Song of the Day: Sister Rosetta Tharpe - Up Above My Head
Let the debate be finished, and let this be the final word: Sister Rosetta Tharpe was the first Christian rock artist ever. Decades before Larry Norman, or even his English predecessors like The Crossbeats or The Pilgrims, Tharpe was writing and performing a new take on Gospel music, utilizing skillful guitar playing and innovating techniques that were used by hundreds of others after her. In fact, it is likely that Tharpe is not only the first Gospel rocker, but the first rock-and-roll artist period, with her early material being created as early as the late 1930s, more than a full decade before Bill Haley and the Comets released “Rock Around the Clock” or Chuck Berry was instructing Johnny on how to B.… Continued →