Mahalia Jackson with Eureka Brass Band at the first New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, 1970
Photo by Michael P. Smith
Mahalia Jackson is widely considered the best and most influential gospel singer in history. She grew up in the Carrollton neighborhood of New Orleans, where she began singing in her church. She moved to Chicago at age 16 and began touring with a gospel group, the Johnson Gospel Singers. During her history-making career, Mahalia Jackson was the first gospel singer to perform at Carnegie Hall (1952) and at Newport Jazz Festival (1958). She also performed at President John F. Kennedy’s inauguration in 1961, at the March on Washington in 1963, and at the funeral of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who was also a friend.
"A voice like this one comes not once in a century, but once in a millennium." Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Legacy and awards:
Grammy Hall of Fame songs -- This distinction was created to honor recordings of lasting qualitative or historical significance that are at least 25 years old.
1947 "Move On Up a Little Higher" Gospel (single) Apollo 1998
1958 "His Eye Is on the Sparrow" Gospel (single) Columbia 2010
1956 "Precious Lord, Take My Hand" Gospel (single) Columbia 2012
(LISTEN) “Mahalia Jackson: Voice Of The Civil Rights Movement,” a National Public Radio feature
Mahalia Jackson and Louis Armstrong perform "Just A Closer Walk With Thee." Recorded at Newport Jazz Festival, July 10, 1970. From Music Vault via YouTube.
Got to Tell It by
Mahalia Jackson was one of the greatest gospel singers America has ever known, the woman who almost singlehandedly brought black gospel from the churches of Chicago into the public eye. In her pink, floor-length organza gown, her black beehive piled high atop her head, and her foot-stomping,hip-swaying style, Mahalia was gospel personified. And whether she was singing in a local church, performing at Harlem's Golden Gate, or appearing on The Dinah Shore Show, her spiritual bewitchery and monumental voice were sure to lift the souls of those listening into an astonishing state ofgrace. Now, Jules Schwerin, the producer of Mahalia Jackson's Grammy award-winning record for best gospel and soul in 1976 and the creator of a highly acclaimed film documentary on Mahalia, brings us a firsthand account of the Queen of Gospel, based on his interviews with Mahalia. We hear Mahalia asshe remembers the local preacher who influenced her style: "There was a way that he would preach, would have a singing tone in his voice, that was sad. And it done something to me....It is the basic way that I sing." We follow Mahalia to Chicago, where her partnership with Thomas A. Dorsey (theFather of Gospel) brought her local fame, and where a young disc jockey named Studs Terkel invited her to appear on his radio program, successfully introducing her and gospel music to the airwaves. (As he recalls, "Watching her in a church...her relationship to the congregation was something toexperience. You didn't forget the call-and-response, the give-and-take; she didn't sing with her voice alone, it's the body, the hands, the feet.") We hear her sing at the Montgomery, Alabama, boycott for Rosa Parks (the woman who had refused to move from the white section of a bus). We feel herperformance of "I Been 'Buked and I Been Scorned" unite and uplift the thousands gathered at the Second March on Washington ("I reached out and touched a chord...lifted the rhythm to a gospel beat...and joy overflowed"). And we also encounter the other Mahalia, who became possessive and paranoidabout her earnings and who fired her longtime companion and accompanist Mildred Falls when she asked for a much-deserved raise. Got To Tell It is the result of Schwerin's personal odyssey to reveal the Mahalia that he and those close to her came to know--a woman who could be at once warm and giving, and also cruel and unmerciful, but whose music would always bring joy and inspiration. Complete with a discography ofMahalia's recordings, here is an unforgettable portrait of the woman who brought gospel to the world.
Black Resonance by
"Black Resonance" analyzes writings by Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison, James Baldwin, Gayl Jones, and Nikki Giovanni that engage such iconic singers as Bessie Smith, Billie Holiday, Mahalia Jackson, and Aretha Franklin. The book focuses on two generations of artists from the 1920s to the 1970s; each chapter pairs one writer with one singer to crystallize the artistic practice they share: lyricism, sincerity, understatement, haunting, and the creation of a signature voice.