{"id":2165,"date":"2017-10-17T15:41:55","date_gmt":"2017-10-17T20:41:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/?p=2165"},"modified":"2017-10-17T15:41:55","modified_gmt":"2017-10-17T20:41:55","slug":"mahalia-jackson-developing-hybridity-and-the-inescapable-political-machine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/2017\/10\/17\/mahalia-jackson-developing-hybridity-and-the-inescapable-political-machine\/","title":{"rendered":"Mahalia Jackson, Developing Hybridity, and the Inescapable Political Machine"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Mahalia Jackson (from the Jimmy Haynes collection at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame)<\/p><\/div>\n

If I’ve learned anything from the\u00a0past few years of music history courses, it’s that music of all kinds has a complicated and intertwining history. Music doesn’t exist in a bubble, and often, the development of assumed distinct musical genres depended on contemporaneous cultural and musical influences. Rock and Roll is no exception to this statement. In fact, this 1969 article<\/a> from the\u00a0Chicago Defender\u00a0<\/em>argues that Rock and Roll owes many of its musical traits from the Gospel genre. Despite the apparent disparity between Gospel and Rock and Roll, Earl Calloway, the article’s author, argues that the chord progressions and “uninhibited style of singing” found in rock music are derived directly from gospel music sung in church. Mahalia Jackson, who Calloway mentions later in the article as one of the first Gospel singers to break into pop culture, is a perfect example of this hybridity. In fact, Jackson was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame<\/a> in 1997. Rock stars like Little Richard count her among their major influences and the syncopation that can be heard in songs like “\u201cMove On Up a Little Higher,\u201d and \u201cHe\u2019s Got the Whole World in His Hands\u201d served not only to popularize Gospel\u00a0music (“He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands” reached the top 100 on the Pop charts), but as a foundation for later rock idioms. Take a listen to “Move on Up a Little Higher” and see if you can hear some Rock and Roll:<\/p>\n\n\n