ESPN RISE

Good Counsel's Kevin McFadden knows about large crowds. After all, Good Counsel packed in more than 4,500 people for its ESPN2 game against DeMatha last season.

But those crowds are small compared to the ones before which McFadden performed.

The 35,000 he once played in front of as a member of the University of Cincinnati football team comes closer to resembling the 25,000-50,000 people who would pack a stadium to see McFadden along with several of the best gospel artists in the country in the late 1990s.

Long before McFadden was the defensive line coach at Our Lady of Good Counsel High School (Olney, Md.), the then-33-year old was a Stellar Award nominee as one of the five best contemporary gospel male solo artists in 1998.

"I remember one minute we flew down to Charlotte arena because John P. Kee had a concert. I'm walking into Charlotte arena on Sunday with Bobby Jones and all the major icons in gospel music -- on stage and slammed in front of 25,000 people," McFadden recalls with a smile. "Then I come back into the workplace -- the mental transition was unbelievable."

The Stellar Awards are gospel music's version of the Grammys.

Ten years ago, McFadden was considered one of the best new gospel artists in the country. The Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service listed his debut album, "Kevin McFadden & Redeemed," as the No. 7 gospel record of 1998.

Now, the 43-year-old is preparing to release his third album and his first since 2002, "Real Life, Feel the Music."

His single, "Dance with the Father," has received heavy interest since appearing on "Gospel Skate Jams Vol. 1" in 2006, and now he has received interest from disc jockeys in Europe. The music video, which was filmed at another Good Counsel coach's home, received more than 10,000 views before it was replaced by the High Definition version that appears on YouTube.com and UltimateTube.com. Since its rerelease a few weeks ago, the video has received more than 9,000 views on UltimateTube.com. His albums are available on Itunes and CDBaby.com.

Dave P is the managing director and founder of the Urban Gospel Network (UGN) and has been playing McFadden's songs since the early 2000s and rediscovered McFadden's new single through his MySpace page.

"It's been a great response -- I'm playing it [the single] all the time right now," Dave P said in an interview from London. "We're hoping to do a lot more with it by pushing it even further.

"You can feel the passion with his lyrics. When I first discovered him, I used to play a track called 'Fret Not' and that track for me was da bomb," Dave P added. "That's just an awesome track."

For McFadden's football family, his musical history comes as a surprise.

His profile on Good Counsel's football Web site does not mention his musical achievements, and within Maryland recruiting circles, McFadden is known as one of the best when it comes to helping an athlete who is having trouble with recruiting.

"When I first heard him sing, I couldn't believe it was him," Good Counsel defensive back Louis Young said. "From a big guy like, that you'd think he was all football, but he's versatile -- he can do it all."

"He's like a father figure and mentor. Once I got to Good Counsel, he helped me out with the recruiting and everything," Young added. "He's the college guru for the area. He gets everyone in school. Anyone who needs help with recruiting, they know who to call."

McFadden's impact on getting athletes into college does not go without reward. Former Falcons Mike Wallace and Caleb Porzel, along with Good Counsel graduate Tina Neighbors, created McFadden's MySpace page without telling him. Now, players like Young take it upon themselves to help keep the pages up to date.

"We invite people to his fan pages. He gets all the help he needs from us," Young said.

While at Cincinnati, McFadden earned second team All-America honors at defensive tackle and spent a year with the Pittsburgh Steelers before injuries took their toll and forced him to give up his professional football dreams.

It was at Cincinnati that McFadden started to focus on his singing -- with the Cincinnati Choral Union from 1985 to 1988.

After his stint with the Steelers, McFadden met Alan Friedman, the owner of Atlanta International Records (AIR Gospel).

A 1984 graduate of Montgomery Blair High School (Silver Spring, Md.), McFadden signed with AIR and released his debut album in 1998. A national tour that included stops in Nashville (Tenn.), Chicago (Ill.), Seattle (Wash.) and the Bahamas kept him busy, but he never strayed far from football.

Leading up to his next album, the recording industry started to change. Downloads became more common and downsizing of labels were commonplace.

"That label folded -- Malaco bought out AIR," McFadden said. "Everybody pretty much had to fend for themselves. Most of the artists were already icons or pastors of their own churches. I was the first contemporary artist that AIR signed."

After that collapse, McFadden started coaching. An old friend, John Buonassisi, was coaching the Silver Spring Saints, a youth football team, and brought on McFadden as an assistant.

It was through that connection that McFadden and Buonassisi started coaching at Good Counsel for the junior varsity.

Soon after arriving in 2002, McFadden moved up to the varsity as the defensive line coach, but dreams of a musical legacy never died.

McFadden has drawers full of recordings from the past 10 years and self-financed his second album, "Real Life, Feel the Music'" in 2002.

Sports and music seem to go hand in hand. Hank Williams Jr.'s "Let's Get Ready for Some Football" is synonymous with ESPN's "Monday Night Football," and some athletes (like the WWE's Chris Jericho) have their own bands outside of their athletic careers.

For McFadden, the two are interlocked and will always be part of his life.

"Music is my relaxation. It's my way out. It's my comfort zone. It's my melody to the world on solutions. It's just my world," McFadden said. "Football is the same thing. It energizes me and gives me an opportunity to work with kids. Football, to me, is that vehicle to let them know that they can be successful. Apply those things that you are being taught into the classroom and into the home and everyday life. Football made me a better man."

While McFadden has become a go-to guy for athletes, a close friend and owner of BG Records, Lionel Green, has kept asking for McFadden to once again focus on his music.

"He's a good talent. He's always been a good talent and a good dude," Green said. "He means what he sings about. Like a lot of artists back then, he could have made more money doing R&B music, but he stuck to doing gospel and landed a major record deal.

"He draws people in everything he does. He's a people person and he backs up everything he says. People knowing he's dependable is a major part of his character -- whether it's football or singing."

It was Green who produced the album "Gospel Skate Jams Vol. 1," in which "Dance with the Father" first appeared and ultimately got the musical wheels rolling again.

"Because of the overwhelming responses I was getting on YouTube and a couple other stations, I needed to go back and release that," McFadden said of his single. "That's why I decided to release that project."

"I'm just real happy that a gentleman, and I can call him a gentleman of gospel, is back with a single, 'Dance with the Father,'" Dave P. added. "I'm looking forward to the album. I would like to see a lot of American radio stick with it and add it to rotation and support an individual."

For now, before the Falcons get started with football season, McFadden is busy recording his new album and getting "Dance with the Father" to radio stations in Europe.

Once the season begins, it will be back to the sidelines and coaching kids.

"Helping these kids and getting them into school is something I'm never going to stop doing," McFadden said. "This will just be a platform to make it easier for me to do it."

ESPNRise encourages comments from its users. Leave a comment below. Mike Loveday covers high school sports for ESPNRISE.com. Mike can be reached at Michael.Loveday@espn.com