SG History 101

SG History 101 - Mar 05

This month, I’d like to examine the contributions of African-Americans to the heritage of southern gospel music.

Cleavant Derricks

In the years following the Civil War, as the United States struggled to re-integrate its’ Southern states back into its’ cultural fabric, gospel singing in both black and white communities developed along similar paths. As shape-note singing spread among whites in the South, so it did with many blacks as well, though economic factors and literacy differences tended to impede the development of songbooks among blacks in a comparable manner to that of whites. Nevertheless, the development of the call-and-response singing tradition among blacks enabled the development of their gospel music to keep at a comparable pace with that of their white neighbors in the South. By the 1930s, both white and black gospel traditions developed along commercial channels, making them accessible to urban centers in all parts of the country. But instead of radio, where white gospel singing dominated, the black gospel artists became popular through recordings, since inexpensive phonographs enabled blacks to gain access to their favorite artists in a way radio could not, and radio catered more to the affluent white markets. Still, there was some intermingling, even then. In the decade before World War II, a black Baptist minister from Tennessee named Cleavant Derricks wrote songs for the Stamps-Baxter Music Company. His music showed a definite shape-note influence, and became popular in the convention songbooks of the period. Derricks wrote many songs that became gospel quartet standards, the best known of which were “Just A Little Talk With Jesus”, “We’ll Soon Be Done With Troubles and Trials”, and “When God Dips His Love In My Heart”. His songs were quite popular among white convention audiences, who most likely were unaware of the author’s racial origins.

Golden Gate Quartet

As the relationship between white quartets and shape-note publishing companies weakened, ties between black and white gospel increased. White quartets who admired the vocal ability of their black counterparts and who were in need of new material, began to appropriate black songs and arrangements through records, radio programs, and concerts. And a lot of white singers were very familiar with the work of such black groups as the Dixie Hummingbirds, the Five Blind Boys, the Nightingales, the Fairfield Four, the Harmonizing Four, and the Golden Gate Quartet. And by 1953, the Blackwood Brothers had recorded spirituals such as “Rolling, Riding, Rocking”, “Swing Down Chariot”, and “Rock-A-My Soul”, and were performing them in their concerts. In fact, in the case of the Blackwoods’ use of the Golden Gate Quartet’s “Swing Down Chariot” and the Statesmen’s adaptation of the Gospel Harmonettes’ “Get Away Jordan”, there was actual cooperation between black and white groups. Both black and white groups were consciously borrowing songs and styles from each other.

The Golden Gate Quartet placed an indelible stamp on white gospel quartets and their fans. They were an extremely versatile group that could not only sing spirituals in a captivating style which included syncopated rhythms, but they were also adept at impersonating sound effects such as automobile engines, train whistles, and boat motors and incorporating them into their material. They sang in a smooth, a cappella style, often described as “jubilee” which appealed to white as well as black audiences, and became quite popular by the 1940s. They travelled extensively across the nation at that time, and were even paired with groups like the Blackwoods and Statesmen in concerts in the South. James Blackwood remembered those associations fondly, despite also having to endure awkward moments when stopping at roadside cafes in the South, and seeing the Gates refused service because of their skin color.

Despite the enforcement of the existing “Jim Crow” regulations, audiences were quite accepting of the Gates’ music, as they appeared often alongside white quartets throughout the early 1950s. Perhaps predictably, though, the southern furor over the landmark Brown vs. Board of Education Supreme Court decision in 1954 put an end to the Golden Gate Quartet’s appearances there with white quartets, and it would be almost two decades before another black gospel group would find that kind of appeal with white audiences.

Teddy Huffam

That group was Teddy Huffam and the Gems, from Richmond, Virginia. Huffam was a talented stylist and pianist who surrounded himself with a group of young black singers in a unique mix that combined traditional black singing with white arrangements. The group’s recording of the Eldridge Fox song “Gone” hit the top of the Singing News Top Forty chart in 1979 and remained in the top twenty there for the next three years, making it one of the biggest southern gospel hits ever.

Huffam’s success paved the way for several other black artists in the southern gospel marketplace, such as Charles Johnson and the Revivers in the 1980s and 1990s, whose success inspired other artists such as Don DeGrate and Strong Tower from Charlotte, NC, the Gospel Enforcers from Morganton, NC, and the Reggie Saddler Family from Yale, NC. Such groups provide an important minority presence within the southerno gospel industry as the 21st century unfolds.

Despite their audiences remaining predominantly white, the very acceptance of them on stage stands as not only a hopeful sign of southern gospel’s reaching out to a broader evangelical coalition, but as recognition of the fact that good music knows no color distinctions, and that black and white alike are a part of the rich musical mosaic that is gospel music.

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Written: 02/28/2005 |

Category: SG History 101

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Reader Comments

MsJudy ~ 03/01/2005

Very interesting John! I for one really appreciate the time you put into this! You're the best! BTW, I love those Blind Boys!