African American Music:
Spirituals and Gospel Music
Spirituals and gospel music are two of several different kinds of music that originated in the experiences of African American people. There are now European American categories within these two styles, but for now, we will focus on spirituals and gospel music of African Americans. Spirituals and gospel music are related to each other, but they developed at different times in history: Spirituals rose out of the experience of enslaved Africans in Colonial America, and gospel music developed in the early twentieth century in cities.
Spirituals
There are two types of spirituals: One is the folk spiritual and the other is the arranged spiritual. The folk spiritual grew out of the earliest spiritual expression of enslaved Africans in the farmlands of Colonial America.
Folk Spirituals
When enslaved Africans were exposed to Christianity, many accepted some aspects of it and rejected others. They came to the New World with the knowledge of another way of expressing religious fervor that involved responding verbally, singing, dancing, and shouting. They sought privacy when worshiping, because some slave owners forbade them to express spirituality in this way. They met in "invisible churches" in ravines, forests, fields, slave quarters, and anywhere else they could that was away from the critical eyes and ears of European Americans. This was the only opportunity for meaningful expression and for preservation of elements of African culture for many enslaved Africans. Their church meetings involved prayer, singing, hand clapping, dancing, telling of personal spiritual experiences, and sometimes shouting and preaching. Prayer often turned into singing, and the congregation was encouraged to respond verbally to what was going on at all times.
The call-and-response pattern of singing that was the basis for the spiritual is one cultural trait that has flourished everywhere the people of Western and Central African countries have gone. In this pattern the soloist sings something different each time, changing the words and the melody, but the group sings the same response, chorus, or refrain after each solo. This musical pattern can go on indefinitely. Some early church meetings lasted all night. The solo-group pattern illustrates a social order in which the success of the individual and the idea of diversity are celebrated by the group, which is constant in its support. The texts for call-and-response spirituals were often taken from European hymns.
Although drums were banned by many slave owners because they were believed to be used to send signals, African Americans still "drummed" with their feet and used body movements to keep drumming styles alive as a part of religious singing and worship.
The "ring shout" is a shuffling circle dance that involves clapping. It was performed with lively spirituals. The ring shout is related to spiritual practices in West Africa.
Spirituals were sometimes sung for purposes other than worship. They were sung in work gangs, to keep everyone working at the same speed. Sometimes they were coded with messages about impending escape attempts, directions for how to head north on the Underground Railroad, or which houses were safe havens while traveling. Spirituals containing such messages include "Go Down, Moses" and "Follow the Drinking Gourd." The texts of most spirituals were based on biblical passages. On the surface, a text might be about Moses leading the Hebrews out of exile, but the message applied well to enslaved Africans who yearned for the "promised land" of the North and the freedom found there.
Arranged Spirituals
Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, was the place where the African American spiritual was developed for presentation in concerts all over the United States and Europe, to white as well as black audiences. The treasurer of the university, George White, organized the Fisk Jubilee Singers to give concerts to raise funds for the university. There were eleven men and women in the group, and most of them were formerly enslaved African Americans. Some elements of the performance practice of spirituals were changed for concert use. Gone were the round shouts, foot stomping, spontaneity, improvisation, and overt expression of folk spirituals. Control, precision, and uniformity of expression were the norm for concerts. Spirituals were sung a cappella and in call-and-response patterns within verse-and-refrain form, but the singing was now blended. The music was notated and arranged for harmony parts in a Western European style. Notating each arranged spiritual gave it a definite ending, unlike the folk spiritual. Important composers of arranged spirituals include John Work II (1873–1925), William Dawson (1899–1990), R. Nathanniel Dett (1882–1943), John Work III (1901–1968), and Undine Smith Moore (1904–1989).
Some arranged spirituals were composed for solo voice accompanied by piano. The solo spiritual has become an important part of African American Christian worship services as well as a favorite way to end a solo vocal recital. Harry T. Burleigh (1866–1949) was the first composer to arrange spirituals for solo voice and piano.
Gospel Music
In the first few decades of the twentieth century, many African Americans moved from the southern countryside to northern cities. They brought their religious traditions with them to the new urban setting. Congregants from small country churches found their new spiritual homes in storefront city churches. Music for worship centered on the folk spiritual, but with the addition of instrumental accompaniment. This was a big change that led to what we call gospel music today. Three styles of gospel music emerged: the gospel hymn, rural gospel (sacred blues), and the Holiness-Pentecostal style.
