Editing Mahalia Jackson (section)

==Style==
===Singing===

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| quote =[Jackson would] sometimes build a song up and up, singing the words over and over to increase their intensity... Like Bessie, she would slide up or slur down to a note. She would also break up a word into as many syllables as she cared to, or repeat and prolong an ending to make it more effective: "His love is deeper and deeper, yes deeper and deeper, it's deeper! and deeper, Lord! deeper and deeper, Lord! it's deeper than the se-e-e-e-a, yeah, oh my lordy, yeah deeper than the sea, Lord." And the last two words would be a dozen syllables each.
| source = – Author [[Hettie Jones]]<ref>Burford 2020, p. 89.</ref>
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Though the gospel blues style Jackson employed was common among soloists in black churches, to many white jazz fans it was novel. As she was the most prominent — and sometimes the only gospel singer many white listeners knew — she often received requests to define the style and explain how and why she sang as she did. Jackson was mostly untrained, never learning to read or write musical notation, so her style was heavily marked by instinct. She answered questions to the best of her ability though often responded with lack of surety, saying: "All I ever learned was just to sing the way I feel... off-beat, on the beat, between beats — however the Lord lets it come out."<ref name="ebony obit"/> When pressed for clearer descriptions, she replied: "Child, I don't know how I do it myself."<ref name="Heilbut, p. 66">Heilbut, p. 66.</ref>

Jackson's voice is noted for being energetic and powerful, ranging from [[contralto]] to [[soprano]], which she switched between rapidly. She resisted labeling her voice range instead calling it "real strong and clear".<ref name="ebony obit"/> She used [[Blue note|bent or "worried" notes]] typical of blues, the sound of which jazz aficionado Bucklin Moon described as "an almost solid wall of blue tonality". She moaned, hummed, and improvised extensively with rhythm and melody, often embellishing notes with a prodigious use of [[melisma]], or singing several tones per syllable. Author [[Anthony Heilbut]] called it a "weird ethereal sound, part moan, part failed operatics".<ref name="Heilbut, p. 66"/> Gospel historian [[Horace Clarence Boyer|Horace Boyer]] attributes Jackson's "aggressive style and rhythmic ascension" to the Pentecostal congregation she heard as a child, saying Jackson was "never a Baptist singer". He continues: "bending a note here, chopping off a note there, singing through rest spots and ornamenting the melodic line at will, [Jackson] confused pianists but fascinated those who played by ear".<ref>Boyer, p. 87.</ref> Bucklin Moon was enamored with her singing, writing that the embellishments Jackson added "take your breath away. As a member of a Sanctified Church in Mount Vernon once told me: 'Mahalia, she add more flowers and feathers than anybody, and they all is exactly right.' She breaks every rule of concert singing, taking breaths in the middle of a word and sometimes garbling the words altogether, but the full-throated feeling and expression are seraphic."<ref>Burford 2020 p. 48.</ref> Writer [[Ralph Ellison]] noted how she blended precise diction with a thick New Orleans accent, describing the effect as "almost of the academy one instant, and of the broadest cotton field dialect the next".<ref>Burford 2020, p. 68.</ref>

By her own admission and in the opinion of multiple critics and scholars, Bessie Smith's singing style was clearly dominant in Jackson's voice. In ''[[Melody Maker]]'', [[Max Jones (journalist)|Max Jones]] contrasted the two: "Whereas Bessie's singing can sound harsh and unlovely, even to jazz students, on first acquaintance, Mahalia's voice is obviously an instrument of uncommon beauty... Her bursts of power and sudden rhythmic drives build up to a pitch that leave you unprepared to listen afterwards to any but the greatest of musicians."<ref>Goreau, p. 132.</ref> Other singers made their mark. In her early days in Chicago, Jackson saved her money to buy records by classical singers [[Roland Hayes]], [[Grace Moore]], and [[Lawrence Tibbett]], attributing her diction, breathing, and she said, "what little I know of technique" to these singers.<ref>Burford 2020 p. 37.</ref>

