|
||
|
||
|
Gospel Music Artists
|
 |
||
GOSPEL MUSIC HISTORYby Paul DavisMore than any Century before it, the Twentieth Century was rich in diverse genres of Christian music. Local "calls to worship" in the new church culture of that new Century nearly always meant congregations joining together in "singing the gospel". Initially, musical accompaniment was generally quite simple. What mattered was down-to-earth sincerity and heart-felt identification with the sentiments of the songs from the performers. That flavoured the genres with genuine emotion- later called "soul". Where worship was a joy rather than a duty, harmony singing prospered, sometimes backed by traditional stringed instruments such as auto-harp and guitar. But more usually, piano or harmonium and later electric guitars and percussion were used. From generation to generation, gospel songs and hymns were lovingly handed down through church community traditions. The hard-working, Victorian pioneers of the Industrial and Agricultural Revolutions doggedly settled into a new religious culture as they adventurously sought social and economic progression amid much hardship. To ease the pain of their deep struggles and dire deprivations, they would often take to singing songs of inspiration. The front parlour's piano or organ became the family gathering place. To the accompaniment of a family member, they loved to enjoy, testify and sing about their faith. Throughout the previous Century, ever-expanding evangelistic campaigns and revivals spawned new spiritual life as churches and tabernacles sprouted up everywhere. It was not long before each church community would develop its own particular style of what they called "music ministry". Choirs, quartets and soloists sprang up, blossomed and flourished. Where ecclesiastical buildings were not available, itinerant ministers and musicians carried the gospel into the countryside and urban environs. The spiritual revivals of the Nineteenth Century opened the way for a new form of Christian musical expression in the next Century. Isaac Watts, several generations before, conformed to familiar metrical schemes namely long, short, and common - for tunes already known. Then the likes of the Eighteenth Century's Charles Wesley wrote regardless of any known tunes or conventions. The enthusiastic, new converts to Christianity from Victorian days were common people of the working class, keen to introduce familiar, singable melodies into their worship. Composers before that time, writing for the church, tended to be "educated" musicians from the establishment. A new genre of home-grown writer and singer was to spring up as a result of the Victorian revivals. Their emphasis became the creation of more folksy singable types of Christian song. The evangelicals and puritans being democratic and ‘of the people’ in philosophy, embraced these radical changes with some enthusiasm. As evangelical denominations became more and more accepted by the establishment, the further use of popular tunes was extended. The newly converted common people within a generation succeeded in introducing spirituality into their every-day poetry and music. A very important event in the on-going evolution of Christian music expansion was the publication in 1873 by singer/songwriter, Ira Sankey of his "Sacred Songs and Solos" book. Well into the Twentieth Century, it sold in millions as he popularised hymns and gospel songs on both sides of the Atlantic. By the turn of the Twentieth Century, history documents that this musical movement helped Christianity to move nearer to the soul of the common people. Folk style rhyme and music successfully blended into the cosmopolitan character of all denominations. By the end of the Nineteenth Century, gospel music was emotionally and culturally having an impact on as never before on individuals and even upon society as a whole. Even the great popular composers of the secular field (such as Arthur Sullivan of Gilbert & Sullivan fame) were contributing to the blossoming field of popular hymnody. Great gospel personalities started to emerge, two of the greatest spanned the end of the Nineteenth century and the start of the Twentieth century. Fanny Crosby was to epitomise the best of the newly evolving gospel songwriters and Ira Sankey was to fulfil the same role as a gospel music performer. More than any other songwriter, Fanny Crosby captured the attention of millions with her simple yet meaningful gospel songs. She devoted her long, fruitful life to transposing the great spiritual truths of the Christian faith into singable rhyme and melody. Fully persuaded of those truths, her life enjoyed and radiated "Blessed Assurance" (to quote her famous song). Ira Sankey gave birth to many vocalising-successors in the Twentieth Century. The subsequent decades saw many performers successfully fulfil their gospel-singing or song-leading ministries initially in the mass