(organ plays) (organ plays) MOSS III: Gracious and most merciful God.

We thank you for those who went before us.

(organ plays) (organ plays) THOMAS: I thank you for this tradition of African American preaching that has always sought the very best for all people.

(organ plays) CROFT: We pray that you will be present among us through your spirit.

So that what we say and what we do, will be to your glory and to your honor.

(organ plays) COOK: Bless us we pray.

It's in your name.

Amen.

(organ plays) HENRY: A little bit of gospel!

♪ You can't call each other ♪ Oh, no ♪ GATES: The Black church has been the home of creative expression and experimentation for more than 300 years.

From the beginning, this creativity was driven by the one instrument that Black people could count on when nothing else was available; The human voice.

♪ Trouble in my way ♪ Now, I have to cry sometimes ♪ Oh, so much trouble ♪ GATES: Preaching and singing have long been the foundational art forms of the Black religious experience, and they came together early in the 20th century to create a new genre known as gospel.

PIERCE: The Black preaching tradition is deeply connected to the gospel music tradition.

Our singers preach, and our preachers sing.

♪ I'm going to lift up holy hands and give God glory ♪ ♪ I need, I need ♪ GATES: From the beginning, gospel was a music responding to its time, testifying to God's goodness and grace in the language of the King James Bible, uplifted by rhythms and riffs from the blues and jazz.

JORDAN: The gospel sound is a free vocal sound that comes from the heart.

♪ Ohh ♪ JORDAN: It comes from the many, many rivers that a people have had to cross to get to freedom.

CROWD: Black Lives Matter!

Black Lives Matter!

HAROLD: It is the musical variant of the Black sacred tradition.

It is the good news.

♪ We're carved scraped, and shaven ♪ ♪ Like rock, wood, and metal ♪ DARDEN: It's the music of Saturday night with the message of Sunday morning.

♪ Ooh ♪ HAIRSTON: Gospel music has transcended where it came from, and now it belongs to the world.

♪ Yeah ♪ Trust in the Lord ♪ GATES: Together with preaching... WOMAN: Hallelujah.

GATES: Gospel has long been the heart and soul of the Black church, spreading the good news and broadcasting the message everywhere.

(theme music plays) ♪ You oughta trust ♪ ♪ Tell me who's that writin' ♪ John the Revelator ♪ Tell me who's that writin' ♪ John the Revelator ♪ Tell me who's that writin' ♪ John the Revelator ♪ Wrote the boo of the seven seals ♪ ♪ Tell me who's that writin' ♪ John the Revelator ♪ Tell me who's that writin' ♪ John the Revelator ♪ Tell me who's that writin' ♪ John the Revelator ♪ Wrote the boo of the seven seals ♪ ♪ You know God walked down in the cool of the day ♪ ♪ Called Adam by his name ♪ He refused to answer ♪ 'Cause he wa naked and ashamed ♪ ♪ Tell me who's that writin' ♪ John the Revelator ♪ GATES: The story of gospel begins with the Great Migration.

As Black migrants made their way from the deep south to cities in the north and the west after 1910, they carried the songs and preaching styles of their home churches right along with them.

Soon the sounds of worship in Black churches in the north began to reflect the tones and timbres of the churches back home in the south.

HAROLD: If you trace the evolution of gospel music, you see the importance of space and place.

♪ Ooh ♪ HAROLD: Gospel music is tied to the history of Black migration and Black movement.

♪ Three he led away ♪ He said ♪ REV.

BARRON: They are melding the sounds of blues... ♪ 'Till I go yonder ♪ REV.

BARRON: With folk spiritual sounds.

And it is creating what we come to know today as gospel music.

♪ John the Revelator ♪ Tell me who's that writin' ♪ John the Revelator ♪ MAROVICH: It was in Chicago that gospel music was first written, sung, performed, disseminated, and recorded.

BEST: Chicago is absolutely the birthplace of gospel music.

♪ Tell me who's that writin' ♪ Oh, John the Revelator ♪ Wrote the boo of the seven seals ♪ ♪ Oh, Lord ♪ God have mercy ♪ GATES: Though many southern transplants contributed to the rise of gospel, perhaps no one played a more pivotal role than a young musician named Thomas A. Dorsey.

Born in Georgia and raised on the music of the church, Dorsey headed north to Chicago after he'd made a name for himself as a blues musician.

DORSEY: Leaving Atlanta I had came to Chicago where I felt that my music could be better felt and more appreciated.

I wrote, recorded, played, and sang with others on more than 200 blues songs in the '20s.

MARTIN: In the 1920s, we have the rise of recorded Black sound.