Improvisation was a significant part of Jackson's live performances both in concert halls and churches. She often stretched what would be a five-minute recording to twenty-five minutes to achieve maximum emotional effect. In black churches, this was a regular practice among gospel soloists who sought to evoke an emotional purging in the audience during services. White and non-Christian audiences also felt this resonance. After one concert, critic [[Nat Hentoff]] wrote: "The conviction and strength of her rendition had a strange effect on the secularists present, who were won over to Mahalia if not to her message. Most of them were amazed at the length of time after the concert during which the sound of her voice remained active in the mind."<ref>Burford 2020, p. 56.</ref> Jackson explained that as God worked through her she became more impassioned during a song, and that what she felt was right to do in the moment was what was necessary for the audience. As her career advanced, she found it difficult to adjust to the time constraints in recording and television appearances, saying: "When I sing I don't go by the score. I lose something when I do. I don't want to be told I can sing just so long. I make it 'til that passion is passed. When I become conscious, I can't do it good."<ref>Burford 2020 p. 53.</ref>

===Recording===
[[File:Mahalia Jackson 1962, van Vechten, LC-USZ62-91314.jpg|thumb|Jackson, photographed by [[Carl Van Vechten]] in 1962]]
Jackson estimated that she sold 22 million records in her career.<ref>Goreau, pp. 453—467.</ref> Her four singles for Decca and seventy-one for Apollo are widely acclaimed by scholars as defining gospel blues.<ref>Burford 2019, p. 174.</ref> The earliest are marked by minimal accompaniment with piano and organ. Apollo added acoustic guitar, backup singers, bass, and drums in the 1950s. Her singing is lively, energetic, and emotional, using "a voice in the prime of its power and command", according to author Bob Darden.<ref name="darden216-217">Darden, p. 216—217.</ref> Although hearing herself on Decca recordings years later prompted Jackson to declare they are "not very good", [[Viv Broughton]] calls "Keep Me Every Day" a "gospel masterpiece", and Anthony Heilbut praises its "wonderful artless purity and conviction", saying that in her Decca records, her voice "was at its loveliest, rich and resonant, with little of the vibrato and neo-operatic obbligatos of later years". Likewise, he calls Jackson's Apollo records "uniformly brilliant", choosing "Even Me", "Just As I Am", "City Called Heaven", and "I Do, Don't You" as perfect examples of her phrasing and contralto range, having an effect that is "angelic but never saccharine".<ref>Burford 2020, p. 35.</ref><ref name="Broughton, p. 53"/><ref>Heilbut, pp. 61, 64—65.</ref> ''The New Grove Gospel, Blues, and Jazz'' cites the Apollo songs "In the Upper Room", "Let the Power of the Holy Ghost Fall on Me", and "I'm Glad Salvation is Free" as prime examples of the "majesty" of Jackson's voice. According to musicologist [[Wilfrid Mellers]], Jackson's early recordings demonstrate a "sound that is all-embracing, as secure as the womb, from which singer and listener may be reborn. The breathtaking beauty of the voice and superbly controlled transitions from speech to prayer to song heal and anneal."<ref name="darden216-217"/>

