Neighborhood News: Chicago’s Gospel Music…From Bronzeville to Millenium Park
As Chicago prepares for its annual Gospel Music Festival in Millennium Park this weekend, it’s worth noting that Gospel Music itself has its roots deep in Chicago’s history.
The evolution of Gospel Music
According to Wikipedia sources, Black and Southern gospel music, as well as the advent and growth of popular media (i.e. radio, television, digital) are largely responsible for gospel’s continued presence in contemporary Christian music, with soul music by far the best–known popular music variant.
The styles emerged from the African-American music and American folk music traditions and have evolved in various ways over the years, from blues, soul and jazz to hip-hop, and continues to form the basis of Black church worship. It has also come to be used in churches of various other cultural traditions (especially within Pentecostalism), and by the gospel choir spearheaded by Chicago ‘s Thomas Dorsey, has become a form of musical devotion worldwide.
History
In the early 1930s, according to Wikipedia sources, Gospel music began to gain popularity in Chicago due to Thomas A. Dorsey’s songwriting contributions at Pilgrim Baptist Church.
Dorsey, known as the ‘Father of Gospel Music,’ according to the Encyclopedia of Chicago, influenced by jazz and blues, composed many of the most celebrated gospel songs, including ‘(There’ll Be) Peace in the Valley (for Me),’ a favorite of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Elvis Presley, ‘I’m Going to Live the Life I Sing About in My Song,’ and ‘Take My Hand, Precious Lord,’ sung by Chicago gospel legends Mahalia Jackson and Albertina Walker.
Dorsey wrote ‘Peace in the Valley’ during pre-WWII tensions, inspired by a peaceful scene of grazing animals in a valley, which he saw as a metaphor for Heaven.
Elvis Presley’s performance of the song on The Ed Sullivan Show reached a massive audience of 54.6 million viewers, further popularizing gospel music.
Dorsey wrote the lyrics to ‘Take My Hand, Precious Lord’ in response to his inconsolable bereavement at the deaths of his wife, Nettie Harper, and his infant son in August 1932. The Protestant hymn ‘Must Jesus Bear the Cross Alone’ became Dorsey’s inspiration for the music to the song.
Although Dorsey himself never claimed credit for creating the genre of gospel music, he stated that he coined the phrase ‘gospel songs’ in the early 1920s, giving a name to the new musical style.
Who was Thomas Dorsey?
Dorsey was born at the turn of the twentieth century in a small, rural town outside Atlanta, Georgia. In 1919, in the midst of the Great Migration of African Americans from the South to the cities of the North, he moved to Chicago.
While much of his earliest musical training had been of a religious nature, Dorsey was also very familiar with blues and jazz, the new musical styles developing in the South. Shortly after settling in Chicago, In 1932, according to GRAMMY.com, Dorsey became the choral director of the Pilgrim Baptist Church in Chicago, a position he maintained until the late 1970s.
Dorsey combined his knowledge of blues and jazz music with religious lyrics and began promoting his gospel songs.
He also influenced other Chicago Gospel artists such as The Caravans and Little Joey McClork, and The Staple Singers (‘I’llTake You There) until his death in 1993.
Gradually, according to the Encyclopedia of Chicago, new composers replaced the blues and jazz influences with more contemporary musical styles. Hip-Hop, rap, and R&B influenced many late-twentieth-century gospel music composers. Since 1985, both traditional and contemporary gospel styles have been celebrated each summer during the annual celebration formerly known as GospelFest, Chicago’s annual salute to gospel music.
Pilgrim Baptist Church becomes the National Museum for Gospel Music
For more than a century, Pilgrim Baptist Church was a beacon of gospel music not only to South Side of Chicago, but to America and the world.
Until it went up in flames.
As Grammy.com tells it, workers were fitting metal coping on the roof of the National Historic Landmark with blowtorches in 2006.
“And they dropped the torch,” Antoinette Wright, the president and executive director of the National Museum of Gospel Music — a museum project centered on its site — told Grammy.com in 2023. “When they dropped it, they kind of didn’t tell anybody that they had. All they did was scurry off the roof; can you believe that?”
But out of the ashes of Pilgrim Baptist Church, an important monument to gospel music will arise. Dorsey’s legacy — as well as that of his entire milieu — promises to be on full display at the National Museum of Gospel Music. Don Jackson, the founder and CEO of Chicago-based Central City Productions, and his team will establish the 45,000 square-foot structure on the site of Pilgrim Baptist, 3300 S. Indiana. The museum will feature:
- Multigenerational programming and educational exhibits
- Auditorium seating up to 350 designed for television production
- Exclusive video archives and collection of the Stellar Gospel Music Awards programming
- Listening and research library
Event-Chicago Gospel Music Festival
Grammy winner Chandler Moore headlines the 2025 Chicago Gospel Music Festival this Saturday, July 12 at Millennium Park from noon–9pm.
It’s evolved from a tribute event to Dorsey at the South Shore Country Club in 1985 to what’s considered to be the largest event of its kind in the world. For more information click here.
Alison Moran-Powers and Dean’s Team Chicago