Gospel Hymn
Charles Albert Tindley (1851–1933) was a Methodist minister in Philadelphia who developed the gospel hymn style. Some of his hymns had their roots in European anthems that lent themselves to choral responses. In his melodies, Tindley sometimes avoided the third and seventh scale degrees to allow for improvisation of blue notes on those degrees. He composed in the traditional call-and-response pattern in verse-and-refrain form, but his instrumental accompaniments moved his work from the spiritual category into the gospel category.
Rural Gospel
The blues of rural areas of the South found their way into church services in the urban North and became gospel music. Religious lyrics were sung in blues style by a solo singer accompanied by harmonica or guitar. Blind Willie Johnson and Blind Mamie Forehand were two important rural gospel singers around the turn of the twentieth century.
Holiness-Pentecostal Gospel
A very expressive and uninhibited worship style evolved in the new Pentecostal denomination in the first decade of the twentieth century. The Holiness-Pentecostal gospel style was close to the rural spiritual style with its singing and dancing. The use of brass instruments, mandolins, and jugs added to the enthusiasm of these worshipers and placed the music in the gospel category. Arizona Dranes was an important Holiness-Pentecostal gospel performer. Her recordings exhibit her trademark rhythmic ragtime piano playing and her vocal leads that could sometimes be characterized as shouts.
In the 1930s, Thomas Dorsey (1899–1993) worked with musicians such as Mahalia Jackson (1912–1972) to blend these three styles into one, which is what we now call traditional gospel music. Dorsey brought a combination of jazz,blues church music to the mix. Mahalia Jackson’s love of her native New Orleans blues, her church choir tradition (Baptist), and the sounds of the church next door to her house (Pentecostal) were blended into the new gospel style. At first, this style of religious musical expression was not accepted. It was called "sin music" because of its similarities to secular music. Thomas Dorsey organized workshops and conventions for gospel choirs. The style caught on fast. Now traditional gospel music is sung by black and white solists, quartets, and choirs of men or women or both. Accompaniments range from organ or piano to synthesizers, electric bass, drum set, bongos, saxophone, and brass. There are no limits on instrumental accompaniment.
Contemporary gospel groups are usually made up of small groups of one soloist or four to six singers; accompaniments are usually the same as the secular style the group embraces, such as hip-hop, rap, jazz, or funk.
A look at spirituals and gospel music reveals that although the musical style of the folk spiritual has changed over hundreds of years (as has much of America’s music), the core beliefs, strengths, and values of African American culture are still intact as expressed in spirituals and gospel music.
Spirituals and Gospel Music
Spirituals and gospel music are two of several different kinds of music that originated in the experiences of African American people. There are now European American categories within these two styles, but for now, we will focus on spirituals and gospel music of African Americans. Spirituals and gospel music are related to each other, but they developed at different times in history: Spirituals rose out of the experience of enslaved Africans in Colonial America, and gospel music developed in the early twentieth century in cities.
Spirituals
There are two types of spirituals: One is the folk spiritual and the other is the arranged spiritual. The folk spiritual grew out of the earliest spiritual expression of enslaved Africans in the farmlands of Colonial America.
Folk Spirituals
When enslaved Africans were exposed to Christianity, many accepted some aspects of it and rejected others. They came to the New World with the knowledge of another way of expressing religious fervor that involved responding verbally, singing, dancing, and shouting. They sought privacy when worshiping, because some slave owners forbade them to express spirituality in this way. They met in "invisible churches" in ravines, forests, fields, slave quarters, and anywhere else they could that was away from the critical eyes and ears of European Americans. This was the only opportunity for meaningful expression and for preservation of elements of African culture for many enslaved Africans. Their church meetings involved prayer, singing, hand clapping, dancing, telling of personal spiritual experiences, and sometimes shouting and preaching. Prayer often turned into singing, and the congregation was encouraged to respond verbally to what was going on at all times.
The call-and-response pattern of singing that was the basis for the spiritual is one cultural trait that has flourished everywhere the people of Western and Central African countries have gone. In this pattern the soloist sings something different each time, changing the words and the melody, but the group sings the same response, chorus, or refrain after each solo. This musical pattern can go on indefinitely. Some early church meetings lasted all night. The solo-group pattern illustrates a social order in which the success of the individual and the idea of diversity are celebrated by the group, which is constant in its support. The texts for call-and-response spirituals were often taken from European hymns.
Although drums were banned by many slave owners because they were believed to be used to send signals, African Americans still "drummed" with their feet and used body movements to keep drumming styles alive as a part of religious singing and worship.
The "ring shout" is a shuffling circle dance that involves clapping. It was performed with lively spirituals. The ring shout is related to spiritual practices in West Africa.
