WXPN awarded Pew Center for Arts & Heritage grant for a year long gospel music project

The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage has awarded WXPN a grant for Saturday Night & Sunday Morning: The Gospel Roots of Rock & Soul.

Through live performances, a radio documentary series, and a media-rich website, WXPN will explore the roots of gospel and its influence on secular popular music. Gospel’s stylistic elements—including soaring vocals, rich harmonies, and syncopated rhythms—have long been fused into secular popular musical genres, such as rock and roll, R&B, soul, and hip-hop. The project’s series of performances will honor gospel’s origins in African American spirituals, illustrate gospel’s impact on contemporary music, and demonstrate how the genre lives in Philadelphia’s music scene and churches today. Featured artists will include the iconic gospel quartet Dixie Hummingbirds, the contemporary R&B and soul-influenced McCrary Sisters, the 18-voice a cappella ensemble the Fisk Jubilee Singers, and the St. Thomas Gospel Choir of the African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas. A radio documentary for regional and national broadcast, by award-winning radio producer Alex Lewis, will include performance recordings, interviews with artists, and conversations with music historians, and a project website will offer performance videos, interviews, and written recollections.

Pew Arts has awarded two previous grants; one for the Mississippi Blues Project, a series of Philadelphia based live concerts featuring Delta blues artists, and Zydeco Crossroads, a year long musical project including live performances, a radio series, a website, and a documentary film, Zydeco Crossroads: A Tale of Two Cities.

Saturday Night & Sunday Morning: The Gospel Roots of Rock & Soul will launch in Fall, 2017. Below, listen to a companion playlist to the project.