Thomas A. Dorsey with Sallie Martin

Thomas A. Dorsey (July 1, 1899 – January 23, 1993) was known as "the father of black gospel music" and was at one time so closely associated with the field that songs written in the new style were sometimes known as "dorseys." Earlier in his life he was a leading blues pianist known as Georgia Tom Sallie Martin (November 20, 1895 -June 18, 1988) was a gospel singer nicknamed "the mother of gospel music" for her efforts to popularize the songs of Thomas A. Dorsey and her influence on other artists. Sallie Martin, raised as a Baptist in Pittfield, Georgia, joined the Pentecostal movement as a young woman. She began her career singing in Holiness churches after coming to Chicago in 1927. Martin's rough-hewn singing style, combined with the enthusiastic physicality of the Holiness church, nearly kept her from working with Dorsey, who looked down on the shouting style of many Holiness singers and was reluctant to hire a singer who could not read music. Martin nonetheless persuaded Dorsey, after three auditions, to hire her as part of a trio he had formed to introduce his songs to churches. She proved to be an able organizer with a shrewd financial sense who marketed Dorsey's songs, organized his finances, developed new avenues for business and helped launch the National Convention of Gospel Choirs and Choruses, Inc. Martin was a successful artist in her own right, forming the Sallie Martin Singers, in which her daughter Cora Martin, Dinah Washington, then known as Ruth Jones, and Brother Joe May were featured, in 1940 after a dispute with Dorsey. She started her own publishing house, Martin and Morris Music, Inc., with Kenneth Morris (8/28/1917-1988), Gospel music publisher, arranger, composer, and innovator, was born in New York. Although he began making music in church as a youngster, he commenced his professional career as a jazz musician. In high school, and later while studying at the Manhattan Conservatory of Music, the ever changing Kenneth Morris Band was often billed at hotels, restaurants, and lounges. He and others of his band traveled to the "Chicago World's Fair" in 1934 to perform dance music for the day and evening concerts. Because of the heavy schedule, Morris became ill, and was forced to leave the band. However, he decided to stay in Chicago, and there met members of the Gospel music community. Among them were Lillian Bowles and Charles Pace. He spent six years with Lillian Bowles Music House. In 1940, Morris partnered with Sallie Martin to form Martin and Morris Music Company and together they were responsible for publishing a number of gospel standards, including "Just a Closer Walk With Thee" (1940). Martin retired from the Sallie Martin Singers in the mid-1950s as the strain of touring grew too great; the group continued on the road for several more decades. She remained an active force in the NDGCC even after she went out on her own and was a vocal supporter of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and of health programs in Nigeria. She remained a vigorous proponent of gospel music and defender of her role in bringing it to the churches, as her appearance in the 1980 movie "Say Amen Somebody" illustrates vividly. As formulated by Thomas A. Dorsey, gospel music combines Christian praise with the rhythms of jazz and the blues. His conception also deviates from what had been, to that time, standard hymnal practice by referring explicitly to the self, and the self's relation to faith and God, rather than the individual subsumed into the group via belief. Thomas Andrew Dorsey, who was born in Villa Rica, Georgia, was the music director at Pilgrim Baptist Church in Chicago from 1932 until the late 1970s. His best known composition, "Take My Hand, Precious Lord", was performed by Mahalia Jackson and was a favorite of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.. Another composition, "Peace in the Valley", was a hit for Red Foley in 1951 and has been performed by dozens of other artists, including Queen of Gospel Albertina Walker, Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash. Dorsey died in Chicago, aged 93. In 2002, the Library of Congress honored his album Precious Lord: New Recordings of the Great Songs of Thomas A. Dorsey (1973), by adding it to the United States National Recording Registry. Dorsey's father was a minister and his mother a piano teacher. He learned to play blues piano as a young man. After studying music formally in Chicago, he became an agent for Paramount Records. He put together a band for Ma Rainey called the "Wild Cats Jazz Band" in 1924. He started out playing at rent parties with the names Barrelhouse Tom and Texas Tommy, but he was most famous as Georgia Tom. As Georgia Tom, he teamed up with Tampa Red (Hudson Whittaker) with whom he recorded the raunchy 1928 hit record "Tight Like That", a sensation, eventually selling seven million copies. In all, he is credited with more than 400 blues and jazz songs. Dorsey began recording gospel music alongside blues in the mid-1920s. This led to his performing at the National Baptist Convention in 1930, and becoming the bandleader of two churches in the early 1930s. His first wife, Nettie, who had been Rainey's wardrobe mistress, died in childbirth in 1932. Two days later the child, a son, also died. In his grief, he wrote his most famous song, one of the most famous of all gospel songs, "Precious Lord, Take My Hand". Unhappy with the treatment received at the hands of established publishers, Dorsey opened the first black gospel music publishing company, Dorsey House of Music. He also founded his own gospel choir and was a founder and first president of the National Convention of Gospel Choirs and Choruses. His influence was not limited to African American music, as white musicians also followed his lead. "Precious Lord" has been recorded by Albertina Walker, Elvis Presley, Mahalia Jackson, Aretha Franklin, Clara Ward, Dorothy Norwood, Jim Reeves, Roy Rogers, and Tennessee Ernie Ford, among hundreds of others. It was a favorite gospel song of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.; and was sung at the rally the night before his assassination, and, per his request, at his funeral by Mahalia Jackson. It was also a favorite of President Lyndon B. Johnson, who requested it to be sung at his funeral. Dorsey was also a great influence on other Chicago-based gospel artists such as Albertina Walker and The Caravans and Little Joey McClork. Dorsey wrote "Peace in the Valley" for Mahalia Jackson in 1937, which also became a gospel standard. He was the first African American elected to the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame and also the first in the Gospel Music Association's Living Hall of Fame. In 2007, he was inducted as a charter member of the Gennett Records Walk of Fame in Richmond, Indiana. His papers are preserved at Fisk University, along with those of W.C. Handy, George Gershwin, and the Fisk Jubilee Singers. Dorsey's works have proliferated beyond performance, into the hymnals of virtually all American churches and of English-speaking churches worldwide. Thomas was a member of the Omega Psi Phi fraternity. He died in Chicago, Illinois, and was interred there in the Oak Woods Cemetery. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.