From humble beginnings, Grammy-winning R&B artist PJ Morton pulls into Charlotte in style

The first time PJ Morton came to Charlotte to perform on tour, everything was a little bit different.

This was more than a decade ago, before the R&B singer, songwriter and producer had won four Grammy Awards, before he’d earned acclaim for playing keyboards for Maroon 5. His budget back then was lean and it showed.

He pulled up to his show in his father’s church bus, with his band and a trove of instruments in tow. His dad, Bishop Paul E. Morton, is a gospel artist and former senior pastor of the Greater Saint Stephen Full Baptist Church in New Orleans.

“I had just signed the publishing deal for my first album, but I still couldn’t get a proper tour bus,” Morton said, laughing. “It basically just had seats. But I took like 14 people on the road, full band, horns, everything. It was crazy. I spent all my money, but I’m still so grateful for that, because it taught me so much about the business side of things.”

Now, Morton has the 2020 Grammy for Best Gospel Album (“Gospel According to PJ”) and released “Watch the Sun” in 2022. He has also been engaged with numerous community projects in his hometown of New Orleans — including work through his nonprofit, Buddy’s House Foundation, which fosters a community center, recording studio, and legacy museum.

And this weekend, Morton returns to Charlotte for a sold-out show Saturday, Sept. 3, at Knight Theater at the Levine Center for the Performing Arts.

Such an enthusiastic local response to the multi-talented artist is not surprising given his loyal fan base. From those humble beginnings, Morton’s career has blossomed — with his solo efforts as well as through the exposure he has received as the lead keyboardist for Maroon 5.

Reflecting on his first visit to Charlotte more than a decade ago, Morton laughed at all the intangible benefits he gleaned from that first experience.

“There are such great memories,” he said. “Our first time in Charlotte, it was a smaller show because we put it on ourselves — in terms of bringing everything ourselves.

“The audience was brand-new but I remember it was enough to keep us coming back. Also, those who were out on tour with me then are all still my friends and have gone on to do great things, so it’s pretty amazing.”

‘Absolutely no Zen’

Fast-forward to 2020.

During the pandemic, Morton took advantage of the time away from touring to spend time with his family, catch up on his reading (including Island Records founder Chris Blackwell’s book, “The Islander”), appear as a podcast guest (check out his episode of Hanif Adurraqib’s delightful Object of Sound), and the self-described TV and film junkie even took time to indulge in some binge watching (recently in his queue, the Hulu series “Bear”).

Music, however, was never far from Morton’s mind. His COVID-era creative process wasn’t without its hiccups, though. Early on, his laptop crashed. Despite the fact that during this phase he had been reading up on the tenets of Taoist philosophy, he was anything but calm.

“There was absolutely no Zen in sight,” he said. “I had no energy to re-create. I went into pure panic mode.

“As a matter of fact — and I just thought about this the other day — I was so in panic mode that I went on the internet to find something to recover my files, and I remember that is what completely killed my laptop. It otherwise might not have been as bad, but whatever I put on the computer just did what it did. So it was pure panic.

“I decided to just stop for a minute because it’s OK to stop,” he added. “That was kind of the start of the album (“Watch the Sun”) for me, a kind of resetting.”

Ultimately a local computer shop was able to recover some of Morton’s older files — including some old drum tracks — but all of his new material was lost in the ether. So, with a new laptop in hand, he started over.

Just not immediately.

“What that experience did for me was that it forced me to stop working completely and focus on other things altogether,” Morton said. “I didn’t want to work on music, actually, for a while. But prior to the pandemic I had started working on the gospel album and so I knew that I didn’t have to start from scratch with that.

“That was my way of starting back up, with baby steps,” he said. “Because I was going to put that album off until after the pandemic, as well, but I just felt like it was an album that was really needed at that time. And so I kind of just pushed myself to complete it right in the middle of it.”

Working with Stevie Wonder and more

Morton’s list of collaborators is long and diverse and “Watch the Sun” features many of these notable voices. From legends like Stevie Wonder, El DeBarge, and Nas, to favorites like Jill Scott, Wale, Jo Jo, and Alex Isley, the varied voices aid in his sonic storytelling. Fans know Morton’s many collaborators cross generations and genres and this feature is one of the hallmarks of his work that listeners appreciate.

When prompted to consider how his Southern influences make their way into his music — and “Watch the Sun,” in particular — without hesitation Morton pays homage to his hometown roots.

“What New Orleans has always done is instill in me a sense of musical integrity,” he said. “It’s like music here is just … well it’s a badge of honor if you play music. It’s like we know how powerful it is to tell stories this way.”

Just like the Southern pastiche Morton pays homage to in 2019’s “Gumbo,” musical influences run deep throughout his catalog. Of course, Stevie Wonder is front and center on that list.

“When I was growing up in the ‘80s, somebody gave me a cassette tape with ‘I Had Never Dreamed You’d Leave in Summer.’ It moved me so much that I was like, ‘Wow, what is this?” he said. “I went on a journey and started buying up the records in chronological order.”

Morton lists of others fundamental to the development of his sound includes The Beatles, Frank Sinatra, Quincy Jones and more.

“Growing up I had so much around me and I think that definitely speaks to why I don’t see a bunch of boundaries when it comes to influences or what I want to put in my music,” he said.

When it was time to record his latest record, he called upon some of these musical forebears to help him.

“We went down to Bogalusa (Louisiana) to make this album and I think it was part of being in the country, but more than that, it was the stuff in the walls that made its way into the record,” Morton said. “It’s like ‘Stevie’s been in here, Betty Davis has been in here, and Frankie Beverly and Maze made records in here. I feel that it was the location, the studio, that influenced this record.”

At the end of the day, Morton wants listeners to find pleasure and authenticity in his music.

“I want people to delight in the music, really the art of what was put into the music. And I want to teach through whatever I do to be an individual, to understand that you were created exactly the way you are for a reason, and it’s not to change into anyone else,” he said. “It’s to be you.”

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This story was originally published August 31, 2022 at 9:57 AM.