Columbia Records, then the largest recording company in the U.S., presented Jackson as the "World's Greatest Gospel Singer" in the 28 albums they released. She was marketed to appeal to a wide audience of listeners who, despite all her accomplishments up to 1954, had never heard of her. In contrast to the series of singles from Apollo, Columbia released themed albums that included [[liner notes]] and photos.<ref>Burford 2019, p. 344.</ref> Compared to other artists at Columbia, Jackson was allowed considerable input in what she would record, but Mitch Miller and producer [[George Avakian]] persuaded her with varying success to broaden her appeal to listeners of different faiths. Though her early records at Columbia had a similar sound to her Apollo records, the music accompanying Jackson at Columbia later included orchestras, electric guitars, backup singers, and drums, the overall effect of which was more closely associated with light pop music. She was marketed similarly to jazz musicians, but her music at Columbia ultimately defied categorization. Her albums interspersed familiar compositions by Thomas Dorsey and other gospel songwriters with songs considered generally inspirational. These included "[[You'll Never Walk Alone]]" written by [[Rodgers and Hammerstein]] for the 1945 musical ''[[Carousel (musical)|Carousel]]'', "[[Trees (poem)|Trees]]" based on the poem by [[Joyce Kilmer]], "[[Danny Boy]]", and the patriotic songs "[[My Country 'Tis of Thee]]" and "[[The Battle Hymn of the Republic]]", among others. ''The Cambridge Companion to Blues and Gospel Music'' describes Jackson's Columbia recordings as "toned down and polished" compared to the rawer, more minimalist sound at Apollo.<ref>Moore, p. 85.</ref> Scholar Mark Burford praises "When I Wake Up In Glory" as "one of the crowning achievements of her career as a recording artist", but Heilbut calls her Columbia recordings of "[[When the Saints Go Marching In]]" and "[[The Lord's Prayer (Albert Hay Malotte song)|The Lord's Prayer]]", "uneventful material".<ref>Burford 2019, p. 333.</ref><ref name="ferris">Ferris, William, and Hart, Mary L., eds.: "The Secularization of Black Gospel Music" by Heilbut, Anthony in ''Folk Music and Modern Sound'' (1982), University of Mississippi Press, pp. 101–115. {{ISBN|978-1-60473-167-5}}</ref><ref>Darden, p. 218.</ref> Jackson agreed somewhat, acknowledging that her sound was being commercialized, calling some of these recordings "sweetened-water stuff".<ref name="Goreau, p. 217">Goreau, p. 217.</ref><ref>Burford 2020, pp. 275–279.</ref> When the themes of her songs were outwardly religious, some critics felt the delivery was at times less lively. John Hammond, who helped secure Jackson's contract with Columbia, told her if she signed with them many of her black fans would not relate well to the music. This turned out to be true and as a result, Jackson created a distinct performing style for Columbia recordings that was markedly different from her live performances, which remained animated and lively, both in churches and concert halls.<ref>Boyer, p. 91.</ref><ref name="nyt obit"/>

===Live performance===

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She roared like a Pentecostal preacher, she moaned and growled like the old Southern mothers, she hollered the gospel blues like a sanctified Bessie Smith and she cried into the Watts' hymns like she was back in a slave cabin. They say that, in her time, Mahalia Jackson could wreck a church in minutes flat and keep it that way for hours on end." 
| source = – Author [[Viv Broughton]]<ref name="Broughton, p. 54">Broughton, p. 54.</ref>
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In live performances, Jackson was renowned for her physicality and the extraordinary emotional connections she held with her audiences.  ''[[The New York Times]]'' stated she was a "massive, stately, even majestic woman, [who] possessed an awesome presence that was apparent in whatever milieu she chose to perform."<ref name="nyt obit"/> So caught up in the spirit was she while singing, she often wept, fell on her knees, bowed, skipped, danced, clapped spontaneously, patted her sides and stomach, and particularly in churches, roamed the aisles to sing directly to individuals. All of these were typical of the services in black churches though Jackson's energy was remarkable.<ref>Marovich, p. 80.</ref> An experiment wearing a wig with her robes went awry during a show in the 1950s when she sang so frenetically she flung it off mid-performance.<ref>Goreau, pp. 177—194.</ref> Anthony Heilbut writes that "some of her gestures are dramatically jerky, suggesting instant spirit possession", and called her performances "downright terrifying. At her best, Mahalia builds these songs to a frenzy of intensity almost demanding a release in holler and shout. When singing them she may descend to her knees, her combs scattering like so many cast-out demons."<ref>Heilbut, p. 65.</ref> Jackson defended her idiosyncrasies, commenting: "How can you sing of amazing grace, how can you sing prayerfully of heaven and earth and all God's wonders without using your hands? My hands, my feet, I throw my whole body to say all that is within me. The mind and the voice by themselves are not sufficient."<ref>Goreau, p. 191.</ref>{{efn|The guidance she received from  Thomas Dorsey included altering her breathing, phrasing, and energy. Dorsey preferred a more sedate delivery and he encouraged her to use slower, more sentimental songs between uptempo numbers to smooth the roughness of her voice and communicate more effectively with the audience. Early in her career, she had a tendency to choose songs that were all uptempo and she often shouted in excitement at the beginning of and during songs, taking breaths erratically. One early admirer remembered, "People used to say, 'That woman sing too hard, she going to have TB!'" (Harris, p. 259.) Jackson took many of the lessons to heart; according to historian Robert Marovich, slower songs allowed her to "embellish the melodies and wring every ounce of emotion from the hymns".(Marovich, p. 122.) They also helped her catch her breath as she got older. (Burford, Mark, "Mahalia Jackson Meets the Wise Men: Defining Jazz at the Music Inn", ''The Musical Quarterly'' (Fall 2014), Vol. 97, No. 3, pp. 429–486.)}}

