The Mighty Clouds of Joy

Experiencing the Mighty Clouds of Joy is more than just a musical encounter. As deeply inspiring as they are terrifically entertaining, the “Clouds” are a five-man journey into one of the richest, most vibrant veins of American music, and a window into the very essence of the Gospel Quartet legacy.
Those are fairly fancy words for what the group’s lifetime lead singer, Joe Ligon, thinks of as simply a calling that chose him, rather than vice versa. “Some people are just born to sing,” he says. “And if you’re one of those people, and you do it long enough, it grows on you until you can’t imagine doing anything else. That’s the Clouds in a nutshell. I was born into a Gospel family. My dad was a singer, and his dad was a preacher. This was always just what I did.”
See the Legacy...
Anyone suspecting that a calling enduring nearly a half-century would inevitably lose some of its early impetus and excitement, need only spend an hour with the Clouds’ newest release, Movin’, to have that notion dispelled, forever and ever…amen.
“We’re more passionate about what we’re doing now than we’ve ever been,” says Joe, emphatically. “When we first started recording—46 years, and 37 releases ago—most Gospel writers just weren’t digging as deep as they are now. It’s a new day, and they’re writing more from the Word, with more substance and a deeper message—and a lot more of a praise message. I listen to Movin’ and I’m excited, because I know it’s going to inspire people—young and old—like nothing we’ve done before.”
That’s quite a statement coming from the leader of a group that—with career sales of over a million units—is the top-selling Gospel quartet of all time. The Clouds singular résumé also includes performances at an unprecedented number in heralded venues from the White House, Radio City Music Hall, Madison Square Garden, Carnegie Hall and the unofficial “Shrine of Soul Music,” the famed Apollo Theater.
The Mighty Clouds of Joy have been sought out to perform and tour with a veritable monarchy of musical legends, including the Rolling Stones, Aretha Franklin, James Brown, Ray Charles, Luther Vandross, and Paul Simon. Their trophy case is filled with three Grammy Awards, and a daunting array of nearly every music award given—many received on multiple occasions—and including, most recently, the Allstate James Cleveland Lifetime Achievement Award, presented to them at the 2007, nationally broadcast, Stellar Awards.
But set aside the accolades, awards and achievements—formidable as they are—and the music of ever-mighty Clouds stills speaks for it self.
It’s been said that a boast is not a boast if one can back it up, and from the first backbeat to the final fade, Movin’ validates Joe’s excitement with one great song after another. Produced by longtime “genius of the mix,” Sanchez Harley—who evoked fire and flair from the group its last time out, on the chart-topping In The House of the Lord—the new album find the Clouds not only Movin’, but in higher gear than ever.