2005

SG History 101 - The Songwriters

Without gospel songs, there would be no gospel music!

Thus, this month’s article is being written to salute the most basic contributors to gospel music…those people who God chose to use as vessels to create the most basic element in gospel music…the gospel song!

Songwriters go back to the very beginning of what would become the gospel music industry. The early gospel music material used by the various quartets and other artists came from hymnals, songbooks which collected the various songs sung by the singers of the day, and songs that were written by the singers or other professional songsmiths of the period.

Even then, some composers were more prolific than others. One who comes to mind is Curtis Taylor, born in 1879, who survived the sinking of the Titanic to write more than 3,800 songs based out of New York City, and Charles Tillman, the writer of “Life’s Railway to Heaven”, and thousands of other songs.

By the 1920s and 1930s, some professional songwriters began to garner attention for their distinctive approaches to the writing of gospel songs.

One of the earliest such songwriters was Albert E. Brumley, born in 1905 in Oklahoma Indian territory. In the years to come, groups such as the Chuck Wagon Gang and the Statesmen would record whole albums of his songs. He not only wrote gospel songs, but country and pop songs as well. It was for his gospel songs, though, that Brumley would be most remembered for.

Brumley was an organist whose musical talents developed in his late adolescence. He attended the Hartford Musical Institute in Hartford, Arkansas, and sang with one of the early Hartford Quartets. In 1931, his new bride Goldie encouraged him to publish some of the songs he had written, so he mailed one he called “I’ll Fly Away” to the Hartford Music Company, who published it right away and asked for more songs.

So he did. Brumley also wrote, “Jesus, Hold My Hand”, “I’ll Meet You In The Morning”, “Turn Your Radio On”, “Did You Ever Go Sailing?”, “Go Right Out”, “The Sweetest Song I Know”, “He Set Me Free”. “Heaven’s Radio Station Is On The Air”, “Little Pine Log Cabin”, “I’m Bound For That City”, “God’s Gentle People”, and “If We Never Meet Again”, restating the greatest story ever told in a fresh way for people of his time, and he eventually ended up owning the Hartford Music Company.

A few years later, Vesphew Benton Ellis, better known by his nickname “Vep”, began to write songs for quartets, steadily more as each previous song became popular. Ellis was born in Alabama in 1917, and was primarily a preacher, as well as being a pastor, an evangelist and musical soloist.

Even though songwriting was a hobby for Ellis, he still wrote over 500 songs and hymns, which were published by the Lillenas Publishing Company and the Tennessee Music and Printing Company. He also recorded five long-play albums and a number of 78s and 45s, and published songbooks filled with his own compositions.

Among his early song successes were “There Is A Change”, first made popular by the Harmoneers, “Heaven’s Joy Awaits” and “When I Got Saved”, both early hits of the Statesmen, and “I’m Free Again” in 1948, which nearly everyone recorded.

Among his other well-known songs were “My God Can Do Anything”, “Let Me Touch Him”, “Heavenly Love”, “Do You Know My Jesus”, “Over The Moon”, “The Love Of God”, and “At The End Of The Trail”. He spent 49 years as a minister in the Church of God, and six years as music director and soloist with famed evangelist Oral Roberts, and his mellow voice and warm smile ensured that his ministry, both in word and song, was a success.

Another of the all-time great gospel songwriters was Lee Roy Abernathy, who, like Ellis, was a man of many facets…performer, teacher, sound engineer, and always an innovator. Abernathy, born in 1913 to a Georgia sharecropper, began writing songs in the 1940s, and like everything else he did, his songs were unusual and distinctive. He wrote “The Burning Of The Winecoff Hotel” in 1946 after the tragedy in Atlanta claimed 119 lives, and that song still brings back bitter memories to those who were a part of the story. He also wrote a song in the 1940s called “Television”, which anticipated the effect of the then brand-new medium well in advance for its’ time.

In a more mainstream gospel vein, Abernathy wrote songs like “He’s A Personal Savior”, “My Home”, “Lord, I’m Ready Now To Go”, and “Lord, I’m Feeling Mighty Fine Today”, and his most famous song, “Everybody’s Gonna Have A Wonderful Time Up There”, was written to a lively boogie beat, which was scandalous to many church people at the time it was written in the 1950s, and even became a top ten pop hit for Pat Boone in 1958. The song is alternately known as the “Gospel Boogie”.

Another of the songwriting greats of that period was Mosie Lister, who was tuning pianos at an Atlanta music store when a young man named Hovie Lister (no relation) offered him a singing job with his brand new Statesmen Quartet. Although he didn’t consider himself a professional singer, and certainly not a touring one, he accepted the position, and was the group’s original lead singer before Jake Hess would join the group. Mosie, a skilled musician, actually wrote material and arrangements for the Statesmen in the beginning, and continued in that capacity until he moved to Florida in the early 1950s.

Among the classic songs that Mosie Lister wrote were “How Long Has It Been?”, “I’m Feelin’ Fine”, “His Hand In Mine”, “Till The Storm Passes By”, “Then I Met The Master”, “The Gentle Stranger”, and many, many others. He is still active in the gospel music business today, having arranged for and coached the Dove Brothers in their recent project paying tribute to the songs he wrote.

