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Themes
Of Gospel |
Introduction to Gospel*Gospel comes out of
congregational singing in the black church.
It has its roots in the pain, struggle and endurance of the black
American experience, including slavery.
Spirituals, which were sung in the cotton field, influenced gospel
music. You can hear it in the
rhythm of the drums, popular in gospel and like spirituals, connecting
this music to Africa. But
gospel is urban music. Gospel first became
popular in the 1920’s as a religious first cousin to the secular blues.
Many of the great early gospel musicians, like Thomas Dorsey
(“Precious Lord”, “God Be With You”), were originally blues
musicians. Gospel was popularized in evangelical revivals, store-front
churches, and poor inner-city neighbors.
Traditional mainline black Baptist and Methodist churches shunned
gospel. Gospel was too
secular, too close to the blues, perhaps too moving, too real, too human.
Ironically, while a
close cousin to the blues, gospel composers like Charles Tindley and
Thomas Dorsey were also influenced by classical music.
Music from the historical gospel period of the 1930’s - 1950’s,
while close to the blues, has simple chords, lush sounds, and classical
arpeggios (Kenny play). In
the 1950’s and 1960’s, amid racial, and class changes, gospel gained
acceptance in mainline black churches.
Gospel itself also changed, entering the contemporary phase, this
time influenced by jazz, it added chromatic scales and a pop sound.
Many crossover pop singers like Aretha Franklin, the late, great
Sam Cooke, Dionne Warwick, and Dinah Washington began as gospel singers.
(Kenny and bass - jazz - play). In
the 1970’s and 1980’s gospel evolved one more time, into urban
contemporary gospel. The
music was still performed by black artists, like Bebe and Cece Wynans, but
for the first time it was reaching a white and black audience.
Kenny played me some urban contemporary gospel and I said “Other
than the words it sounds like a Walt Disney score.”
Kenny said “Yes”, it is like pop music, only with Biblical
words and the feel and emotion of gospel.
Obviously, the easy accessibility is why many people love and are
sustained by this style of gospel. For
me, this style of gospel is more challenging, lush, contemporary sounds
wrapped in a Biblical message. (Uneasy
by marketing, popularity? Would
not want to deny power and importance to others). Even
more recently gospel has evolved one more time to “Praise and Worship”
music that began in the white evangelical “seeker” church movement
(like Vineyard), and gained later acceptance in the black church.
Kenny told me that he heard praise and worship gospel for the first
time on “PTL” with Jim Baker, a white preacher reaching a white
audience. This is celebratory, hands up, clapping, scriptural theme music.
The evolution of gospel
is the story of the evolution of race in twentieth century America, out of
the depths of black struggle, despair and hope, at first only listened to
by poor, urban blacks. In one
hundred years gospel has conquered America, reaching into all avenues of
the black church, and many white churches as well, converting souls to its
visionary vitality. When I did my pastoral
chaplaincy training in Boston I worked with Danny, a man from rural
Kentucky studying for the priesthood.
Sometimes we would sit at the piano.
Danny would play and together we would sing “God Be With You,”
a gospel favorite you will hear later in the service.
A someday Unitarian Universalist minister and Catholic priest, both
of us white. This is the
wonderful power of gospel, music that makes strangers into friends. Themes of Gospel “It has been said
that there is hardly an emotion that gospel music cannot stir.”
I’d like to tell you a story about gospel stirring. At last Thursday’s rehearsal, some choir members had
questions about one of the pieces you are about to hear “I Need You to
Survive.” They were
uncomfortable with some of the lyrics “I need you, you need me, we are
all a part of God’s body.” I
am grateful that these members had the courage to voice their concerns.
We can’t fully learn from one another until we honestly share our
truths. If we are to be honest
as Unitarian Universalists, we must have the courage to stand next to this
challenge. We are a faith
that encourages acceptance of one another (3rd Purpose and
Principle), and a free and responsible search for truth and meaning (4th
Purpose and Principle), both of which assume that we will not always share
the same opinions. I knew in preparing for
this service that there would be concerns, and not just in the choir.
Gospel music is gospel in large part because it spreads the “good
news” of the New Testament, stories of God, Jesus, and salvation.
I spoke to one person, raised in a church with gospel music, who
told me that gospel taught her the Biblical stories from childhood, and
that it has always brought her closer to God.
This is a wondrous use of music, but not one that has meaning for
all of us. Kenny
and I were careful. We did not select gospel music with overly divisive Christian
themes, but you will hear Christian themes.
You are not going to hear any songs about Calvary (story about
interfaith service). We went good news light in this service. And
at the same time, it was important for us to bring the authentic gospel
experience, not to delete its language, story, and emotional power.
I didn’t exclude jazz from our worship and arts series because it
is not religious. Likewise, I
am not going to exclude gospel because it is religious.
Jazz and gospel both belong in this series because of what they
move us to understand (spontaneity, Christianity, emotion, contact, the
black experience, the American experience).
Take what has meaning for you at the service and leave the rest
behind. There is no attempt
at conversion here today, only an experience of worship and the arts and
theological diversity. In
meeting with Kenny to prepare for this service he told me that he
recognizes gospel both by the words and the feel, that gospel is
emotional, soulful, stirring, inspirational. So here is a further challenge for us this morning.
Sometimes we are so interested in words and ideas that we ignore
mood and emotion. Sometimes
we misuse words and ideas to distance ourselves from mood and emotion.
Can a Unitarian Universalist need someone?
Can someone need a Unitarian Universalist?
Yes, and yes. All our
lives we are in need. Are we
afraid to have the need named and stirred? Well,
as Unitarian Universalists, our choir had to take a vote.
And our choir here, composed of fellow Unitarian Universalists,
voted to sing “I Need You to Survive.”
First Church Choir, thank you.
We commend your honesty, courage, and democracy.
But they went even further. You
should have heard Kenny telling me with disbelief what happened after
choir rehearsal. “They
decided the piano should be on stage, so we could all be closer, work
together, and hear another. Sharon,
then they pulled the heavy risers out, and pulled the piano on stage.
The women joined in. The
choir, Sharon.” “It has been said that there is hardly an emotion that
gospel music cannot stir.” Hmm. * Factual information and quote taken from J. Jefferson Cleveland, "A Historical Account of the Black Gospel Song," Songs of Zion (1982), 172. |