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Biography of Thomas Andrew Dorsey
Name: Thomas Andrew Dorsey
Birth Date: July 1, 1900
Death Date: January 23, 1993
Place of Birth: Villa Rica, Georgia, United States
Nationality: American
Gender: Male
Occupations: composer, songwriter, singer, pianist, publisher
Thomas Andrew Dorsey
Thomas Andrew Dorsey (1900-1993), often called the Father of Gospel Music, migrated from Atlanta to Chicago as a young man, thus exemplifying the experience of many southern blacks of his day. This journey is also critical to an understanding of what Michael W. Harris called "the rise of gospel blues" in his book of that title, which chronicles the role Dorsey's music played in urban churches.There was a great deal of early resistance to Dorsey's work, partly because it was rooted in the rural southern African American culture from which the old-line urban churches sought to distance themselves in favor of assimilation. These churches discouraged expressive congregational participation and attempted to incorporate white church traditions in both service and music. In addition, the blues factor of the gospel blues equation had associations with secular venues and activities often discouraged by the church. It is perhaps Dorsey's greatest achievement that he …showed first 150 words…
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…showed last 150 words…being helped into a room, he addresses a group of people, moving comfortably in and out of song all the while. He was ordained a minister in his sixties, formalizing the union of song and worship. The Pilgrim Baptist Church created the T. A. Dorsey Choir to honor him in 1983. Dorsey died of Alzheimer's disease on January 23, 1993 in Chicago, Illinois. However, he lives on each Sunday as voices rise in praise, singing the gospel across the land. Further Reading Harris, Michael W., The Rise of Gospel Blues: The Music of Thomas Andrew Dorsey in the Urban Church, Oxford University Press, 1992.We'll Understand It Better By and By: Pioneering African American Gospel Composers, edited by Bernice Johnson Reagon, Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992.Ann Arbor News, February 24, 1993.Chicago Tribune, January 25, 1993.Down Beat, April 1993.Entertainment Weekly, February 5, 1993.Jet, February 8, 1993.Newsweek, February 8, 1993.New York Times, January 25, 1993.Time, February 8, 1993.Village Voice, October 5, 1982.Washington Post, January 25, 1993; January 31, 1993.
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