In line with improvising music, Jackson did not like to prepare what she would sing before concerts, and would often change song preferences based on what she was feeling at the moment, saying: "There's something the public reaches into me for, and there seems to be something in each audience that I can feel. I can feel whether there's a low spirit. Some places I go, up-tempo songs don't go, and other places, sad songs aren't right."<ref>Burford 2020 p. 57.</ref> She had an uncanny ability to elicit the same emotions from her audiences that she transmitted in her singing.<ref name="globe obit"/><ref name="jabir">Jabir, Johari, "On Conjuring Mahalia: Mahalia Jackson, New Orleans, and the Sanctified Swing", ''American Quarterly'' (September 2009), Vol. 61, No. 3, pp. 649-669.</ref><ref name="Harris, p. 258"/> ''[[People Today]]'' commented that "When Mahalia sings, audiences do more than just listen—they undergo a profoundly moving emotional experience."<ref>Goreau, p. 151.</ref> Jackson used "house wreckers", or songs that induced long tumultuous moments with audiences weeping, shouting, and moaning, especially in black churches. Gospel singer Evelyn Gaye recalled touring with her in 1938 when Jackson often sang "If You See My Savior Tell Him That You Saw Me", saying: "and the people, look like they were just awed by it, on a higher plane, gone. She had that type of rocking and that holy dance she'd get into—look like the people just submitted to it."<ref>Goreau, p. 81.</ref> White audiences also wept and responded emotionally. According to jazz writer Raymond Horricks, instead of preaching to listeners Jackson spoke about her personal faith and spiritual experiences "immediately and directly... making it difficult for them to turn away".<ref>Burford 2020, p. 61.</ref> Promoter Joe Bostic was in the audience of the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival, an outdoor concert that occurred during a downpour, and stated: "It was the most fantastic tribute to the hypnotic power of great artistry I have ever encountered. Nothing like it have I ever seen in my life. Those people sat... they forgot... they were completely entranced."<ref>Goreau p. 256.</ref>

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She didn't say it, but the implication was obvious. Mahalia Jackson doesn't sing to fracture any cats, or to capture any Billboard polls, or because she wants her recording contract renewed. She sings the way she does for the most basic of singing reasons, for the most honest of them all, without any frills, flourishes, or phoniness. 
| source = – Jazz writer George T. Simon<ref>Burford 2020 p. 54.</ref>
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A significant part of Jackson's appeal was her demonstrated earnestness in her religious conviction. Bostic spoke of her abiding faith: "Mahalia never became so sophisticated that she lost her humility, her relationship with God as a divine being. She never got beyond that point; and many times, many times, you were amazed — at least I was, because she was such a tough business woman."<ref>Goreau, p. 131.</ref> During her tour of the Middle East, Jackson stood back in wonder while visiting [[Jericho]], and road manager David Haber asked her if she truly thought [[Battle of Jericho|trumpets brought down its walls]]. Jackson replied honestly: "I believe Joshua did pray to God, and the sun stood still. I believe everything."<ref>Goreau, p. 306.</ref> Gospel singer [[Cleophus Robinson]] asserted: "There never was any pretense, no sham about her. Wherever you met her it was like receiving a letter from home. She was a warm, carefree personality who gave you the feeling that you could relax and let your hair down whenever you were around her — backstage with her or in her home where she'd cook up some good gumbo for you whenever she had the time. A lot of people tried to make Mahalia act 'proper', and they'd tell her about her diction and such things but she paid them no mind. She never denied her background and she never lost her 'down home' sincerity."<ref name="ebony obit"/> Television host Ed Sullivan said, "She was just so darned kind to everybody. When Mahalia sang, she took command. The band, the stage crew, the other performers, the ushers — they were all rooting for her. When she came out, she could be your mother or your sister. I mean, she wasn't obsequious, you know; she was a star among other stars. Other people may not have wanted to be deferential, but they couldn't help it. This woman was just great."<ref>Goreau, pp. 153—154.</ref> Commenting on her personal intimacy, Neil Goodwin of ''[[The Daily Express]]'' wrote after attending her 1961 concert at the Royal Albert Hall: "Mahalia Jackson sang to ''ME'' last night." Others wrote of her ability to give listeners goosebumps or make the hair on their neck tingle.<ref>Goreau, pp. 292, 319.</ref>

