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Gospel Music Essay

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An African American religious experience has always been shown and experienced through in the United States specifically, is called Gospel Music. A deep-rooted African American tradition formed by generations of African slaves. Gospel music was virtually ignored by white Christians and it was not until the twentieth century that denominational churches included gospel as a form of music. The church audience is a unique audience in which American gospel became performance based and was isolated from the American mainstream entertainment. They were songs that should change lives and become part of the entire Christian experience. A form of black gospel music derived from church services and from spirituals sung as a way of life. Origins from …show more content…

Dorsey. Thomas A. Dorsey, first hand created gospel music. He has written over 400 compositions in his lifetime while recording his most known hymn “Take my hand, precious Lord”. He mixed his secular genre of blues and jazz music with incorporated with the sacred text of the bible. However, he did not have an immediate impact with the church, especially ones that are predominately white. Dorsey was continuously rejected by numerous of mainstream churches after his recovery. Later on, he teamed up with fellow gospel legend Mahalia Jackson. To add on, Mahalia Jackson called the “queen of gospel music” with Thomas A. Dorsey combined to form the golden age of gospel music. Mahalia Jackson was born on October 26, 1911, in New Orleans. Mahalia Jackson is viewed by many as the “Queen” of gospel music. Her singing began at the age of four in her church, the Plymouth Rock Baptist Church in New Orleans. Her early style blended the freedom and power of gospel with the stricter style of the Baptist Church. To get more exposure she moved to Chicago at the age 16 and immediately got a lot of work as a soloist at churches and funerals. As she got older she became friends with Thomas A. Dorsey and became becoming more popular. Throughout the 1950’s she becoming heard on radio stations and music halls all across America. These two artists became very influential towards the later generation not to just African

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