Christian Pop Singer Tornquist

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St. James says she particularly enjoys sharing the stage with Tornquist, who was known simply as Evie to many Christian music fans in the 1970s and ’80s.

“She could have been a comedian, she is so hilarious,” St. James says. “It’s very interactive. We have a Q&A time in the show. It’s like a three-hour conference-meets-a-music-event-meets-a-comedy-show.”

The conferences have been very successful. But that St. James still receives honors such as “favorite female singer,” in Christian music polls indicates that despite an absence of new music, there’s a hunger for St. James: Christian pop star.

And there is new music in the works.

“At the point I started coming off the road four years ago, I was pretty exhausted having been on the road 12 or 13 years straight,” St. James says. “I really didn’t want to just hash out an album when I didn’t feel like I had anything that was authentic or fresh or that came from my heart.

“Now, the more I do spot shows and SHE events, I’m in a spot where I do feel like things are fresh.”

St. James says she is working on a worship- oriented album that will combine new music and established praise hits that she anticipates will put a “fresh modern feel” on worship. “The main thing is that people will be able to worship God with it … I don’t want to get caught up in making something sound so super hip at the cost of it not truly drawing people in to worship.”

St. James has long maintained that, while many of her Christian music compatriots have courted the mainstream market, she aims for Christian listeners.

“I think people are really understanding the niche of Christian music and that there’s an audience here that really wants to buy music and have encouragement through music for their walk with God,” St. James says.

The past few years, St. James also has been trying to dole out encouragement in a new venue: film.

After dipping her toes into acting and drama through several projects, including the rock opera  Hero in which her character, an unwed pregnant woman considering an abortion, is shown some potential consequences of her decision.