Family & Friends Remember Cliff Barrows

CHARLOTTE, NC — Music and ministry. Cliff Barrows spent more than six decades crusading with the Reverend Billy Graham. Graham calls Barrows one of his closest friends. Today, the man behind the music, and Graham’s radio and television programming, was remembered and honored.

“They had a lot of experience together,” says Graham’s executive assistant David Bruce of the relationship with Barrows. “Traveled the world together. Raised their families together.”

Billy Graham first met Cliff Barrows in 1945, and soon the two were inseparable, sharing music, ministry and fellowship for 69 years.

“They traveled all over the world, when traveling wasn’t easy,” says Steve Rhoades, Vice President of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Associations. “So they became very close. And they had experienced the difficulty it was to preach the gospel, and to reach people with good news.”

Barrows was the voice behind Billy Graham, and the man behind the music for countless crusades.

“He talked about music as being sort of the precursor to revival,” says Rhoades. “If people could sing, they would experience revival.”

“A singer. A song writer. A musician,” says Bruce. “A coordinator of programming, which he did. He also had leadership skills with Worldwide Pictures.”

He was also the director of television and radio programming, and an inductee in the Nashville Gospel Music Hall of Fame and the Religious Broadcasting Hall of Fame.

His funeral service at Calvary Church in South Charlotte brought family, friends and admirers from all corners.

“His personality, probably above all else, was let me hear about you, rather than hear about him,” says Atlanta resident Chuch Furedy, who has known Barrows for 15 years. “And he was a friend to all, a friend to us.”

“Having sung a couple of times in the Billy Graham Crusades under his direction, a long, long time ago, was just incredible,” says Indian Land resident Julie Limmer. “Then to be here today, and hear the choir singing, and all the people that came. And I think that he would have been honored. He was honored, but Christ was glorified.”

Cliff barrows passed away one week ago, on November 15. He was 93 years old. Billy Graham was not able to attend the funeral.