Ernest Phipps & His Holiness Singers

Ernest Phipps and His Singers would record six sides in 1927 and six more the following year. Apart from his preaching and singing occupations, Phipps was a coal miner. Born around 1900, he died in 1968. In the summer of 1927, Ernest Phipps and His Holiness Quartet, all members of the Free Holiness Pentecostal Church around Corbin, Kentucky, journeyed to Bristol, Tennessee, to record for Ralph Peer for the historical “Bristol Sessions”. These sessions were considered the “Big Bang” of real American Country Music recordings mostly because Jimmy Rodgers and The Carter Family, two of the most successful and influential early Country artists were discovered there. During these few days in in July and August 1927, Mr Peer recorded a large sample of vernacular music from the South, String bands,banjo players, singers and religious bands. Among the religious performers, the most exciting sound came from Phipps and His Holiness Quartet, who sang in the fervent and vigorous style of the Holiness Church, accompanied by string instruments and clapping. This type of religious performance evolved from “The Great Awakening”, when “American Protestant rebelled against Old World Puritanism ” and spread a new spirit of religious fervor and emotion, which lead to the foundation of new religious groups like the Pentecostal and Holiness Churches. Like in many african-american churches, the congregation was invited to sing and rejoice with all his heart and sometimes reach a kind of ecstatic experience through the process. "Shine On Me" from Ernest Phipps and His Holiness Singers is on The Anthology of American Folk Music Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.