“You keep using that word, I don’t think it means what you think it means”

Anderson University is the home-place of the Church of God movement - a reformation, non-pentecostal, “Back-to-the-Bible,” women-in-the-pulpit church. Anderson University’s music department is named after Bill and Gloria, who have funded the majority of the department.

So many people have so many opinions and ideas of what church Gaither affiliates himself with. Strange.

At any rate, the thrust of my original comment on the Jason Crabb post was not to argue that you, as you say, “[misunderstood] the relationship of artists’ denominational affiliation to their work and its appeal.” The only reason I wrote that entire comment, quite frankly, was to try to correct the conflation of the holiness and pentecostal traditions in your original “Spring Hill and Jason Crabb” post–a conflation you have made before on other occasions over the last four years, and it finally got under my skin enough to try to point out the distinctions between the two traditions.

Apparently either you still don’t quite get the distinction I was trying to make or you disagree with me (which is fine, I suppose, though as a church historian and historical theologian focused on American Christianity, and as a minister in the Church of the Nazarene, I’m pretty confident I’m correct in my interpretation of these distinctions). But you’re still conflating the holiness tradition and the pentecostal tradition [cf. the last line of your fourth paragraph in this current post on “Denomination and Style”].

And for the record, since previous commenters seem to have raised questions about it, my original comment stated that Bill Gaither was raised in the Church of the Nazarene and has spent his adult life in the Church of God (Anderson)–though, as Jenn (#7) pointed out, the two denominations are closely related.

But to the issue at hand: I’m not sure I would try to go very far in arguing that sg artists try to appeal to certain denominational or theological traditions. And I don’t believe that my original comment made the “common mistake” of “assuming that artists aim for, and appeal to, roughly the same denominational background from which the artists themselves emerge.”

In your original post on Jason Crabb signing with Spring Hill, you wrote: “For Gaither and Co., Crabb brings with him an abiding popularity among a country/holiness demographic that Gaither could want to make inroads into. How Crabb’s Pentecostalism would play on the Homecoming stage is an open question, as I imagine it won’t be easy to control or contain the guy when he gets on a holy roll.”

My original comment was primarily intended to point out that Gaither IS in the holiness tradition and has had that group among his fanbase from the beginning–and thus would have no need to try to “make inroads” into that tradition–and that what I thought you actually meant was that Gaither might be trying to make inroads into the “pentecostal demographic” (since, as I’ve said, I believe you are conflating the two). Examples of groups coming out of the holiness tradition would include Gaithers, Speers, Collingsworth Family, Pfeifers, etc. I don’t believe that any of these groups evoke the kind of “pentecostal / charismatic” stage presence to which you seem to be alluding.

But here is the rub, given your current post: You yourself, in the excerpt from your “Spring Hill and Jason Crabb” post that I quoted above, seem to imply that there are “demographics” in the southern gospel community–and it seems, based on my interpretation of what you’ve said (replacing the word “holiness” with “pentecostal,” which is what I believe you mean) that you at least would delineate a demographic that is “pentecostal / charismatic” and a demographic that is a bit more reserved (i.e., Gaither crowd, lots of Baptists, the holiness tradition, and the few Methodists in the sg circuit, etc.). Not that there are clear lines of division between the two, nor to say that there aren’t an awful lot of sg groups that appeal to both demographics–but you do seem to suggest that there are [at least] two demographics out there. And I think you’re probably correct up to that point. I wouldn’t try to go any farther than that with it, nor do I believe that I went any farther than that in my original comment–so I don’t believe I’m guilty of the “common mistake” you’ve attributed to me. I actually think we’re on the same page in this regard (at least if I can get you to quit saying “holiness” and “pentecostal” are the same thing).

Perhaps we could put it in terms of a Venn diagram: Let’s say there are two circles–the “pentecostal / charismatic demographic” circle and the “more reserved evangelical demographic” circle–that overlap. They overlap a lot–for the sake of argument, let’s say that 85% of southern gospel groups fall into the part of the circle where there’s overlap. But there are also a handful of groups that do appeal to the “pentecostal / charismatic” demographic but don’t appeal quite as much to the “more reserved” demographic. The example I used in my original comment was the McGruders, but I think one could make the argument that a lot of the resistance to the Crabbs from certain sectors of the sg fanbase stemmed from a perceived pentecostal / charismatic orientation to their performance style. (I know, there were lots of other issues ranging from attire and hairstyle to loudness to attempts at genre-bending to, in my opinion, jealousy at their quick success in the market. But it would be hard to deny that a reaction against a perceived charismatic / pentecostal orientation was NOT in the mix, and you seem to suggest the same yourself in the passage you wrote that I quoted above.) Perhaps some would add the Wilburns to that list as well. Whether or not there are many, or even any, groups in the circle representing the “more reserved” demographic that are NOT also in the “charismatic / pentecostal” demographic’s circle might be an interesting point for discussion.

For the record, for the most part I’ve always enjoyed the McGruders and the Crabbs and the Wilburns, even though I’m in the holiness tradition and not in the pentecostal /charismatic tradition. So just because one is not pentecostal / charismatic oneself does not mean that one will not enjoy or appreciate groups that seem to evidence a more charismatic stage presence. But with regard to your implication that there is more than one demographic out there, I think I would agree. I’m simply trying to look at the evidence empirically, as I believe you were doing when you originally raised that issue. And, to be sure, Eddie Crook (#1) is equally correct in pointing out that there are some Baptist groups that seem to appeal more to the pentecostal / charismatic crowd.

For the most part, I think I could substantially agree with everything else you wrote in this current post. We’re both trying to get a handle on this thing empirically, and I think your statement that southern gospel seems to be trending more charismatic / pentecostal in recent years has a lot of empirical support. And I believe your argument about the “Denominational Paradox” as well as your corollary to the same offer an interesting and fresh way of looking at this subject. I’ll have to digest it a bit more before jumping completely on board with you, but I don’t find anything in my initial reading of your argument with which I would immediately disagree.

I grew up in that world. Recently the president of the college preached a sermon against the evils of Southern Gospel. Funy that the tour groups sing SG songs that are on the charts……minus the drums of course. I guess it is ok for the college music director to find those songs. He just has to cleanse them of the wicked drums.

hahahahaha..

Again….not the same this as Anderson Unicersity in Anderson, IN. That is the School that Bill Gaither support with his donations.

I thought Anderson College (formerly Hyles- Anderson) was an independent Baptist College of the MOST CONSERVATIVE order.

LOL…maybe he’s got a dual church membership.

Naw…..keep your beliefs to yourself untill you get their mone…..untill you minister to them.