One of the most influential gospel artists of all time, Sister Rosetta Tharpe turned the electric guitar into an instrument of praise. In the process, she became an international gospel artist, broke down barriers for women in instrumental music and was among the first to alert major record companies to the power and popularity of gospel singing. Tharpe was born on March 20, 1915, as Rosetta Nubin in Cotton Plant, Arkansas. Her parents were cotton pickers. Her mama, Katie Bell, wasn’t just any mom; she was “Mother Bell,” a traveling evangelist, mandolin-playing and shouter. Rosetta began playing guitar and singing at age four in the Church of God in Christ as Little Rosetta Nubin. At age 6, she regularly performed alongside her mother in the church and was cited as a musical prodigy.
About 1921, at age six, Tharpe had joined her mother as a regular performer in a traveling evangelical troupe. She accompanied her mother in performances that were part sermon and part gospel concert in front of audiences across the American South. She excelled at the guitar, playing melodies and riffs. Her playing was influenced by her mother and by pianist Arizona Dranes, as well as bluesman Thomas A. Dorsey. In the mid-1920s, Tharpe and her mother settled in Chicago, Illinois, where they performed religious concerts at the Roberts Temple COGIC on 40th Street, occasionally traveling to perform at church conventions throughout the country. Tharpe developed considerable fame as a musical prodigy, standing out in an era when prominent Black female guitarists were rare.
In 1934, at age 19, she married a minister, Thomas A. Tharpe, a COGIC preacher, who accompanied her and her mother on many of their tours. In 1938, she left her husband and moved with her mother to New York City. The marriage did not last long. Although she married several times, she performed as Rosetta Tharpe for the rest of her life. She remarried in the 1940s to Fosh Allen. By 1938, Rosetta had taken her talent into venues such as the Cotton Club, where she became part of the Harlem club’s famous revue, where she focused on jazz songs. Rosetta made her first records for Decca in October 1938 and had successes with versions of gospel songs by Thomas A. Dorsey. Her version drew ire from the "Father of Gospel Music", who felt gospel songs were not designed for anything but holy dancing. Her Cotton Club performances were disparaged by churchgoers who believed a sacred singer should not appear in nightclubs.
Rosetta continued to record songs for her gospel fan base such as "Rock Me", "That's All", "My Man and I" and "The Lonesome Road", establishing Tharpe as an overnight sensation and one of the first commercially successful gospel recording artists. She was 28 at the time, just launching her career as gospel’s first real hitmaker, its first crossover artist and first national star. Tharpe was becoming a household name as a gospel singer influencing established and up and coming artists. Nevertheless, music impresario John Hammond selected Rosetta to help represent sacred music at his 1938 “From Spirituals to Swing,” in Carnegie Hall, accompanied by the great boogie-woogie pianist Albert Ammons. Though echo-drenched and not of the highest quality, these early recordings are considered some of the first rock’n’roll records. Tharpe’s song “Rock Me” is an early influence on what would become Rock and Roll music.
Rosetta moved effortlessly between sacred and secular. She was a vocalist with orchestras led by Lucius “Lucky” Millinder’s jazz orchestra in 1941 and 1942, but continued to sing and play guitar in COGIC churches. Her stint with Lucky Millander’s Orchestra found her performing and recording both gospel and – to the dismay of church folks – secular songs such as “Four Or Five Times". Her records caused an immediate furor. Many churchgoers were shocked by the mixture of gospel-based lyrics and secular-sounding music, but secular audiences loved them. Tharpe played on several occasions with the White singing group the Jordanaires. Performing gospel music for secular nightclub audiences and alongside blues and jazz musicians and dancers was unusual, and in conservative religious circles, a woman playing the guitar in such settings was frowned upon. Tharpe fell out of favor with segments of the gospel community, while at the same time gained new fans. By 1943 Rosetta considered rebuilding a strictly gospel act, but she was contractually required to perform more worldly material.
Her nightclub performances, in which she would sometimes sing gospel songs amid scantily clad showgirls, caused her to be shunned by some in the gospel community. They called her controversial, said she was mixing the sacred and the profane. But Rosetta didn’t pay them no mind. She knew what she was doing. She was taking the raw emotion of the blues, the joy of gospel, and creating something powerful, something that transcended genre. One of her biggest gospel hits came in late 1944, with "Strange Things Happening Every Day". With that recording she holds the honor of singing the first Gospel song to crossover on the Billboard race charts in 1945. This Decca recording, accompanied by Sammy Price and his jazz combo, reached No. 2 on the Hit Parade. From that point forward, Rosetta stuck strictly to Christian musical fare, though her electrifying guitar picking would influence future rock ’n’ roll guitarists.
During this time masculinity was directly linked to guitar skills. Tharpe was often offered the intended compliment that she could "play like a man", demonstrating her skills at guitar battles at the Apollo. She was so popular, she was one of only two African American gospel acts to record “V-Discs” for U.S. troops overseas during World War II. Rosetta teamed up with vocalist Marie Knight after seeing her perform at a Mahalia Jackson concert in New York, in 1946. Marie subdued vocal approach provided an effective contrast to Tharpe’s more emotive phrasing. They toured the gospel circuit for a number of years, during which they recorded hits such as "Up Above My Head", "Didn’t It Rain and Up Above My Head" and "Gospel Train". Starting in 1949, their popularity took a sudden downturn. Mahalia Jackson was starting to eclipse Tharpe in popularity, and Knight harbored a desire to break free as a solo act into popular music.
Furthermore, around this time, Knight lost her children and mother in a house fire. Rosetta’s 1949 rendition of White Christmas hit No. 8 on Billboard’s R&B Hit Singles chart and earned her and the Rosettes a coveted spot on CBS Television’s Supper Club with Perry Como on January 1, 1950. On July 3, 1951, a paying crowd of 25,000 gathered in Washington, D.C.’s Griffith Stadium to witness Thorpe’s third marriage to her manager, Russell Morrison. In 1952, Tharpe and Red Foley recorded the B-side "Have a Little Talk with Jesus", which is likely the first interracial duet recorded in the U.S. In 1956, Tharpe recorded an album with the gospel quartet the Harmonizing Four, titled "Gospel Train". One year later, Rosetta embarked on a tour of Europe, where she performed alongside Chris Barber’s Jazz Band. After trying to appeal to the pop music market, her concert dates slowed, and she lost her contract with Decca Records.
In April and May 1964, Sister Rosetta Tharpe tried another tour of Europe, this time as part of the Blues and Gospel Caravan, alongside Muddy Waters and Otis Spann, Ransom Knowling, and Little Willie Smith, Reverend Gary Davis, Cousin Joe, Sonny Terry, and Brownie McGhee. Tharpe's performances were curtailed by a stroke in 1970. On October 9, 1973, the eve of a scheduled recording session, she died in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as a result of another stroke. Despite facing criticism from conservative religious groups, she never abandoned gospel music. Her style was a gumbo of influences – gospel, blues, jazz – all blended together into something uniquely her own. Because several future rock performers attended Rosetta’s concerts, some consider her English appearances to have helped ignite the flame of the 1960s British Invasion. In many ways she can be considered the Godmother of Rock n Roll. She is attributed for being responsible for the careers of the many of the biggest rock giants to come after her. While controversial among conservative religious groups due to her forays into the pop world, she never was inducted into the Gospel Hall of Fame. For her significant contributions to the blues, she was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2007.