Origin(s) of gospel music, black Americian gospel and blues

The main differences between Gospel and spirituals/hymns are
1. Gospel was a new trend lead by professional composers. Spirituals/Hymns came from folks doing traditional music or folklore @ churches.
2. Gospel was aimed at the masses, popular, until then it wasn't considered right to use religious music as popular, but then they accepted it in order to pull masses closer to religion.
3. Spirituals and Hymns were very close in singing form to congregations, sermons and prayers. In recordings of the most popular Spirituals/Hymns singers like Rev. McGhee and Rev. Gates a sermon during the record wasn't rare, the style of singing was very much influenced by that, closer than the Gospel singers.
4. In the Spirituals/ Hymns singers were trying as much as they can that the music would not sound Blues, because it was considered the Devil's music. In the 1930's and 1940's when Gospel was on, the borders became looser and looser, until they created together (Jump) Blues+Gospel=Soul.

The distinction between "gospel" and "hymns" is complicated by the fact that hymns came before gospel, but gospel then incorporated hymns into the genre. Hymns can be sung "straight" or in gospel style.

Muddy

As regularly demonstrated in Lutheran churches :D

I just recently was in the Miss. Delta to give in-school/Blues In The Schools presentations and give an all day blues history/teaching seminar at the BB King Museum and Delta Interpretive Center in Indianola, MS.

I will be posting photos of that trip in the 'blues hangout' area as soon as I get a chance to go through and edit them ... in the meantime ...

While I was at the BB King Museum there was a program being presented in the lobby/coffee/gift shop area by Mr. Golden, an older Black gentleman, in his late 70s I'd guess, a former field hand in the cotton fields, on subject of cotton picking/labor in the 'old days' ... and he brought along lots of items to 'show and tell' about ... cotton sacks, tools, photos, etc.

In the course of his presentation he asked if anyone had questions ... since I was doing a presentation on blues history and teaching blues history at the museum on the following day ... I asked Mr. Golden about what was sung in the fields in this area of Mississippi ... there were also some older, over 70, Black ladies present who work as docents at the museum ... they all responded to my question with the same/similar answers ...

"When our parents were in the fields working with us we generally sang Dr. Watts hymns. Somebody would suggest we 'Hey, sing an old Dr. Watts hymn!' And we would proceed to sing a song like "Father I stretch my hand to thee." "When our parents were not in the fields with us we would frequently sing blues songs."

This was fascinating to me ... and I proceeded to ask about who Dr. Watts was ... but Mr. Golden and the docents/ladies could not tell me anything about Dr. Watts. All they knew was that the hymns they most frequently sang were taught to them from Dr. Watts' book.

I then proceeded to go in to tour the BB King museum ... and the first thing I saw when I walked into the museum was the photo/lyrics on the wall, facing the entrance as you walk into the museum ... see below. Now I had a 'lead' ... I went into the lobby and got one of the docent/ladies who had taken much time in telling me about 'singing in the fields' ... I showed her the mural with the lyrics and she said ... "Oh, now we both know a little bit about Dr. Isaac Watts. He's the one who wrote the hymn books we learned from."

So what I learned from this is that the hymns of Dr. Isaac Watts were frequently taught in Black churches in this region and frequently sung in the fields while working ... and as I was still very curious to know more about Watts, I followed up by looking for information on Dr. Watts online ... and judging by what I read about Watts at various web sites, he was/is a famous guy and very prolific in his contributions to Christian hymnal history/annals ... a 'testament' to my ignorance on the subject. I guess, some might say, "What? You've never heard of the great Dr. Isaac Watts?" ... well, no, I hadn't ... but, hey, I learned something ...

Dr. Isaac Watts bio.:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Watts
http://www.wholesomewords.org/biography/bwatts2.html

Isaac Watts (1674-1748) was an English pastor, preacher, poet, and hymn writer. Wrote about 600 hymns including When I Survey the Wondrous Cross, Am I a Soldier of the Cross, and Joy to the World. Considered the founder of English hymnody and children's hymnody. Published books of poetry, hymns, and three volumes of theological discourses.
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http://www.hawkeyeherman.com/pdf/african_american_music.pdf

The music of blacks during slavery integrated their African heritage and the Judeo-Christian ethic. African American musical traditions began to emerge as an identifiable entity in the latter half of the 18th century, with the development of the sacred form of music known as the spiritual.

