The Rise of Gospel Blues

In the late 1930s gospel blues, a blend of sacred texts and blues tunes, were first heard in the Protestant black churches of the American Midwest and Northeast. The music especially appealed to the recent black migrants from the Deep South. Michael Harris's book is the story of the development of gospel, one of the major popular music styles of the past half century, as seen through the career of its founding figure, Rev. Thomas A. Dorsey. The discussion of Dorsey is focused on Afro-American religion and culture and on the influence that gospel music had on blacks in general.