The Pepperdine community at large knows Professor Joi Carr as a professor of American literature and film studies under the Humanities Division as well as the director of the Multicultural Theatre Project. She is a quiet, shy and humble individual who is highly respected for her positive influence on students. However, this quiet storm has a secret life that she has agreed to reveal officially to the Pepperdine community via the Graphic.
Outside of Pepperdine, Carr is an active member of the Screen Actors Guild and a world-renown a cappella singer/songwriter whose music has reached almost every corner of the world.
Carr began singing at age three in her mother’s fashion shows, serving as entertainment during any impromptu fashion delays. It was then, while singing a Captain and Tennille song, “Love Will Keep Us Together,” that Carr was noticed for her mature and beautiful voice.
“For me it felt normal, I’ve always sung. I’ve never made a conscious choice to do it. It’s just always been a part of my life,” Carr said.
Carr was brought up on a wide variety of musical genres including jazz, country, African rhythms and world music, and accredits her eclectic taste to this upbringing. She has also found influences in Carole King, Phoebe Snow, Barbra Streisand and Billie Holiday.
At age 12, she began professionally singing in large venues and also contributed as a sessions singer for many artists including David Lee Roth. At age 20, she was approached by Motown Records to record a Rhythm and Blues record and sign onto their company. However, Carr turned down the contract because she wanted to pursue a career in a cappella gospel music.
When asked why she loves to sing, Carr said, “I think it has more to do with what it does to people universally … Somehow it touches our emotive aspect as well as our cognitive space … Song touches the deepest part of our soul and sometimes we can’t even articulate why it does that.”
During her teens, Carr was pursuing an acting career. At age 15, she won the Miss Sugar Ray Youth Pageant, and as a result started working with her first manager, who at the time was also managing Malcolm-Jamal Warner and Larenz Tate. She then started working as a guest star on various television sitcoms including “Amen,” “227,” “The Bronx Zoo” and played the starring role in “Juvi” (CBS Schoolbreak Special).
Carr has remained an active member of SAG-AFTRA, also fulfilling the role as a member on their Ethnic Employment and Woman’s National Committees. Being in these positions has given her wonderful opportunities including writing the script for the AVA Ivy Bethune Diversity Awards during which Bill Cosby and J.R. Martinez were honorees.
While Carr admits that many were disappointed that she turned down the Motown deal, she said “I knew I needed to focus on a cappella, and I’ve been doing it ever since.”
This attitude has made Carr one of the most renowned a cappella gospel artists in the world. She has recorded more than 50 songs, seven albums and has her own production company, Chara (which means Grace) that produces and records a cappella gospel music.
After teaching throughout the week, Carr tours extensively on weekends as a performer to various national events (time permitting). She is widely known in the Church of Christ community for her performances around the U.S.
Carr’s professional work with film, theater and music led her to develop Pepperdine’s Multicultural Theater Project. This project is an “alternative theater program to encourage students to develop their leadership skills, intercultural communication, create a campus climate of inclusion, to increase recruitment and retention of students from under representative minority groups and to achieve a more diverse student body…. For me it was an initiated way to teach literary and historical text…. I was able to integrate the pedagogical style with theater and have this conversation about diversity in this safe space”, said Carr.
Besides putting on a performance every February, Carr has initiated alternative programs with MTP, which included hosting guest speakers such as Obba Babatunde (actor) April Grace (actor), Berney Casey (actor), Sonja Norwood (CEO of Norwood Entertainment), Jayne Kennedy Overton (sports anchor) and Wren T. Brown (actor, producer).
When asked about how Pepperdine has affected her life, Carr said, “I’m both an artist and academician, I’m able to integrate the two here at Pepperdine in a way that I don’t know I could do anywhere else.”
To learn more about Professor Joi Carr’s music, go to joicar.com.