Eugene writes, "I have no idea how this young woman with a child as her chaperone managed to gather a congregation of working men from those logging and mining camps to sing gospel songs, listen to gospel stories, and let themselves be prayed for on those Sunday nights in the thick of the Depression".
For at least two centuries, scholars and popular writers have mined the Christian Gospels to "look behind" them, to create a portrait of Jesus, using purely modern methods: the historical Jesus as opposed to the Christ of faith.
"The phone rang, and it was a minister friend of mine, Reverend Timothy Wright, the Grammy-nominated gospel singer," Sharpton recalled last week.
(Chinen) * ROBERT GLASPER TRIO (Through Sunday) A percussive and tuneful pianist, Mr. Glasper mines a tradition informed by gospel and seemingly every strain of R & B; his superb trio makes its first Village Vanguard appearance on the heels of "Canvas," an auspicious Blue Note Records debut.
Since "spiritual elevation" is what "really lights" him up, Johns must have been very, very happy working with Jones because, in a departure from anything he's done previously, for this project Jones mined the American spiritual and gospel songbook to come up with an album that is, for him, highly unusual.
Basically, go wherever you find work that excites you — don't take anyone's advice as gospel, least of all mine!
Same story on "Crying In The Chapel," which was recorded for Elvis'6060 gospel album His Hand In Mine, but because of a copyright issue, it was left off the album.
He moved to a down-and-out coal-mining village in Belgium, where he taught the gospel, nursed the sick and drew portraits of the miners.
Blood and soil: America's poor--cotton field slaves, mine workers, sharecroppers--find freedom through music, creating gospel, protest songs, and Delta blues.