So we have everything on the phonograph from Louis Armstrong, Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey.

MAROVICH: Dorsey was self-trained for the most part on piano.

And to earn income, he played house parties.

♪ Listen here folks wanta sing a little song ♪ ♪ Don't get mad we don't mean no harm ♪ ♪ You know, it' tight like that ♪ ♪ Beedle-um-bum ♪ Oh, it's tight like that ♪ MAROVICH: He had that reputation in Chicago for being a jazz or blues pianist.

♪ It's tight like that beedle-um-bum ♪ ♪ Hear me talkin' to ya ♪ I mean it's tight like that ♪ MARTIN: Thomas Dorsey learns from others like Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith about how to navigate the record industry, how to navigate the business to make sure he would receive the fruit of his labor.

COOPER: Dorsey's copyrighting the music.

He had an understanding of the two revenue streams; copyright and publishing.

♪ Bum-bum-biddly ♪ GATES: Just as Dorsey's career as a blues musician was beginning to blossom in Chicago, a visit from his uncle called him back to the church, where he rediscovered the power of its sacred traditions.

MAROVICH: Thomas Dorsey was born in Villa Rica, Georgia.

His father was a Baptist pastor.

His mother was very religious, played the organ, but in 1921, he goes reluctantly with his uncle to the National Baptist Convention, which is there in Chicago in the South Side.

REV.

DATES: They got a chance to hear some of the richest, newest music being created.

The role of African American Christian Conventions and Conferences were instrumental.

You have your Church of God in Christ convocations.

You have your annual meetings for the African Methodist Episcopal, but the Baptists run the yard.

♪ Just to behold ♪ His face ♪ HADLEY: Founded in 1895, the National Baptist Convention is still one of the largest Black religious organizations in the world.

BURFORD: It's very much a trade show, in a sense, because you had songwriters who came to pitch their songs, you had singers to pitch their wares.

♪ Who've gone ♪ MAROVICH: And while Dorsey's there, he hears William Nix Jr. sing I Do, Don't You?

♪ I do ♪ COOPER: And the lyrics says, "I know a great savior.

I do, don't you?

I live by his favor.

I do, don't you?"

The song is so infectious.

It cuts right to Dorsey's heart.

♪ I do, don't you ♪ REV.

DATES: He has the voice of his father, the Baptist preacher, is in his ear.

And the cry of his mother, the church mother is in his heart.

And so, he's torn between the church and the juke joint.

COOPER: He's moved to answer.

He answers them in two ways.

He converts.

He decides, "I want to know that savior."

The second thing he does is he says, "I want to write that kind of music."

MAROVICH: So, he writes If I Don't Get There.

♪ If I don't get there, if I ♪ MAROVICH: All the pastors that he tries to sell them to are outraged.

This sounds like the music of the club.

This sounds like the music of vice.

♪ With heart's in despair ♪ My father and mother ♪ COOPER: Ain't that Georgia Tom?

Who is this man coming in here with these, you know, jazzy articulations, this rhythm?

♪ If I don't get there ♪ BEST: This is different.

This sounds like blues.

It sounds like secular music.

It disrupts people's idea of what sacred music actually is.

(harmonizing) Before gospel music, the music of the church was often classical music, you know, oratorios and so forth and so on, European stylized Negro spirituals and so forth.

♪ Come down, come down ♪ CASSELBERRY: And that very much has to do with respectability politics.

HIGGINBOTHAM: This kind of idea of respectability is far more important to the Old Settlers than it will be to these new people who are coming up who, who aren't living under that gaze.

HADLEY: There's also this intentional shedding of things that feel homespun, or southern, or country to embrace a northern urbanity, in order to secure our own safety and acceptance in a broader American life.

We read that as assimilationist now, but at the time, people are trying to figure out what it means to be Black and free and safe.

♪ And fighting all the time ♪ DORSEY: You couldn't go into a church and tell them that you were gonna sing a gospel song.

Preacher wouldn't let you do it, most of them.

Says you can only preach the gospel.

You can't sing no gospel.

If you want to sing a song go ahead and sing it.

They told you just like that.

I've been thrown out of some of the best churches in America.

(laughs) GATES: Often in the history of gospel, when artists introduce a new style of singing to God, why do you think the church kicks him out?

(laughter) GATES: Dorsey, even Mahalia.

CARR: It could be tradition, um, you know, mind sets of people, they feel like because it's not done their way, that it's not God.

No.

Sometimes you have to check yourself, maybe God is introducing us into a new way, you know, of things, or a different way of things.

It doesn't make them wrong.

It's just their unique style.

