It’s easy enough to forget about the root of all roots music. As Cyril Neville reminds us on his Uptown Allstars CD, “Here in New Orleans, home to the greatest gospel singer who ever walked this earth, Mahalia Jackson, you can’t find a plaque mentioning that fact, nowhere.”
Part of the reason for our omission of gospel’s great legacy, of course, is church music’s resistance to commercialization, especially in the first half of this century. And part of the reason Mahalia Jackson has yet to receive the recognition due her can be traced to her refusal to appear in nightclubs or to record anything but gospel. But a commercial profile was the only thing she lacked.
Listen to these earliest recordings, many of which were to become mainstays of her repertoire—”In the Upper Room,” “His Eyes Is On The Sparrow,” “Walk in Jerusalem,” “It’s No Secret,” and you can hear power and soul to match any 20th century diva. Part of the beauty of these earliest recordings are their primitive touches—scratches from vinyl originals, unbalanced mixing, accompaniment from just a stand-up piano—which only serve to set Mahalia’s striking passion and clarify in stronger contrast.
These are essential recordings in the canon of New Orleans music—the resemblances between Mahalia and the city’s currently reigning soul queen, Irma Thomas, are remarkable—and should be a part of any collection with an interest in American roots music. Other releases in the same series are just as impressive, especially the genre compilations, which provide as thorough an overview of early gospel as you’re likely to find anywhere.
In addition to the church recordings of Aretha Franklin collected on You Grow Closer, the series currently includes: Ladies of Gospel, Precious Memories; Men of Gospel, We Are Soldiers; Great Gospel Groups, Over In Glory; Great Gospel Choirs, Through the Years. The raw beauty and sheer power of these early recordings also ought to encourage us to pay more attention to the real sources of the music we love, and here in New Orleans, to those who played, significant roles in transporting that beauty around the world.
These momentoes of the natural splendor of Mahalia Jackson’s musical gifts should encourage us to begin the effort, right now, to properly honor her memory, here in her hometown.
