A World Apart, That's My Mama and Amen...

, Charles S. Dutton

Charles S. Dutton

Charles Stanley Dutton is an American stage, film, and television actor and director. He is perhaps best known for his roles as "Fortune" in the film Rudy and "Dillon" in Alien 3...

, Kim Fields

Kim Fields

Kim Victoria Fields is an American actress and television director. She is known for her roles as Tootie Ramsey on the NBC sitcom The Facts of Life, and as Regine Hunter on the Fox sitcom Living Single...

, Larnelle Harris

Larnelle Harris

Larnelle Steward Harris is a gospel singer and songwriter. During his 30-plus years of ministry, Harris has recorded 18 albums, won five Grammy Awards and 18 Dove Awards, and has had several number one songs on the inspirational music charts.-Early life:A native of Danville, Kentucky, Harris...

, Edwin Hawkins

Edwin Hawkins

Edwin Hawkins is a Grammy Award-winning American gospel and R&B musician, pianist, choir master, composer and arranger. He is one of the originators of the urban contemporary gospel sound. He are best known for his arrangement of "Oh Happy Day" , which was included on the Songs of the Century list...

, Tramaine Hawkins, Linda Hopkins

Linda Hopkins

Linda Hopkins is an African American actress and blues and gospel singer. She has recorded classic, traditional, and urban blues, and performed R&B and soul, jazz, and show tunes, all with distinction and style since the 1950s....

, Al Jarreau

Al Jarreau

Alwin "Al" Lopez Jarreau is a seven-time Grammy Award winning jazz singer.- Background :Jarreau was born in Milwaukee, the fifth of six children. His web site refers to Reservoir, Inc., the name of the street where he lived. His father was a Seventh-Day Adventist Church minister and singer, and...

, Chaka Khan

Chaka Khan

Chaka Khan , frequently known as the Queen of Funk, is a 10-time Grammy Award winning American singer-songwriter who gained fame in the 1970s as the frontwoman and focal point of the funk band Rufus. While still a member of the group in 1978, Khan embarked on a successful solo career...

, Gladys Knight

Gladys Knight

Gladys Maria Knight , known as the "Empress of Soul", is an American singer-songwriter, actress, businesswoman, humanitarian, and author...

, Lizz Lee, Dawnn Lewis

Dawnn Lewis

Dawnn Lewis is an American actress and singer, perhaps best known for her roles on sitcoms such as A Different World and in the first season of Hangin' with Mr. Cooper.-Career:...

, Babbie Mason

Babbie Mason

Babbie Yvett Robie Wade Mason is an American gospel singer, songwriter, writer, and adjunct professor of songwriting at Atlanta Christian College and Lee University, and also a television talk-show host. In 1995, she was featured in the Warren Chaney docudrama, America: A Call to...

, Johnny Mathis

Johnny Mathis

John Royce "Johnny" Mathis is an American singer of popular music. Starting his career with singles of standards, he became highly popular as an album artist, with several dozen of his albums achieving gold or platinum status, and 73 making the Billboard charts...

, Marilyn McCoo

Marilyn McCoo

Marilyn McCoo is an American singer, actress, and television presenter, who is best known for being the lead female vocalist in the group The 5th Dimension, as well as hosting the 1980s music countdown series Solid Gold...

, Mike E., Stephanie Mills

Stephanie Mills

Stephanie Dorthea Mills is an American R&B and soul singer, and a former Broadway star.-Career:Mills began her career appearing in her first play at the age of nine. Two years later, Mills won Amateur Night at the Apollo Theater a record six times...

, Jeffrey Osborne

Jeffrey Osborne

Jeffrey Linton Osborne is an American funk and R&B musician, songwriter, lyricist, and former lead singer of the band, L.T.D.-Early life and career:...

, David Pack

David Pack

David Robert Pack , is a Grammy Award Winning Artist, Producer & Music Director of Global Events. His career began as the front man, vocalist and guitarist with the rock group Ambrosia popular in the 1970s and 1980s.-Career:...

, Phylicia Rashād

Phylicia Rashad

Phylicia Rashād is an American Tony Award winning actress and singer, best known for her role as Clair Huxtable on the long-running NBC sitcom The Cosby Show....

, Joe Sample

Joe Sample

Joseph Leslie "Joe" Sample is an American pianist, keyboard player and composer.He is one of the founding members of the Jazz Crusaders, the band which became simply The Crusaders in 1971, and remained a part of the group until its final album in 1991 .- Biography :Sample began playing the piano...

, Richard Smallwood

Richard Smallwood

Richard Smallwood is an American Gospel music artist who formed The Richard Smallwood Singers in 1977 in Washington, DC.-Biography:...

, Sounds of Blackness

Sounds of Blackness

Sounds of Blackness is a Grammy Award-winning vocal and instrumental ensemble from Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota who perform music from several genres music including gospel, R&B, soul, and jazz. The group scored several hits on the Billboard R&B chart and Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play...

, Take 6

Take 6

Take 6 is an American a cappella gospel music sextet formed in 1980 on the campus of Oakwood College in Huntsville, Alabama. The group sings in a contemporary style, integrating R&B and jazz influences into their devotional songs and has 10 Grammy wins, 10 Dove Awards, one Soul Train Award and two...

, Darryl Tookes, Mervyn Warren

Mervyn Warren

Mervyn Edwin Warren is an American film composer, record producer, music conductor, music arranger, lyricist, songwriter, pianist, and vocalist. Warren is a five-time Grammy Award winner and a 10-time Grammy Award nominee...

, Thomas Whitfield

Thomas Whitfield

Thomas Anthony Whitfield was an American gospel singer, songwriter, arranger, pianist, choir director and producer best known for helping to shape the fabric of contemporary gospel music with his elaborate choral arrangements and the merging of musical styles ranging from jazz to classical into...

, Vanessa Williams

Vanessa L. Williams

Vanessa Lynn Williams is an American pop-R&B recording artist, producer, dancer, model, actress and showgirl. In 1983, she became the first woman of African-American descent to be crowned Miss America, but a scandal generated by her having posed for nude photographs published in Penthouse magazine...

 and Chris Willis

Chris Willis

Christopher "Chris" Willis is an American singer-songwriter and producer. Although initially a gospel singer, he later received international attention for his collaborations with house music artist David Guetta, including on the songs "Just a Little More Love", "Love Don't Let Me Go , "Love Is...

.