♪ I want Jesu to walk with me ♪♪ GATES: Dorsey's first attempt to popularize a new style of sacred song failed miserably, but his time would come.

In the 1920s, the recording industry created, "Race Records," a response to the increased buying power of the rapidly expanding migrant market... Recognizing the potential of the medium to reach thousands of new congregants, Black preachers seized the moment to evangelize.

One exceptionally talented pastor from Atlanta would even sell more records than the leading blues singer, Bessie Smith.

His name was J.M.

Gates.

MARTIN: Reverend J.M.

Gates, was friends with Thomas Dorsey.

They knew each other, passed each other in studios.

He'd name some of his sermons after his songs.

J.M.

GATES (over record): These hard times are tight like that.

Your house rent is du and nothing to pay with.

Ah, your house... MARTIN: These Time Are Tight Like That, was a song about how difficult times were during the Great Depression.

GATES: While record labels were forced to drop many secular artists because of the economic hardships of the Great Depression, Gates's, Sermons With Singing, continued to thrive.

BEST: People were buying J.M.

Gates at an incredible rate, but his message was often not progressive, actually.

Sermons like, Manish Women, uh, Did You Spend Christmas in Jail?

MARTIN: But we also have sermons such as, Say Goodbye to the Chain Stores, which is a tremendously progressive and prophetic sermon.

In 1929, chain stores were dominating America and many people felt that they were actually the cause of the Great Depression.

J.M.

GATES: Ah, I want you to listen, then I want you to put it into action.

Stay out of these chain stores.

When you come to town, spend your money with people who, ah, will give you credit.

Spend your money with the people who, ah, give you a job.

Ah, I'm telling you this for your good, and now boys, I want you to sing; ♪ There's two things abou these chain stores, Lord ♪ ♪ You'll find it to be true ♪ They do no give you work to do ♪ ♪ And they will not credit you ♪ Now let me tel you people, Lord ♪ ♪ The best thing for this land ♪ You better stay ou of these chain stores ♪♪ BEST: He is being entertaining, but he's also being political.

I just love the way he read the culture.

What's going to happen to Black people when the mom-and-pop stores disappear?

CROFT: He's saying support those who are going to employ you.

Support those who are going to give you credit.

Support Black businesses.

MARTIN: The sound of Reverend J.M.

Gates' preaching is so powerful, it's the chanted sermon.

It's the mixed-type sermon.

BEST: So, mixed-type preaching went this way... J.M.

GATES (over record) Ah, I won't speak to you people from this sermon... BEST: He would start maybe with a scriptural text, and then you could almost feel the energy rising.

J.M.

GATES (over record) We can't eat, ah, at the same table.

BEST: He's about to let the spirit take over.

♪ As an eagle stirs her nest ♪ MAN: Come on, uh.

WOMAN: Yes!

♪ And as an eagle bird stirs up her nest ♪♪ MAN: Well.

WOMAN: Oh, well.

♪ And fluttereth over her young ones ♪♪ MAN: All right.

WOMAN: Yes!

♪ And beareth them on her wings ♪♪ MAN: Come on.

WOMAN: Ain't it.

♪ Sure nuff ♪ WOMAN: Yeah!

♪ Stirs people ♪ MAN: Come on, now.

CROFT: J.M.

Gates is the one that had this kind of growl, we call it whooping...

He brought about this singing the sermon, that celebration, in a sense, of the sermon.

GATES: To understand the legacy of Reverend Gates' preaching techniques, I attended the Hampton University Ministers' Conference to speak with Bishop Rudolph McKissick and the Reverend Doctor William Curtis, who explained to me the art and science of homiletics.

(clapping to the beat) This is called the Super Bowl of Black preaching.

Why is that?

REV.

CURTIS: This is the Mecca.

Hampton is the gathering ecumenically of every African-American clergy, of every denomination of reformation across the entire country.

This is the best of the Black church experience, from hymn singing, to anthems, to spirituals, to gospel, and then to the cadence of Black preaching.

GATES: What is the relationship between preaching and music in the Black church?

BISHOP MCKISSICK: Music is not separate from the preaching.

Music is preparation for the preaching moment.

Music is preaching in song, because it should have theology.

REV.

CURTIS: But I think that some sermons are saved on the wings of melody.

GATES: Oh, that's great.

REV.

CURTIS: So that really helps, yeah.

GATES: Oh, I love that.

BISHOP MCKISSICK: Now, he sings too.

REV.

CURTIS: No I don't.

GATES: Oh, yeah?

REV.

CURTIS: No, not as well.

GATES: So, are you whoopers?

BISHOP MCKISSICK: I think we would be tuners.

