Gospel Music

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Gospel songs to praise God everywhere you go!!

Gospel music singers of the following:

Mary Mary

Kirk Franklin

Isaac Carree

Fred Hammond

Tasha Cobbs

Marvin Sapp

Stacie Orrico

Yolanda Adams

Crystal Lewis

Gospel Music

Have you ever heard a song that moved you to the point where you wanted to tell all of your friends about it? Well, that is the type of feeling you may experience when listening to gospel music. By its very definition, the term gospel means good news. Gospel music is one of the vehicles through which the ideals of Christianity have been spread to audiences all over the world.

History

Gospel music is deeply rooted in the rich traditions of the African-American church. During the late 1800s, African-American churches in the southern United States started to fuse various styles of music into their worship services including African-American spirituals, hymns, and sacred songs. Such music was primarily sung at church and accompanied by hand clapping and foot stomping.

At the heart of the gospel music tradition was the use of a choir. The church choir consisted of a group of volunteer singers from the church congregation. Choir members could easily be distinguished from the rest of the congregation because they normally dressed in uniforms, which were choir robes. This might be something you remember from various films like The Blues Brothers, Sister Act 2, or Norbit.

The types of music sang by the gospel choir followed the call and response format similar to that used in traditional hymns and sacred songs.

The traditional structure of gospel music changed in the late 1930s when Thomas A. Dorsey began work for Pilgrim Baptist Church in Chicago, Illinois. Dorsey was a former jazz pianist and composer who had worked with famous players such as Ma Rainey and Hudson Tamp Red Whitaker. Dorsey infused his study of blues and jazz with traditional gospel music. This new style of music, known as gospel blues, was initially rejected. However, by the end of the 1930s, gospel blues won over acceptance as the new form of traditional gospel.

Thomas Dorsey, The Father of Gospel Music

Thomas Dorsey, The Father of Gospel Music

Gospel music continued to evolve throughout the late 1930s. There are four distinct styles of gospel music including, but not limited to, quartet style, traditional gospel, contemporary gospel, and praise and worship. The Gospel quartet style is one in which a small number of male vocalists sing music together with tight harmonies. The major difference between traditional and contemporary gospel styles is that contemporary gospel places more emphasis on the solo artists as opposed to the choir. Most contemporary artists rarely sing with a choir. Praise and worship is a combination of both contemporary and traditional gospel styles, in that a praise leader has a small group of singers to help lead the congregation into singing gospel music.

Artists

In addition to Thomas Dorsey, there are many others who contributed to the development of gospel music including James Cleveland and Mahalia Jackson. James Cleveland was a member of Pilgrim Baptist Church and sang under the direction of Thomas Dorsey. Cleveland was the founder of the Gospel Music Workshop Association (GMWA), the first gospel artist to record a live gospel LP, and the first gospel artist to sell 50,000 albums.