===Mildred Falls===

Until 1946, Jackson used an assortment of pianists for recording and touring, choosing anyone who was convenient and free to go with her. As her career progressed, she found it necessary to have a pianist available at a moment's notice, someone talented enough to improvise with her yet steeped in religious music. Jackson found this in Mildred Falls (1921–1974), who accompanied her for 25 years. Falls is often acknowledged as a significant part of Jackson's sound and therefore her success. She was born Mildred Carter in [[Magnolia, Mississippi]], learning to play on her family's upright piano, working with church choirs, and moving to California with a gospel singing group. A broken marriage resulted in her return to Chicago in 1947 when she was referred to Jackson who set up a brief training with [[Robert Anderson (singer)|Robert Anderson]], a longtime member of Jackson's entourage.<ref name="goreau 113-123"/> Falls  accompanied her in nearly every performance and recording thereafter.<ref>Burford 2020, pp. 187—188.</ref>

Always on the lookout for new material, Jackson received 25 to 30 compositions a month for her consideration. Falls played these so Jackson could "catch the message of the song".<ref>Burford 2020 p. 51.</ref> Once selections were made, Falls and Jackson memorized each composition, though while touring with Jackson, Falls was required to improvise as Jackson never sang a song the same way twice, even from rehearsal to a performance hours or minutes later. Falls found it necessary to watch Jackson's mannerisms and mouth instead of looking at the piano keys to keep up with her. At the beginning of a song, Falls might start in one key and receive hand signals from Jackson to change until Jackson felt the right key for the song in that moment. Falls remembered, "Mahalia waited until she heard exactly what was in her ear, and once she heard it, she went on about her business and she'd tear the house down."<ref>Burford 2002, p. 188.</ref>

Studs Terkel compared Falls to [[Paul Ulanowsky]] and [[Gerald Moore]] who played for classical singing stars [[Lotte Lehmann]] and [[Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau]], respectively.<ref>Burford 2020, p. 81, 90.</ref> Ralph Ellison called Falls and Jackson "the dynamic duo", saying that their performance at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival created "a rhythmical drive such as is expected of the entire Basie band. It is all joy and exultation and swing, but it is nonetheless religious music." Falls' right hand playing, according to Ellison, substituted for the horns in an orchestra which was in constant "conversation" with Jackson's vocals. Her left hand provided a "walking bass line that gave the music its 'bounce{{'"}}, common in [[Stride (music)|stride]] and [[ragtime]] playing.<ref name="jabir"/> Similarly, television host Dinah Shore called Falls' left hand "the strongest thing in the whole world", giving Jackson's music a prominent beat usually missing from religious music. When Shore's studio musicians attempted to pinpoint the cause of Jackson's rousing sound, Shore admonished them with humor, saying: "Mildred's got a left hand, that's what your problem is."<ref>Goreau, p. 227.</ref> Anthony Heilbut explained: "By Chicago choir standards her chordings and tempos were old-fashioned, but they always induced a subtle rock exactly suited to Mahalia's swing."<ref name="Heilbut, p. 68">Heilbut, p. 68.</ref>