GATES: Tuners?

Oh.

BISHOP MCKISSICK: Yeah.

GATES: I didn't know about tuners.

BISHOP MCKISSICK: That's a little different.

You know, a tuner is someone who can put the music in their voice.

GATES: Oh.

BISHOP MCKISSICK: A whooper is someone who can do tricks with their voice with the tune.

GATES: Okay.

Okay, can you give me an example of both?

BISHOP MCKISSICK: Hmm... ♪ Won't he, won't he, won't he ♪ Won't he, won't he ♪ And that's kind of my hook, REV.

CURTIS: Hmm... BISHOP MCKISSICK: And, and I modulate, but see, that's more of a tune.

The, the whoop is... ♪ Yeah Lord ♪ If you hear somebody doing that, turning that and kind of going into a minor modulation, GATES: Mm-hmm.

BISHOP MCKISSICK: That's, that's a whooper.

REV.

CURTIS: And I, I pray we never, ever lose that.

BISHOP MCKISSICK: Me neither.

REV.

CURTIS: It is so unique to the Black church... BISHOP MCKISSICK: Yes.

Yes.

REV.

CURTIS: And it's a part...

It's, it's not an add on to the sermon, it's the euphoric celebration.

BISHOP MCKISSICK: Yes.

GATES: Now what makes preaching Black?

REV.

DYSON: The style, the substance, the, the way you join sound and sense, voice and vision.

To me Black preaching has joined, uh, the greatest traditions of spiritual outreach and moral reflection to a kind of powerful performance ethic at the heart of what we do as Black preaching.

That's why you have such a variety of styles.

You've got the whoopers; C.L.

Franklin... (gasps) ♪ You don't hear me ♪ Charles Adams, the Harvard Whooper, "In the wilderness as God reaches out."

And then you've got my pastor, Doctor Frederick Sampson; "God stands on tiptoe expectancy!"

And then you've got William Augustus Jones; "They sit after sundown at supper," and Gardner Taylor; "God saves us not by flattering us, but by opposing us."

So when you look at the tremendous variety of styles, uh, Black preaching is an incredible art form.

GATES: Just as Black preachers refined their signature style, Dorsey continued to experiment with his signature sound.

In 1930, he would get a second chance at the National Baptist Convention in Chicago.

His song, If You See My Savior, electrified the convention.

A bold new sound in gospel had been born.

♪ I was standing by th bedside of a neighbor ♪♪ DORSEY: That's me.

MARTIN: Yeah, that's you all right!

♪ Who was just about t cross the swelling tide ♪♪ MARTIN: That's your first one.

♪ And I asked him i he would do me a favor ♪ ♪ Kindly take thi message to the other side ♪ ♪ To the other side ♪ If you see my Savior ♪ Tell Him that you saw me ♪ That you saw me ♪ When you saw me ♪ GATES: Thomas Dorsey, whom I love, had his first gospel hit at the National Baptist Convention in 1930 when they didn't even want him around.

He wasn't even there 'cause he was persona non grata.

Why do you think that song became so popular?

What was it about that song?

CARR: I think it was the lyrics that carried so much power... ♪ I was standing by th bedside of a neighbor ♪ ♪ Who was just about t cross the swelling tide ♪ ♪ And I asked i he could carry ♪ ♪ Carry this message, carry it over to the other side ♪ ♪ If you see m Savior, tell Him ♪ ♪ Oh, I'm on my way ♪ Oh, you may see somebody ♪ See somebody wh may ask you for me ♪ ♪ Tell him I' coming home someday ♪♪ GATES: Oh, that's beautiful!

MAROVICH: And people love this song, and they want to know who's the man who wrote it?

So, they bring Dorsey there.

Suddenly, the National Baptist Convention, said, "Young man, come up and sell your songs at our convention," and that was Dorsey's evolution into a gospel songwriter.

DRAKE: He and others are changing the religious culture, Black religious culture.

♪ If you see my Savio tell Him that you saw me ♪ ♪ That you saw me ♪ When you saw m I was on my way ♪ ♪ On my way ♪ HADLEY: When we talk about the origins of gospel music it's Thomas Dorsey and nobody else.

But we can't say enough about Sallie Martin.

DORSEY: Now I want to give credit to Mrs. Sallie Martin.

She traveled with me, she worked with me through the early years.

GATES: A partnership with Sallie Martin, a highly-respected gospel singer and a visionary entrepreneur, would prove instrumental to Dorsey's success.

MAROVICH: Sallie Martin, the mother of gospel music, was a force.

Also, a migrant from Georgia to Chicago, she saw Dorsey doing well with his songs artistically but not financially.