But perhaps the most preeminent gospel songwriter of all is Bill Gaither. Born in 1936 in Alexandria, Indiana, Gaither grew up like many youngsters of his day, hearing gospel music on the radio and falling in love with the various quartets. Young Gaither collected 78s of all his favorite quartets, among them the Statesmen and Blackwood Brothers, and yearned to make a living doing music just as they did.

When Gaither entered college in nearby Anderson, he joined a quartet there, still in search of his youthful dreams. By that time, though, the “quartet boom” of the 1950s was well underway, and it was a very competitive situation for any aspiring singer or musician to try to make it in. When it became apparent that he would not be able to break in at that point, Gaither resigned himself to a teaching career. Although he began a professional trio during that period, clearly his musical dreams had to take a back seat to practical reality.

But Gaither was always writing songs…as an English teacher, he had a knack for language, and by the time he married another teacher with a knack for poetry, Gloria Sickal, in 1962…the ingredients for the greatest gospel songwriting tandem in history were falling in place…and by the time their early efforts at songwriting were being accepted by gospel groups, things were well on their way. A quartet that his brother Danny was in, the Golden Keys Quartet, began to record his material, and later, the famous Speer Family would record it, and in fact published some of the early Gaither material.

Then, in 1963, the Gaither song “He Touched Me” became a staple for the repertoires of many a gospel artist. As was the case with the people discussed earlier, artists began asking for more and more material from Gaither, and he and Gloria began to produce it, en masse. By 1967, the success of Gaither’s songs enabled him to leave his teaching job, and devote himself full-time to writing and performing with his trio(which by then included Danny and Gloria).

Rather than continue with an extended narrative here, I’ll just share the numbers, which speak eloquently for themselves. Over 30 years as a performer, songwriter, and producer…four Grammys, over 20 Dove Awards, the first Gold record awarded an inspirational album, nominations to both the GMA and the SGMA Halls of Fame, and an honor from ASCAP as Christian Songwriter of the Century.

Just a few of the some 600+ songs that Gaither has composed and have become gospel standards include “Because He Lives”, “The King Is Coming, “He Touched Me”, “The Family of God”, “Something Beautiful”, “There’s Something About That Name”, “Going Home”, “Jesus, We Just Want To Thank You”, “It Is Finished”, “The Broken Vessel”, “Happiness”, “Get All Excited”, and “Something Worth Living For” seal Gaither’s legacy as the preeminent gospel songwriter of all-time.

Unfortunately, limitations of time and space forbid me from going into detail about a number of other truly great songwriters, so I’ll just list some more by name. People like JD Sumner, Jim “Big Chief” Wetherington, Bob Prather, Dottie Rambo, Joel Hemphill, Neil Enloe, Gordon Jensen, Harold Lane, Phil Cross, Ronnie Hinson, Dianne Wilkinson, Phil Cross, Rodney Griffin, Kirk Talley, and Gerald Crabb are just a few of the many songwriters who have graced fans of gospel music with memorable, outstanding song material over the long history of gospel music.

SG History 101 - Aug 05

When we left off last month, JD Sumner had just made it possible for the Blackwood Brothers and the Statesmen, competitors on stage but still business partners and colleagues, to both go to venues in brand new, custom buses.

At that time, and for some time afterward, when the Blackwood-Statesmen team did anything in gospel music, most groups followed…or to borrow a phrase used to describe the Dodgers in baseball’s National League, when the Blackwood-Statesmen team sneezed, the other gospel groups caught cold. From the “team”’s use of buses to travel far and wide to personal appearances, it was not a long stretch for the rest of the industry to follow suit. Over the next few years, as they were able, most gospel artists acquired their own buses, so that they, too, could make appearances far and wide across the United States and Canada.

This brought a whole new group of people into gospel music, people who may or may not have had musical ability, but people who were willing to use their particular talent(driving and maintaining a vehicle, in this case)to do their part in taking gospel music to all people who loved it and wanted to hear it.

As was the case with their music, the Blackwood Brothers brought one of the more interesting personalities into this aspect of gospel music as well.

By this time, JD Sumner had not only proven his own ability to drive and maintain a bus, but had taught all the other members of the Blackwood Brothers Quartet to drive the bus, so he wouldn’t have to spend every waking moment behind the wheel. Even the diminutive James Blackwood took a turn driving the large gospel bus, and though he sometimes struggled to cope with the vehicle, he helped his quartet get from place to place in their bus.

But having group members drive the bus was not part of JD’s original idea in buying the vehicle. The bus was supposed to allow the group to get from place to place comfortably, so the members would be relaxed and refreshed, and do a better job singing. So JD was always on the lookout for a new regular driver to replace the ill-fated Buddy Darvis, who was the Blackwoods’ initial driver, that was let go.

At one point, when the quartet was in Nashville, JD discovered a young mechanic at the Trailways depot there, making just forty dollars a week. The youngster supplemented his income by driving for another bus company on the side. JD hired the young man on the spot, offering him eighty-five dollars a week to drive for the Blackwood Brothers.

