Gospel Song

Gospel music is a specifically American genre that has undergone many changes since its inception in revivalistic camp meetings during the mid-nineteenth century. This development has informed both worship style and musical roles within churches across denominational lines. Current trends in gospel music suggest that the influence of general public musical taste may be stronger than that of theology. Historical Orientation Gospel music is a genre of popular Protestant worship-song specifically American in its origins. Traceable to the rural revival camp meetings of the South (1830-60), it later expanded in the major Northern urban revival campaigns of the last third of the nineteenth century. Its practice among both black and white evangelical communities has resulted in two definable styles of performance and sound-aesthetic, despite the amount of material shared in common. Stylistic relations to Tin Pan Alley during the first thirty years of this century, and to definitive black i…