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VIA: The Belle Report

Marvin Sapp is still waiting for that elusive first Grammy Award.

Nominated for a Grammy for the eighth time since launching his solo career in 1996, the acclaimed Grand Rapids Gospel singer on Sunday lost out, to the surprise of many, to alt-country/Americana singer Patty Griffin for best traditional Gospel album of 2010.

It was Griffin’s first nomination ever in a Gospel music category.

“Everybody’s trying to figure out who she is. It happens,” Sapp said by phone from Los Angeles, immediately after the afternoon “pre-telecast” awards ceremony which precedes CBS’s glitzy evening Grammy broadcast of high-profile pop categories.

“It’s always an honor to be nominated. That’s the same old speech, but it’s true. It’s just a blessing to be nominated. This album went to No. 2 and was smashing all kinds of records. That’s the stuff that can never be taken away from me. I’m just enjoying the ride.”

The somewhat surprising Grammy outcome for Sapp came after his nominated recording, “Here I Am,” not only topped Gospel and R&B charts last year, but soared to No. 2 on the Billboard 200 pop chart, making it the highest-charting gospel album in history.

Sapp, 44, pastor of Lighthouse Full Life Center Church in Grand Rapids, already has a trophy case full of awards stemming from “Here I Am,” including five recent Stellar Gospel Music Awards.

He had recently called all the honors and his Grammy nomination “bittersweet” because they came after last September’s death of his wife, MaLinda, who had battled colon cancer. She was integrally involved in the album, which was recorded at Wyoming’s Resurrection Life Church.

Sapp’s children – Marvin II, 16, MiKaila, 13, and Madisson, 11 – accompanied him to Los Angeles, where he took them shopping, to an NAACP Image Awards luncheon and a Haiti benefit concert. “Really enjoying this time,” he tweeted at one point to his followers on Twitter.

“It’s been a great, great time for us as a family to be able to get away and just bond,” he told The Press late this afternoon. “With the loss of my wife, it’s been kind of difficult for me. I’ve tried to throw myself into my kids and my work. The fact we’ve been able to … spend an enormous amount of time here … means more to me than anything else.”

Griffin’s “Downtown Church” also beat out albums by other distinguished gospel performers in the traditional gospel category: Shirley Caesar, Vanessa Bell Armstrong and Karen Clark Sheard.

Another Grand Rapids-bred nominee, El DeBarge, 49, also came up empty at the Grammys on Sunday. The title track from DeBarge’s “Second Chance” comeback album was nominated in R&B categories for best male vocal performance and best song. The awards went to Usher and John Legend & The Roots, respectively.

DeBarge’s song and album had earned high praise for the artist whose battles with drug addiction landed him in federal prison in 2008. The Detroit native who grew up in Grand Rapids soared to fame with his siblings in the vocal group DeBarge.

With “a few more albums” left in him, Sapp insisted he’s not giving up his Grammy quest, though he also stressed that’s not his overriding motivation.

“I’ve been blessed to do what I love to do and people have been blessed by my music. That’s why we do what we do,” he said. “We don’t do it for rewards; we do it for the glory of God.”

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