How did this Charlotte artist — who twice lost to dogs on ‘AGT’ — win Fantasia’s trust?

You don’t have to spend much time with Dennis Reed Jr. to get a sense of his enormous capacity for positivity, and gratefulness, and humility when it comes to almost everything that he’s experienced as a Charlotte-based artist who has national street cred.

Just maybe avoid talking to him about dogs.

Why? Well, a couple of reasons, both related:

• One, in 2012, when he was just 27 years old, the Northwest School of the Arts alum led a singing dance troupe called Inspire the Fire to the live-voting rounds of NBC reality competition series “America’s Got Talent’s” seventh season — which eventually was won by an act that saw up to 10 dogs performing tricks.

• Then two, last summer, Reed led a singing “trap choir” called Sainted to the live-voting rounds of the same show’s 18th season — which also was won by a dog act.

The first time, “I was like ... how in the world did dogs beat not just us, but every human act?” he recalls, chuckling. “You have people shooting fire out of their mouth, or doing cartwheels and back flips, and escaping death — near-death experiences underwater. And then a dog that can, like, turn around and do a flip beats everybody.”

The second time, “I was just silently like, We’ll see. Even though I know their (eventual Season 18 winners Adrian Stoica and Hurricane) performance went well, we will see.

“And we saw,” Reed says, laughing.

Even so, the 39-year-old Reed and group co-founder DJ Fannie Mae recently brought their trap choir back to NBC for “America’s Got Talent: Fantasy League,” a pre-taped spin-off series that premiered Jan. 1 and sees them once again competing against a pup. (Among the 40 returning acts being featured is, yes, Adrian Stoica and Hurricane.)

Sainted’s qualifying-round performance — of Prince’s “Purple Rain,” Reed says — will air during Monday night’s episode.

Yet there is a reasonable chance something could happen this week that might be an even bigger deal to Reed than seeing himself on television.

On Tuesday morning, Fantasia Barrino has a shot at being nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress for her portrayal of Celie in the 2023 movie-musical “The Color Purple.” And if she does, the High Point native and Charlotte resident, also 39, will have earned the accolade at least in some small part because of Reed.

Here’s the story behind how their relationship came to be:

Out on tour — in an unlikely role

In April 2013, Fantasia released “Side Effects of You,” her fourth studio album since winning “American Idol” nearly a decade earlier.

Reed knew her hair stylist through church ties, and her hair stylist knew Reed was leader of a gospel group called Dennis Reed & The Gap in addition to directing Inspire the Fire. That spring, Fantasia was doing a promotional tour for the new album, and ahead of the Charlotte stop Reed received a call from her hair stylist asking if he could put together some singers and musicians who could join Fantasia for the album release party here.

He did (cue Inspire the Fire), and she loved their work, Reed recalls.

As it turned out, the keyboardist Reed recruited for that performance would go on to be hired as Fantasia’s music director. That proved to be another important connection, because in 2016, this keyboardist-turned-music director called up Reed and asked if he’d be interested in doing some vocal coaching with Fantasia and creating arrangements for her background singers in advance of her upcoming tour with Anthony Hamilton.

He did, again, and she loved his work, again.

So much that even though she couldn’t pay him to be the vocal coach on the tour, she had the budget for a head of wardrobe and wanted to hired him for that role — despite the fact that he was had none of the qualifications it normally would have required.

“‘I just want you to go on tour with me because I just need somebody with your energy, with your vibe,’” he recalls her telling him.

“It was the hardest I ever worked. But I was so excited, because it was the first time I had been on a major tour like that,” Reed says. “I’m taking care of the band’s clothes, I’m taking care of the singers’ clothes, and at the same time, I’m playing double-duty because they were still using me to warm them up before shows.”

While the tour may have been a bit of a blur, one moment definitely stands out, he says.

Days before the end of the tour, Reed was in Fantasia’s dressing room with her background singers, ready to warm them up with the piano that was there. Fantasia was feeling down about something, he recalls, so one of the singers suggested Reed cheer her up with a gospel song he’d taught them titled “Necessary,” which was originally on an album he and his Gap group had self-released more than a decade earlier.

Reed started teaching Fantasia the song, and at some point she decided to go live on Facebook, captioning the video: “This song ministered to us so we had to share it with you.”

The video ultimately was viewed more than 18 million times. It also blew up the song for him — the following week, digital sales of “Necessary” increased by 546 percent, according to Nielsen Music. By July, Dennis Reed & The Gap’s long-overlooked tune had reached the top of Billboard’s gospel charts.

“From that moment,” he says of Fantasia, “we’ve kind of been bonded.”

‘The star of the movie trusted me??’

Though he later decided being on the road wasn’t for him, Reed says he has continued to answer calls from Fantasia asking for his help with musical arrangements for her tours.

He’s also collaborated with her on a variety of other projects, including in March 2021 when they performed together during a prime-time, hour-long gospel music special that aired on the Oprah Winfrey Network. And Fantasia has had at least one of her children participate in programs offered by Reed’s nonprofit; also called Inspire the Fire, it was founded by Reed at age 17 and has included thousands of young people in its efforts to help them succeed on stage and in life over more than two decades.

Today, Reed considers Fantasia “a good friend.” Fantasia, in a message to The Charlotte Observer last week, said of Reed: “Not only is he great at what he does but he is like another brother to me.”

So it probably shouldn’t be a surprise to hear her say that when she learned about the possibility of “The Color Purple,” she called Reed to help her prepare for her audition for the lead role of Celie — who Fantasia had previously played while starring in the same-named Broadway musical in 2007 and 2008 and on a national tour of the show in 2010.

They met at least three times a week for about a month and a half in the summer of 2021, Reed says.

At the time, Fantasia had a newborn: her third child, daughter Keziah, born in May 2021. Officially, she was on vocal rest.

“She’s like, ‘I don’t feel a hundred percent because I haven’t sang in so long,’” Reed remembers her telling him. “You know, sometimes a woman’s voice can change and all these things can change when you have a kid. So to trust me, and be vulnerable, and work through the voice change, work through the cracks in your voice, trying to get your range at a certain place ... I felt so humbled.”

After she landed the role and shooting began, Reed says, they continued to talk at least once or twice a month about how things were going with the job.

Reed was never on set, but last June both he and Fantasia were in New Orleans for Essence Music Festival and he says he was able to meet the director and several members of the cast of “The Color Purple” at a surprise birthday celebration for the singer. He also got to hang with Fantasia during a “Color Purple”-focused event around Christmastime at Bazal Gallery Lounge in Charlotte, just days after Fantasia had lured Reed’s then-girlfriend Ohavia Phillips to the same venue with a fib — so that Reed could propose to Phillips. (She said yes.)

And days after that, he finally got to see his friend, collaborator and “sister” on the big screen.

It was an emotional experience, Reed says, pointing out that the original 1985 film (starring Whoopi Goldberg, directed by Steven Spielberg, and based on Alice Walker’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel) “was already a staple piece. Right? For cinema, period. And legendary. It’s, for me, one of the greatest movies in our Black culture.

“Then to have this remake and then you’re a part of it in some way — the star of the movie trusted me?? To vocally coach them? — I was like, Wow. So that’s how I felt the entire time.”

‘America’s Got Talent: Fantasy League’

See Reed on TV: He’ll appear on Monday’s episode of “America’s Got Talent: Fantasy League” when it airs on NBC (WCNC Channel 36 in Charlotte) beginning at 8 p.m.