Has the rivalry begun?

I wasn't even aware that anything was going on until I got to NQC and heard the buzz. I didn't think much of it, the fact that Ernie Haase had decided to record "Get Away Jordan".
Then I talked with McCray Dove and he informed me that he had asked permission from Hovie Lister, as a courtesy of course, to record the Statesmen signature song "Get Away Jordan". "Now", McCray says, "the gauntlet has been thrown down." With a smile on his face he says, "And Ernie didn't even ask.", indicating that Ernie Haase and Signature Sound had recorded "Get Away Jordan", which McCary considers to have become the Dove Brothers signature song. McCray adds, "We've tried to drop the song, but the fans just won't let us." So, Saturday night, just a little after 10PM, after singing one song off their new CD, McCray throws down his own gauntlet. McCray tells the 15,000 in attendance that the hottest quartet in Southern Gospel Music could not be at the NQC this week because they were in Africa singing, and he asks them if they know who it is. Of course the crowd yells back "Signature Sound". Then McCray tells them that Signature Sound is singing "Get Away Jordan" over in Africa, and asks them how they would like to hear the Dove Brothers sing a Signature Sound song at NQC. Of course, the crowd, raved. However, McCray, not satisfied with just a little raving, said "Well if you don't want us to sing it, we won't do it", and of course the crowd cheered him on. At this point Tim Lovelace prances on stage and announces that the Dove Brothers could not just "sing" a Signature Sound song, but they had to "look" the part. So, Tim proceeded to around to each singer and mess up their hair trying to make them have the Signature Sound hair style. The Tim pulled out a pair of scissors from his coat and proceeded to cut each singers tie very short. Now, the Dove Brothers were ready to sing a Signature Sound song.

Then the introduction to the Signature Sound hit "Stand By Me" started and the crowd went wild. The whole place was on their feet. One thing that the Dove Brothers do NOT have is dance moves, but that didn't stop them from trying. David Hester did a pretty good straight up job of singing the Bass feature, but the rest of the guys were pretty much struggling to find some sort of dance move even close to Signature Sounds moves. I was frankly afraid that McCray might hurt himself with some of those moves. I hope he knows a good chiropractor. I can only assume that the rest of the crowd was enjoying the song, because I was laughing so hard that my eyes were watering.

The Dove Brothers went straight into their version of "Get Away Jordan" and the crowd cheered even louder. Going from that right into "Didn't It Rain", the crowd never let up cheering and clapping the whole time. I was sitting in front of the timer and noticed that for fifteen consecutive minutes the crowd was on it's feet clapping and cheering for the Dove Brothers, and you could see in McCray's eyes that he was saying to Ernie Haase........ "Take that!!!!".

I can remember many years back when there was a rivalry between the Blackwoods and the Statesmen and between the Oak Ridge Boys and the Kingsmen. It was lots of good old fashioned rivalry that brought some real competition that made each group better. There was not mean spiritedness, but there was some pranks that got carried out. That rivalry brought out the best of all the groups and in the long run brought out the best of Southern Gospel Music.

So, I'm waiting to see if this was just a fluke, or has the rivalry between the Dove Brothers and Signature Sound begun?