Walter Hawkins Concert and Funeral

Shouting broke out in the capacity crowd and on stage Tuesday night at the Paramount Theatre following a rousing rendition by Kathy Taylor Brown and the hundred-voice Love Center Choir of the Walter Hawkins composition “Special Gift.” Feet moved. Arms flapped. Some shrieked. Others spoke in unknown tongues. The program, in which some of the biggest names in gospel music performed one song after another written over the years by the late bishop of Oakland’s Love Center Ministries, was briefly interrupted by the spontaneous display of spiritual ecstasy, but no one seemed to mind.