MARTIN: So, I could see he wasn't keeping up with nothin'.

I said, "You got something here, but you just don't know what to do with it."

DORSEY: Well, I, I had addressed you to do it.

MARTIN: And I took over.

And he lives today on it.

(laughter) DORSEY: Thank you.

MAROVICH: The Dorsey songs became popular largely because of the salesmanship of, of Sallie Martin.

DARDEN: Sallie Martin was a savvy genius businessperson.

She not just organized his finances but organized a way that gospel music could succeed.

MARTIN: Wherever I'd go I'd carry the music, sing the song.

Sell the music after the service was over, and that's the way Mr. Dorsey's business was built.

MAROVICH: She really turned the Thomas A. Dorsey music publishing firm into something that was a major force.

JACKSON: We know him today as the father of gospel music, simply because he wrote so many songs.

Within a couple of decades, he's written about 300 songs.

DARDEN: The thing about Dorsey, is that he's not a very good singer, and he's not a particularly charismatic performer.

BURFORD: Dorsey was a very good musician.

He was a prolific songwriter, but he wasn't a virtuosic singer.

So, he relied on people to sing and demonstrate his songs and that they would sell.

MAROVICH: Back in those days, if you wanted to sell a song, you had sheet music, and if somebody couldn't read music, you'd have to have a song plugger.

GATES: Dorsey would find the perfect singer to elevate his music.

The woman whose heavenly voice would become synonymous with gospel.

Her name, Mahalia Jackson.

♪ GATES: Like Thomas Dorsey, Mahalia Jackson's musical influences were rooted in the Baptist and Pentecostal church, seasoned with some New Orleans blues.

While Mahalia's God-given talent was undeniable, her rise to prominence would not be immediate, nor would it be without controversy.

BURFORD: When she showed up in Chicago, she was kind of censured by some of the more conservative mainline churches, primarily because of her performance style.

She would hike up her dress when she sang and really throw herself into it.

DARDEN: She does a holy shimmy, but a shimmy, nonetheless.

BEST: And she was dismissed from some churches because of the way she sang.

♪ When I was lost ♪ Lost in sin ♪ Jesus carried ♪ To the end ♪ WHITE-CLAYTON: When something sounds outside of what has become accepted or expected, especially if it sounds anything reminiscent of what is secular, it's demonized.

GATES: "If you bring Saturday night into this church, one more time, you are going to the devil and you're being kicked out of this church."

WHITE-CLAYTON: That's sad!

You talked about Mahalia, that was her.

In fact, my father sponsored Mahalia, um, and not, he wasn't the only one, but he was one pastor who did, because there were lots of churches who did not want her in their church 'cause she shook her hips, as we should be shaking our hips in the name of the Lord.

GATES: Absolutely.

MAROVICH: Around 1928, Dorsey meets Mahalia Jackson when she's new from New Orleans.

She's a real bubbly personality, he got to know her on the South Side.

He admired her, and he finds eventually that she's a great vehicle for his songwriting.

♪ Coming back hom to live with Jesus ♪ ♪ Coming back home ♪ Left my ♪ JORDAN: She had a great connection between the sanctified singing and was able to preach and deliver a song... ♪ From the road ♪ JORDAN: As if she was the preacher for the afternoon.

♪ Filling m spirit from above ♪ ♪ Coming back hom to live with Jesus ♪ ♪ Coming back home ♪ JACKSON: It is the basic way that I sing today, from hearing the way the preacher would preach.

In a cry, in a moan, would shout.

♪ He told me, when m work may hardest be ♪♪ GATES: As Thomas Dorsey and Mahalia Jackson were perfecting their new sound, tragedy struck.

♪ Coming back home ♪ GATES: In 1932, Dorsey's wife and son died from childbirth, spiraling Thomas into a deep depression.

GATES: Within this dark space of hopelessness, Dorsey implored a loving God to rescue him from the depths of his despair.

God answered Dorsey's plea... With a song.

Take My Hand, Precious Lord, gave birth to a new, more personal form of gospel, redirecting the arc of the music's future.

With this composition alone, Dorsey would be hailed as, "The father of gospel music."

♪ Precious Lord ♪ Take my hand ♪ Lead me on ♪ Let me stand ♪ Lord ♪ SORETT: The perhaps preeminent Gospel standard, Precious Lord, it's less about a particular Christian theological discourse.

It's a personal cathartic expression of adversity and of struggle.

BEST: Dorsey creates this genre of music that is intensely personal, but it connects to people because they're going through similar troubles.

Gospel music is born from trauma in an urban context during the worst economic downturn of the 20th century.

