Peter Marks, Writing for The Washington Post:
When it sings, “Shout Sister Shout!,” dramatist Cheryl L. West’s no-frills portrait of gospel sensation Sister Rosetta Tharpe, is all thrills. The charge comes most electrifyingly from the evening’s star, Carrie Compere, who dedicates body and soul to the story of a singer anguished by conflicting loyalties to her music, her mother and her maker.
The success of “Shout Sister Shout!,” though, is chiefly in its scaling the high notes in the career of a woman who became known both as the Swinging Gospel Queen and the Godmother of Rock-and-Roll — and in Compere’s charismatic seizure of her crown.