evangelism arena. This gospel music train included Charles Alexander, Homer Rodeheaver, Gypsy Smith, Cliff Barrows and George Beverly Shea. As leisure time increased, the gospel music train in the second half of the Twentieth Century was to usher in the arrival of contemporary Christian music in the entertainment sphere. Artistes who expanded the genre to daringly embrace the risky new idea of Christian music entertainment were the likes of the Blackwood Brothers, Mahalia Jackson, Pat Boone and then surprisingly Elvis Presley (in the USA) and Sir Cliff Richard (in the UK)! This relatively new entertainment phenomenon from both "white gospel" and "black gospel" emerged essentially through the pious efforts of highly-motivated, evangelistic singers of the early part of the Twentieth Century. Their rich legacy enthused many to sing message-music professionally. Convention-style singing was pioneered in the American Southland by the deeply spiritual and charismatic school teacher, James D. Vaughan. His ground-breaking quartet initially was composed of him and his three brothers. After music school, taught by E. T. Hildebrand, Vaughan practised his songwriting to the full, going on to write hundreds of easy-on-the-ear ditties such as ‘I Feel Like Travelling On’. Theologically, Vaughan was of Nazarene persuasion from a Holiness and Wesleyan background. ‘Gospel Chimes’ was Vaughan’s first published songbook embracing the shaped note techniques. Conceived several hundred years ago and called ‘Sacred Harp’, users could recognise the Fa, So, La or Mi by reading the shape of the note on the stave. In the USA particularly, churches of every denomination prospered in number in the first quarter of the Twentieth Century as a result of the great revivals. With their steady growth came a hunger in lay people for newer gospel songs. To meet common demand, Vaughan set up a publishing and marketing concern in Lawrenceburg, Tennessee with a network of enterprising quartets to promote the new sacred songs. By 1912, they were selling eighty-five thousand songbooks per year and by the mid Twenties there were no less than sixteen quartets on the road. Then Vaughan expanded into new even more adventurous branches of activity such as radio stations, phonograph records and singing schools. Expansion came geographically too, as the organisation extended into four other states including Texas. Basically of Southern Baptist and Calvinistic theological persuasion, it was in Texas that the Stamps' gospel enterprise prospered mostly under the astute auspices of V.O. and Frank Stamps in the second quarter of the Twentieth Century. Later, "their empire" joined with the "Baxter empire" to form the renowned joint "Stamps Baxter empire"'. For many years, the "Stamps Baxter" quartet-style of music was slow in gaining acceptance even in the South of the USA among mainstream, denominational churches. Serious-minded evangelicals particularly in the North in the USA and in the United Kingdom were still distrustful of songs that had a beat. Some felt that the message was not deep enough, and the pentecostal theology too emotional. Groups, who failed to sing in the strict tempo that the churches expected, were distrusted. They were also distrustful of songs when themes strayed from the well-trodden orthodox path. The pentecostals were the first grouping to make widespread use of black and white Southern gospel music. Their emotional, enthusiasm-flavoured worship was ideally suited to using contemporary songs with a beat. In the Twenties and Thirties, this type of music was commonly heard at "All Day Sings", "Brush Arbor Meetings" and Festivals of Male Voice Praise". All were opportunities where enthusiastic Christians of several denominations would rally together. It was in such events in the Twenties that the young impressionable Blackwood Brothers were introduced to this kind of engaging music. The wholescale advent of the electronic media (including phonograph records and radio) was to explode, facilitating the expansion of gospel music. Within the time span of only one generation, gospel music eventually reached every corner of the world. The Blackwood Brothers and other groups supported the pioneer publishers and in the decades that followed pioneered the spread of Christian music across the USA. Between the two great World Wars, they put in the hands of common folk books with songs from James D. Vaughan, R. E. Winsett, Hartford Music, Stamps Baxter Music, and Gospel Quartet Music. These prized publications contained three major types of sacred songs, sweet solemn hymns, repetitive spirituals, and the happy, rollicking gospel songs! The spirit of these numbers inspired multitudes! Like many established structures of society, the focus of Christian music began to dramatically change during the period after World War II and particularly in the Sixties. Society's accepted values and norms were under