The youngster’s name was Bundy Brewster, and he reported for work the following week, and James Blackwood, not having been consulted about the hire, asked JD who this young man was, and who was going to pay him to drive. JD introduced Bundy to James, assuring him he’d found good driver, and even offering to pay him out of his own pocket. So Bundy became the Blackwood Brothers’ bus driver, and JD bragged on his “find” to the rest of the group, and the Statesmen as well.

Bundy’s first trip as bus driver was to Tupelo, MS…where the “team” was scheduled to sing. The Statesmen were there first, and all eyes were on the Blackwood bus as it arrived with its new driver behind the wheel.

Unfortunately, Bundy’s debut was not auspicious. A canopy at the front of the building to protect people from rain and other elements was part of the problem. As Bundy was told to park the bus as close to the auditorium as possible to make unloading it easier, he was unable to avoid striking the canopy, and as he tried to stop the bus, it got a hold of the canopy and nearly ripped it from the building.

As the shaken Blackwood Brothers filed off the bus, they all GLARED at JD, who just sat in embarrassed silence. When they got off, JD remained for a few more minutes, enough time for Hovie Lister of the Statesmen to get on and tell JD, “Fantastic bus driver you got there! Fantastic!”

JD knew that Bundy still had a lot to learn about driving a bus.

But characteristically, JD took Bundy under his wing and taught him, and taught him well. In time, Bundy learned his job very well, and stayed with the Blackwood Brothers for over 20 years, eventually even learning how to operate the quartet’s sound equipment, doing more than just driving the bus.

But one thing Bundy never learned how to do was sing.

Oh, he tried. He sang often to himself on long trips, and was continually asking James Blackwood to let him sing on stage with the quartet, which James eventually did. Those occasional stage appearances by Bundy demonstrated why the driver was not a part of the quartet!

Though audiences warmed to Bundy’s pluck and determination, and he inexplicably got applause for his rare vocal appearances, there was no demand for a Bundy Brewster album or anything of that sort. And fortunately, he was not paid to sing, but drive!

And the Blackwood Brothers were fortunate to have their own driver, because singers still had a rough time at times navigating those large cruisers.

One example of the struggle some singers had in driving the vehicles occurred in the mid-1960s, when the Rebels Quartet was out on the West Coast, performing dates with the Couriers Quartet. When the groups arrived in Oakland, having arrived there from Southern California, the Couriers noticed a rather shaken Jimmy Taylor. When they asked the Rebels’ pianist what was wrong, he told them the story.

It seems that when they were heading north through the Tehachapi Mountains, into the Central Valley toward the San Francisco Bay Area(a route very familiar to this writer), something scary had occurred as they headed down the 6 % grade that was on the highway as it descended from the mountains. Bass singer London Parris, who was driving the bus in the wee hours of the morning, inexplicably took the bus out of gear as it went down the grade. The bus picked up so much speed going down, it literally jumped up and down the highway as it hurtled toward the valley below. As they were violently jostled from sleep, the rest of the quartet ran to the front of the bus to help keep it on the road.

Finally, when the bus got to more level terrain, they managed to get the bus under control. Needless to say, another member of the quartet took over behind the wheel. Fortunately, the group made it safely the rest of the way.

As one might expect, there have been a number of wrecks and near-misses over the many years of bus travel by groups…nothing as tragic as the 1954 Blackwood plane crash however…and fortunately, there have been relatively few mishaps over the years of bus travel…a tribute not only to the skills of the dedicated bus drivers, but to the love and mercy of the Lord Himself.

These large buses have not only served to help gospel groups get from place to place safely and efficiently, they have often served as advertising vehicles for the artists they carry. Until recent years, in fact, these buses had large signs on their sides proclaiming the name of the group they were carrying.

Yet, as more and more artists from all kinds of music have resorted to buses for their travel, fewer and fewer of them boast those signs any longer…why? Perhaps the following anecdote from the driver from a current group, Embrace, can explain…

We had stayed in a hotel and I had gotten up early to get the bus fueled up and ready to go. I pulled into the local truck stop and filled up. As I walked in to pay, I noticed that there were three women working there that seemed to be very interested in the bus. As soon as I reached the counter, the first woman asked, "Who ya got in that there bus?" I told her that I was alone and no one was on the bus. She said, "We don't believe you..is Alan Jackson or Kenny Chesney on that bus? (both of these artists had been in Tupelo the night before in concert) I do believe I saw that bus last night at the coliseum." I assured her that she had not seen our bus and that neither of those guys was on the bus.

At just about that time, one of the other women spoke up and said, "If Kenny Chesney is on that bus, there ain't no way you are gonna stop me from gettin' to him!" I said, "Sorry Mam!" and took off in a dead sprint! Gosh, I don't blame groups for leaving their name off now!

I thank Paul Hand for allowing me to share his story with you all.

I hope you enjoyed this look back at the development of travel in gospel music, and we’ll have another fond look back at the history of gospel music again next month…same time, same station. Stay tuned!