Spirituals were sung in both religious and nonsacred settings. The use of the spiritual reflects the African ideal that while sacred song allows one to communicate with the other world, it may also address matters of the present world.

One combination of song and movement that developed during slavery was known as ring shouts, or shout spirituals. These were a form of musical and religious expression performed primarily "after service" in praise houses or after a formal religious event. The music was call-and-response oriented; accompaniment included singing, hand clapping, foot stamping, and thigh slapping. Shout music came from a body of spirituals and/or hymns used primarily for religious expression. The music was drawn from remnants of African melodies, single lines from hymns or folk spirituals, and songs reflecting significant events in the lives of participants.

Spirituals developed in northern independent black churches during the 18th and 19th centuries. Freedmen utilized the singing style and the practice of mixing movement with the music found in the South, but modified them to suit their specific needs. Spirituals were adapted from other hymnals, taken from folk and popular songs, or were new tunes composed to accompany text. Richard Allen's hymnal, published in 1801, used all of these techniques. Allen modified some hymns by adding supplementary lines, refrain lines, and choruses to ensure full participation of the congregation.

Philadelphia minister Charles Albert Tindley continued the tradition of Richard Allen. By the early 1900s, Tindley wrote more than 45 hymns, including "Stand By Me," "We'll Understand it Better By and By," and "I'll Overcome Someday." In the late 19th century, arranged spirituals appeared. George L. White, a young white teacher at Fisk University, developed a repertoire of classical music and musical forms that originated during slavery but were changed to reflect the different circumstances under which these former slaves lived. He gave his students musical training and formed the Fisk Jubilee Singers, who began touring in 1871. This started a musical tradition in historically black colleges and universities.
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photo:
Large photo/mural projected on the wall at the entrance to the BB King Museum in Indinola, MS;

Attached Image

This reminded me of the Blind Boys Of Alabama's "Amazing Grace", which sounds like "House Of The Rising Sun".

<<Spirituals/Hymns came from folks doing traditional music or folklore @ churches.>>

MM,

IMHO, spirituals and hymns do NOT necessarily emanate from the same source, and generally do not. Please read my previous post in this thread ... many of the hymns sung in African American churches, and in the fields to pass long hours of labor in the Mississippi Delta were composed by Dr. Isaac Watts, a (white) Englishman, as well as other hymnal composers. That takes the 'hymn' out of the realm of what you have called 'came from folks doing traditional music of folklore' and into the realm of professional musicians/composers. Hymns and spirituals should not be placed in the same category, nor do they come from the same source.


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Isaac Watts (1674-1748) was an English pastor, preacher, poet, and hymn writer. Wrote about 600 hymns including When I Survey the Wondrous Cross, Am I a Soldier of the Cross, and Joy to the World. Considered the founder of English hymnody and children's hymnody. Published books of poetry, hymns, and three volumes of theological discourses.

Hawkeye, where did you get the idea I was saying it is the same source? I think you are jumping to a conclusion that that cannot be extracted logically from the text I wrote.

I read what W.C. Handy wrote ... re read his book and see that what I wrote here is exactly the point he wrote in his book. He explained the two sources there.

What does it matter whether Watts was black or white?

Not wanting to stand on Hawkeyes, MMs toes or anything but I can confirm the above is correct from a Scottish point of view. At a regular Church of Scotland service the congregation sings around 6 songs from the book of Psalms and the book of hymns. This has been the case for many hundreds of years and is still ongoing. Spirituals do not form any part of the service and from another place entirely.

I think W.C. Handy saw it differently, because for him it was just a matter of two different kinds of churches. In most book they always write "spirituals" only and don't deal with hymns, especially because they don't do the churches separation. But Handy did recognize that there are two streams. Maybe because hymns got later a new meaning. But Handy (and actually, this very thread), is dealing with the original source, not with modern terminologies. Hence I think Handy who was himself a great and unappreciated researcher, he was interested in the way things were developed by folks and he researched how it really was developed.

<<Spirituals/Hymns came from folks doing traditional music or folklore @ churches.>> - MM

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