♪ Ooh ♪ HADLEY: The song and the words linger because it speaks to that exhaustion, but yet that hope that there is help available, and that just is a balm.

COOPER: Thomas Dorsey was still playing the blues he just played it for a different reason now.

♪ To the light ♪ Please, take my hand ♪ Precious Lord ♪ GATES: Throughout his life, Thomas Dorsey would create music that spoke to his despair, but also testified to the good news of the gospel carrying him through.

Dorsey had begun to spread this message of the transformative power of gospel through the first modern gospel choir at Ebenezer Baptist Church, which he co-created in Chicago in 1931.

Influenced by annual gatherings like the National Baptist Convention and building on the choir's popularity, Dorsey co-founded The National Convention of Gospel Choirs and Choruses in 1933.

In short order, the gospel choir would become one of the most powerful, and most lasting elements in the evolving sound of the gospel tradition.

MAROVICH: The National Convention of Gospel Choirs and Choruses being formed in Chicago in 1933 sort of cemented Chicago as the Gospel Mecca.

♪ I want to go there ♪ ♪ Where there's no sorrow ♪ I want to go there ♪ Where there's no pain ♪ BURFORD: It really networked Black church choirs and connected his own songs with these choirs.

♪ I want to go there ♪ HADLEY: He was strongly invested in establishing the pedagogy of gospel.

He had very strong ideas about how it was taught the right way and the right way to do things.

♪ Where there's no pain ♪ DARDEN: They're being taught the best singing techniques.

They're being taught how to organize and run a choir.

It became almost impossible to find a major church that didn't have a gospel choir.

HAIRSTON: There was nowhere else in the world where you could learn from the people who really created it, other than the Dorsey convention.

DARDEN: They're also selling an awful lot of Dorsey music, and for a time, they were even called Dorseys.

WHITE: Come on, put your hands together.

Let's give God some glory.

Come on, make your joyful noise for Him.

Come on, you can clap your hands like this.

He deserves the glory.

♪ Blessed be thy name ♪ WHITE: Come on.

GATES: By training singers, developing choirs, and publishing music, Thomas Dorsey and Sallie Martin built an infrastructure that enabled gospel to become self-sustaining...

Independent of White publishing companies or White audiences.

Over 90 years later, the NCGCC continues to build on the foundation established by Dorsey and Martin.

♪ His wonderful name ♪ Wonderful name ♪ NEAL: His vision for controlling the publishing, right, and, and the workshops that he took around the country selling his music, but then teaching folks how to sing his music.

It allowed I think for the gospel music industry to thrive independently.

COHEN: Thomas A. Dorsey, Sallie Martin, Roberta Martin, these gospel creators owned as much of themselves as they could.

BURFORD: It really is about conscious institution building by Black musicians, uh, Black Declaration of Independence, both artistically and entrepreneurially.

GATES: As Dorsey's convention spread the sound of the gospel choir from city to city, Black preachers, singers, and music directors began experimenting with a new means of spreading the good news; through the magic of radio.

BEST: There was some nervousness about radio.

Like a lot of modern inventions, they wondered if this could truly be used by God.

There were those people who would say, "No, they would never do it," because they couldn't imagine spreading the gospel through the airwaves.

There were others who thought that's precisely what we need to be doing.

GATES: In 1935, a gospel preacher named Clarence Cobbs and his ingenious music minister, Kenneth Morris, brought a daring spirit of experimentation to gospel at their weekly midnight Sunday service... Making history in the process.

(radio chatter) COBBS (over radio) Radio station WCFL Chicago, which emanates live and direct from the main auditorium of the Firs Church of Deliverance.

BEST: Clarence Cobbs was known to be forward thinking.

He was out front, absolutely visionary with music, and one of the most important preachers with one of the most important ministries in Chicago.

COBBS (over radio) Don't allow anyone to steal your joy.

BEST: You were nobody, in the early days, if you as a gospel artist, the up-and-coming, hadn't performed at First Church of Deliverance.

MAROVICH: First Church of Deliverance really becomes a way to take the gospel out of Chicago, Illinois and just like the Dorsey Convention, spread it all over the country.

In being an innovator, Clarence Cobbs was always looking for something new and Kenneth Morris was his music minister in the late '30s, and Kenneth Morris was a jazz musician.

GATES: Just as Thomas Dorsey married the blues with gospel, Kenneth Morris brought the experimental spirit of jazz into the church in 1939 with the Hammond organ.

(organ plays) HADLEY: The construction of the Hammond, with its knobs and drawbars, allow it a range of vocality that is rare among instruments.

