Katie and Brian Rowden Christian-themed lyrics
Katie and Brian Rowden, a brother-and-sister duo from West Olive, jump-started City Jam, a Christian music contest based in Largo, Fla. It came to light after Brian, Katie and fellow musician Bobby Tinsley decided they wanted to create their own vocal competition.
“We just went for it like everything we do,” Katie said.
The Rowdens returned to West Michigan this month after traveling with this season’s winner, Aaron Unthank, to Nashville, Tenn. There they wrote and recorded Unthank’s single and set him up with record producers.
Katie said she and Brian are planning the competition’s third season and are hoping to take the contest nationwide.
“We plan to have City Jams across the country,” she said.
And why not? In the past two and a half years, Katie said she has been home for six months at most because of City Jam and touring with her brother for their band, Three Sixteen.
Katie said the best way to describe Three Sixteen’s music is pop and R&B with a flavor of hip hop.
“A lot of people don’t know it’s Christian music,” she said, despite the Christian-themed lyrics found in many of Three Sixteen’s songs.
Katie said she and Brian created the band as a way to combat the “trashy pop” of a few years ago.
“We wanted to create edgy, mainstream music with love in it,” she said.
Their journey to becoming Three Sixteen began as part of a different ensemble that opened for Christian boy-band Plus One at Muskegon’s Unity Christian Music Festival in 2001. At the festival, Katie and Brian attracted the attention of another artist who asked them to join his band. The arrangement lasted for about six months.
“We tried to change them, they tried to change us,” Katie said. “Brian and I thought we should start our own group.”
While on a family boat outing, the siblings’ mother suggested the name Three Sixteen for the band, based on the Biblical passage John 3:16: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
“I remember saying, ‘Yes, that’s it. That’s perfect,’” Katie said.
In 2003, Three Sixteen got its big break. Plus One asked Katie and Brian to be an opening act again in Memphis, Tenn. In the course of two and a half weeks, Katie and Brian finished four songs, did a photo shoot and hired back-up dancers to prepare for the occasion.
“It was crazy,” Katie said. “It was the first time we were singing originals.”
Though Katie was a professional dancer at the time and Brian was starting his own company, both decided to take on the band full time — and within months, they had created an hour-long live show and 12 songs.
After recording two albums and one concert DVD, their third album, “At the Gate,” was released nationally in August 2005.
The next year, they performed at Youth Explosion in Ohio, an event Katie said she really enjoyed because she and Brian held gender-specific seminars to discuss personal identity and self-image questions.
“I have a passion for people to be comfortable in their own skin because God made us just the way we are,” she said. “The little quirks that you may not like about yourself make you who you are.”
To Katie, the band isn’t just about the music — it’s about the message.
“Our mission is to reach people and hope that it touches them in some way,” she said.
Those that have met them and heard their music have first-hand experience with that mission.
“They’re really great kids,” said Kevin Newton, director of Unity Festival. “Not only do they have good music, but also high energy.”
Newton said he first met them in 2001 at Unity Festival’s debut, then brought them back on stage at last year’s festival.
“They’re really dedicated to doing their best and I really enjoyed having them,” he said.
Jared Henderson, worship pastor at Lakeshore Vineyard Christian Fellowship in Holland, said he was also struck by the pair’s enthusiasm.
“They’re excellent musicians and love the Lord,” he said.
Henderson said the two have performed at the church’s youth group and Sunday morning service.
“They’re both just super nice people,” he said. “They’re really mature individuals, and they seem to have a really good family life. They love each other. They love their parents.”
With such close familial ties, Katie said the past two and a half years away from home have been difficult. She said she and Brian are planning on staying in West Michigan for the summer to catch up with family. The two graduated from Jenison High School in the late 1990s and still have relatives in the area.
“Family’s very important to us and we’ve sacrificed it for so long,” Katie said.
They will hit a local stage Sunday when Three Sixteen performs at the Taste of Wellspring Outreach Festival in Hudsonville. The festival runs from noon to 3 p.m. at the Wellspring Community Church, 4466 Bauer Road in Hudsonville. There is an admission charge of $8 for adults and $5 for children.
And after that?
“We’re just trying to juggle all that we do,” Katie said. “We’re always just really excited to get new music out there.”