Spirituals were sometimes sung for purposes other than worship. They were sung in work gangs, to keep everyone working at the same speed. Sometimes they were coded with messages about impending escape attempts, directions for how to head north on the Underground Railroad, or which houses were safe havens while traveling. Spirituals containing such messages include "Go Down, Moses" and "Follow the Drinking Gourd." The texts of most spirituals were based on biblical passages. On the surface, a text might be about Moses leading the Hebrews out of exile, but the message applied well to enslaved Africans who yearned for the "promised land" of the North and the freedom found there.
Arranged Spirituals
Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, was the place where the African American spiritual was developed for presentation in concerts all over the United States and Europe, to white as well as black audiences. The treasurer of the university, George White, organized the Fisk Jubilee Singers to give concerts to raise funds for the university. There were eleven men and women in the group, and most of them were formerly enslaved African Americans. Some elements of the performance practice of spirituals were changed for concert use. Gone were the round shouts, foot stomping, spontaneity, improvisation, and overt expression of folk spirituals. Control, precision, and uniformity of expression were the norm for concerts. Spirituals were sung a cappella and in call-and-response patterns within verse-and-refrain form, but the singing was now blended. The music was notated and arranged for harmony parts in a Western European style. Notating each arranged spiritual gave it a definite ending, unlike the folk spiritual. Important composers of arranged spirituals include John Work II (1873–1925), William Dawson (1899–1990), R. Nathanniel Dett (1882–1943), John Work III (1901–1968), and Undine Smith Moore (1904–1989).
Some arranged spirituals were composed for solo voice accompanied by piano. The solo spiritual has become an important part of African American Christian worship services as well as a favorite way to end a solo vocal recital. Harry T. Burleigh (1866–1949) was the first composer to arrange spirituals for solo voice and piano.
Gospel Music
In the first few decades of the twentieth century, many African Americans moved from the southern countryside to northern cities. They brought their religious traditions with them to the new urban setting. Congregants from small country churches found their new spiritual homes in storefront city churches. Music for worship centered on the folk spiritual, but with the addition of instrumental accompaniment. This was a big change that led to what we call gospel music today. Three styles of gospel music emerged: the gospel hymn, rural gospel (sacred blues), and the Holiness-Pentecostal style.
Gospel Hymn
Charles Albert Tindley (1851–1933) was a Methodist minister in Philadelphia who developed the gospel hymn style. Some of his hymns had their roots in European anthems that lent themselves to choral responses. In his melodies, Tindley sometimes avoided the third and seventh scale degrees to allow for improvisation of blue notes on those degrees. He composed in the traditional call-and-response pattern in verse-and-refrain form, but his instrumental accompaniments moved his work from the spiritual category into the gospel category.
Rural Gospel
The blues of rural areas of the South found their way into church services in the urban North and became gospel music. Religious lyrics were sung in blues style by a solo singer accompanied by harmonica or guitar. Blind Willie Johnson and Blind Mamie Forehand were two important rural gospel singers around the turn of the twentieth century.
Holiness-Pentecostal Gospel
A very expressive and uninhibited worship style evolved in the new Pentecostal denomination in the first decade of the twentieth century. The Holiness-Pentecostal gospel style was close to the rural spiritual style with its singing and dancing. The use of brass instruments, mandolins, and jugs added to the enthusiasm of these worshipers and placed the music in the gospel category. Arizona Dranes was an important Holiness-Pentecostal gospel performer. Her recordings exhibit her trademark rhythmic ragtime piano playing and her vocal leads that could sometimes be characterized as shouts.
In the 1930s, Thomas Dorsey (1899–1993) worked with musicians such as Mahalia Jackson (1912–1972) to blend these three styles into one, which is what we now call traditional gospel music. Dorsey brought a combination of jazz,blues church music to the mix. Mahalia Jackson’s love of her native New Orleans blues, her church choir tradition (Baptist), and the sounds of the church next door to her house (Pentecostal) were blended into the new gospel style. At first, this style of religious musical expression was not accepted. It was called "sin music" because of its similarities to secular music. Thomas Dorsey organized workshops and conventions for gospel choirs. The style caught on fast. Now traditional gospel music is sung by black and white solists, quartets, and choirs of men or women or both. Accompaniments range from organ or piano to synthesizers, electric bass, drum set, bongos, saxophone, and brass. There are no limits on instrumental accompaniment.
Contemporary gospel groups are usually made up of small groups of one soloist or four to six singers; accompaniments are usually the same as the secular style the group embraces, such as hip-hop, rap, jazz, or funk.
A look at spirituals and gospel music reveals that although the musical style of the folk spiritual has changed over hundreds of years (as has much of America’s music), the core beliefs, strengths, and values of African American culture are still intact as expressed in spirituals and gospel music.