♪ Just a close walk with Thee ♪♪ HADLEY: Its ability to interact with, and sometimes mimic the human voice, in the way that Black people sing, and the way music exists within Black community.

♪ Daily walking ♪ Close to Thee ♪ Whoa, let it be ♪ COHEN: It brought this whole new sound to gospel music because it was flexible.

It was loud.

It was powerful.

It could rock.

It could groove.

♪ Jesus keep me from all wrong ♪ I'll be satisfied as long ♪ Oh, yes I will ♪ You let me walk ♪ Dear Lord, close to Thee REV.

BRYSON: We were kind of criticized for bringing... GATES: The devil's music.

REV.

BRYSON: The devil's music.

Just like, uh, Thomas Dorsey was accused of the same thing.

Bringing the devil's music into the house of God.

Well, we didn't feel that it was the devil's music, and we just felt it was yet another way of expressing praise to God.

BEST: No one had done that in Chicago before, and once it took off there was no turning back.

MAROVICH: People started hearing the Hammond organ on their radio sets, and they're like, "What is this thing?"

People were coming to the midnight program to see the Hammond organ.

♪ Grant it, Jesus ♪ HADLEY: The Hammond quickly becomes an integral part of Black worship experience.

The Hammond is softly playing underneath the announcements, the welcome to the visitors as the pastor's giving pastoral emphasis during the altar call.

BEST: What he was able to do at First Church of Deliverance still today is having a major impact on gospel music.

♪ Lord we need it now, just a closer walk with Thee ♪ ♪ Lord we need it ♪ Just a closer closer walk with Thee ♪ ♪ Yeah ♪ Ooh ♪ GATES: With the introduction of the Hammond organ, Kenneth Morris established himself as a major player in gospel music, and he looked for partners to expand his influence.

A fallout between Thomas Dorsey and Sallie Martin would give Morris a life-changing opportunity.

Dorsey's loss would be Morris' gain.

MAROVICH: Sallie felt that Dorsey was taking too much credit for her work, so she talks to Reverend Clarence Cobbs about what happened, and he said, "Well, my music minister, Kenneth Morris, why don't the two of you form a partnership?"

(organ plays) GATES: This partnership gave birth to a groundbreaking gospel music publishing business, the Martin and Morris Music Studio, where sales reached as much as $200,000 annually.

Together, Martin and Morris created an engine to market and sell sheet music written by gospel's rising stars, establishing a financial model that elevated Black songwriters.

MAROVICH: That is a watershed moment in gospel music, really in African American history.

It becomes the most successful Black-owned music publisher of gospel music in the country.

GATES: The business of gospel was steadily growing, giving vocalists like Mahalia Jackson opportunities to record on major music labels.

BURFORD: Mahalia Jackson records for the first time in 1937 for Decca.

♪ Lord ♪ I want ♪ To live ♪ For Thee ♪ JORDAN: Her sound on those recordings almost don't sound the same as the Mahalia we end up hearing.

It's a younger voice that has a sort of a higher quality to it.

She is going along with the traditional, um, melodic and rhythmic signature of the songs.

It is not as freed up.

GATES: How would you say her voice in, Oh My Lord, recorded in 1937 change, evolve?

CARR: I think it got better and better, because with, Oh my Lord, first of all, if you've heard the, the pace of the song, she has some lungs, 'cause not everybody can sing that high and then sing back-to-back like that.

♪ Will you sing on my tenor ♪ You sing on my baritone ♪ You sing on, my soprano ♪ I know the Lord he'll hear you sing ♪ ♪ You sing on, my singer ♪ And don't yo worry about your leader ♪ ♪ And when I get to heaven, going to put on my shoes ♪ ♪ I'm going t walk around heaven ♪ ♪ Share the good news ♪ I'm going t stand beside King Jesus ♪ ♪ Tell him about my trouble ♪ I'll be walkin with the Lord, the Lord ♪♪ GATES: Oh Bravo!

Bravo!

That is great!

BURFORD: But the records didn't sell very well.

You have to remember that gospel at this time was really a speculative venture.

I mean, the idea that you can sing Black church songs on commercial records and that they would sell was not a sure thing, compared to singing the blues.

JORDAN: Decca Records wanted Mahalia to sing the blues.

They wanted Mahalia to be secular.

And Mahalia was not interested in that at all.

JACKSON: I'm very religious and don't use my voice for anything else but religious songs.

I believe what I'm singing.

I believe in these songs.

PIERCE: She really lived what she sang.

She makes the decision that she would never cross over into secular music.

WALD: She wasn't going to jazz up her style.