tremendous attack not least in morality, fashion and art-forms. It was a substantial social revolution that affected every area of culture, even ethics. Gospel music until this time, (from the likes of George Beverly Shea, Mahalia Jackson, Pat Boone, the Blackwood Brothers, James Cleveland and others), aimed primarily at the older church members. The younger generation wanted Christian music to attract all ages. Suddenly, innovative sounds arose from artistes like Elvis Presley, Cliff Richard, Andrae Crouch, Second Chapter Of Acts, Jessy Dixon, Barry McGuire and many more! Contemporary composers, arrangers, and producers (such as Michael Omartian, David Clydesdale, Bruce Herring, Jimmy and Carol Owens, Bob MacKenzie and others) started writing more modern material potentially much wider in taste and scope. The Sixties were a pivotal time in the church - the early days of the "Jesus Movement", the "Charismatic Movement", the "House Church Movement" and the "Praise and Worship Movement". In the Seventies, performers emerged to international prominence from what became known as the "Jesus Movement". On the Californian coast thousands of teens and twenties were "turning to Christ" as winds of revival blew worldwide. Not everyone, however, approved but the younger generation warmly embraced the changes as repertoires and arrangements illustrated. Later decades continued to push back the established cultural horizons in Christian music as a whole. Large and noteworthy gatherings started to take place such as England's Greenbelt Arts Festival and the Christian Artistes Conventions hosted in different parts of the world by the likes of pioneers like Cam Floria and Leen La Riviere of Continental Ministries. Fuelled by the new trends, by this time it was generally considered that progressively professionalism was now found its role throughout the ranks of all the growing Christian music genres. Many of the audio recording projects were now made in the hit-making studios of London, Chicago, New York, Los Angeles and in particular, Nashville. Over later decades, thousands of new recordings followed from a galaxy of many new Christian artistes with substantial God-given talent such as Michael W. Smith, Amy Grant, Sandi Patti, Bill and Gloria Gaither, Carman and Graham Kendrick. By the Nineties it seemed that professional diversity was complete as Christian artistes foraged into the whole spectrum of styles ranging from rap, dance, jazz, soul, rock, country, folk as well as "praise and worship". Artistes such as dc Talk, Steven Curtis Chapman, Delirious, Matt Redman and Martin Smith proliferated. In the UK and the USA, new festivals and conventions that majored on contemporary expressions of music prospered profusely. History’s irrepressible advances will condemn the vast majority of mankind’s art and industry to be lost forever in the sands of subsequent generations. In this book in a balanced way, I have sought to subjectively and objectively select the special inspirational songs that I think, on merit are deserving of longevity. Clearly reflective of my personal taste, those songs have sufficient quality or dare I say, an eternal quality to outlive the generations that produced them. The dictionary describes a classic as a work of lasting quality. Among the ranks of inspirational music recording classics are some outstanding works and performances that justly deserve more than a dust-gathering place on the archive shelves of the great recording companies. History documents that Man's longest lasting songs are God-directed. Relatively speaking, the audio recorded works of Mankind's music belong to recent history. Although much of what is produced may commendably serve its own generation, the majority will clearly not, and does not deserve to stand the test of time. As we commence the Third Millennium AD, these musical expressions of faith are a tangible reminder of God-honouring gospel music that can inspire those who follow. Our peers still find genuine inspiration and peaceful consolation in the music of the Twentieth Century! Singable Christian rhyme is still at the core of the British and American cultures and peoples. Despite the flagrantly permissive attitudes and actions around us, Middle-Britain and Middle-America's Christian communities are musically still generally, down-to-earth, unpretentious and happy to "wear religion on the sleeve". Paradoxically, the Twentieth Century Christian music legacy is brimful of both the personal and impersonal, the complex and uncomplicated, the sentimental and the unsentimental. Yet it is music that personally, still tugs at the heart, moistens the eyes, sets feet tapping and voices humming! It will continue to inspire generations yet unborn. PAUL DAVIS (copyright 2003) |
|||
| Web Design |
|
Paul Davis (NCM),
P O Box 6207,
Leighton Buzzard,
Beds.
LU7 0WQ,
England
www.newchristianmusic.co.uk | 1:25 - Saturday 6 September 2008
