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THOMAS ANDREW DORSEY MAHALIA JACKSON
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Although it has been asserted that the ‘blues’ arose from gospel music,
becoming its 'darker side', it is probably nearer to the truth that they were "cousins" with a
common music lineage, and that their respective development was in parallel,
with both the blues and spiritual music emerging from earlier field holler songs.
Itinerant musicians playing the streets of the southern states would often
switch between performing the blues and sanctified music depending on the
nature of the audience! From 1930 Dorsey began to work more and more on music arranged in a religious setting, applying blues melodies and rhythms within a spiritual context. In 1932 Dorsey’s young wife died in childbirth and his newborn son lived only a day. Heartbroken, Dorsey wrote "Precious Lord, Take My Hand", a song that has since become one of the best known gospel standards in the world. Thereafter he recorded extensively, publishing his own sheet music and lyrics and he became the choral director of the Pilgrim Baptist Church in Chicago. He founded the National Convention of Gospel Choirs and Choruses in Chicago in 1933, serving as its president for 40 years. He stopped recording in 1934 but carried on performing into the 1940s.
Although Dorsey continued writing, in middle age he mainly concentrated on lecturing and administrative church duties and perhaps during this time, the importance of his contribution to gospel music was overlooked. However he finally achieved the recognition he deserved in 1979 when he became the first African American to be inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. Dorsey died in Chicago in 1993.
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