Rosetta Tharpe was... (guitar playing) GATES: A musical prodigy from Arkansas, Rosetta Tharpe attended Roberts Temple Church of God in Christ in Chicago, where she developed a musical style that merged the secular with the sacred, revolutionizing music inside, as well as outside of the church.

WALD: What made Rosetta Tharpe a musical innovator was that guitar.

She had a way of taking that instrument and playing where everyone could get in touch with the Holy Spirit.

HIGGINBOTHAM: Rosetta Tharpe was in a whole 'nother world.

She started in the Pentecostal Church.

♪ In the valley ♪ Couldn't hear nobody pray ♪ Oh, Lord ♪ Couldn't hear nobody pray ♪ HADLEY: She's not solely invested in the propriety of the church, the COGIC Church, the permission of the church.

She is ambitious, she, uh, will sing and play wherever there's an opportunity to sing and play.

COOPER: She pushed the boundaries in terms of someone coming out of the church, playing jazz, playing, playing with blues artists, but then coming right back to the church.

(guitar playing) ♪ Now won't yo hear me singing ♪♪ WALD: When Rosetta Tharpe first records in late 1938, she makes tweaks to the lyrics and the delivery.

In a song like, Rock Me, she's using a Dorsey composition, so material that has a religious context, no longer has a religious feel.

♪ Of life is over ♪ Oh, rock me ♪ In the cradle of our love ♪ HADLEY: If we talk about gospel music we can talk about the sound, we can talk about the lyrics, but a lot of it is anchored to place.

What is the appropriate place for gospel music to reside?

Do we believe that the gospel is for everybody and it should be everywhere all the time?

♪ Up above my head ♪ Music in the air music in the ♪ ♪ Up above my head ♪ There is music in the air ♪ HADLEY: And to the benefit of American music, Sister Rosetta Tharpe tests that.

(guitar solo) When you hear her play, you hear where all the supposed rock guitar Gods first saw the sun.

♪ Bow, bow, bow above my head now ♪ ♪ Thanks for the money ♪ Music everywhere ♪ HENDERSON: When you think of Chuck Berry and you think of that kind of... (vocalizing).

Little Richard had that same thing, you can trace back and go to Sister Rosetta Tharpe... (vocalizing).

(guitar solo) All those double stops and that kind of swing approach to everything.

These men are on record and talking about having sat in the pews to listen to Sister Rosetta.

BURFORD: It really marks an important shift when there was an increasing interest in these new soloists like Mahalia Jackson or Sister Rosetta Tharpe.

HENDERSON: The dynamic between her and Mahalia was, like, definitely competitive, and that was interesting because they were both good Christian women.

BURFORD: There is this interesting tension between competition and camaraderie.

Gospel is a competitive sport.

WALD: There is a 1946 battle between Rosetta Tharpe and Mahalia Jackson.

There were people who were like, "I'm on Team Mahalia," or "I'm on Team Rosetta."

♪ There's only on thing that I long for ♪ ♪ When I reac that heavenly land ♪ ♪ To see m Jesus and His glory ♪ ♪ As I go from land to land ♪ GATES: With Mahalia and Rosetta both bringing their A games to the battle, no clear winner would emerge that night, but the impact of these Chicago stars would soon be felt across the nation as the gospel sound grew.

The next decade would usher in what's known as, "Gospel's Golden Age," when lead singers, quartets and choirs broke through to staggering levels of fame and sales.

♪ Without a father without a father ♪ ♪ We got to bea this journey by myself ♪ ♪ Heartache and pain heartache and pain ♪ ♪ All left in shame ♪ GATES: With the record industry's temptations of earthly fame and untold riches, the most popular gospel artists would be forced to choose which God they wanted to serve.

♪ Hey, without a mother ♪ Hey, without a father ♪ Without a father ♪ We got to journe by ourselves ♪ ♪ By ourselves ♪ Our, heart break and pain ♪ All left in shame ♪ And our journey and our journey ♪ ♪ All alone ♪ There's only one thing ♪ That I long for ♪ When I reac that heavenly land ♪ ♪ I know, I kno we shall see Him ♪ ♪ I know, I kno we shall see Him ♪ ♪ I know, I kno we shall see Him ♪ ♪ In that sweet, i that sweet, oh my Lord ♪ ♪ Peaceful rest ♪ (music plays through credits) NARRATOR: Scan this QR code with your smart device to immerse yourself in all things "Gospel" with exclusive interviews, a music playlist, a companion concert performance and more.

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♪ ♪ ♪ Oh let it be ♪ ♪ Dear Lord ♪ ♪ let it be ♪ ♪ ♪