SHOUT! Black Gospel Music Moments - Blind Willy Harris

In recent years, music lovers have re-discovered producer Juan D. Shipp’s fabulous D-Vine Spirituals label out of Memphis. Fat Possum Records’ re-releases of classic D-Vine 45s have even been featured on NPR and Free Record Day.

Shipp and engineer Clyde Leoppard started D-Vine in 1970 and over the next 15 years released an astonishing array of gospel artists, including the Gospel Wymics, the Pure Heart Travelers, the Exciting Legion Airs and Blind Willie Harris and the Sensational Six.

Harris’s rendition of the beloved gospel song “Jesus Loves Me” is a perfect example of what D-Vine did best – fueled by a Stax Records-styled horn section, it’s slow and gritty and bluesy and absolutely drips with soul.

MUSIC: Blind Willie Harris and the Sensational Six, “Jesus Loves Me,” 45.

PREVIOUS EPISODES OF SHOUT! BLACK GOSPEL MUSIC MOMENTS

SHOUT! Black Gospel Music Moments - “Oh, Mother Tonight” by The Gospel Twins

The rare 45 “Oh, Mother Tonight” by the otherwise unknown Gospel Twins is a uniquely primitive addition to Baylor’s Black Gospel Archives.

SHOUT! Black Gospel Music Moments - "Oh, Have You" by Evangelist Jessie Mae Renfro

Evangelist Jessie Mae Renfro was one of the last great traditional gospel voices, as her song “Oh, Have You” so beautifully displays.

SHOUT! Black Gospel Music Moments - “No Segregation in Heaven” by Jordan Jubilee

The Jordan Jubilee’s slow and brooding “No Segregation in Heaven” was a pretty grave statement to make in the early 1970s!

SHOUT! Black Gospel Music Moments - "Down by the Riverside" by The Rev. Cecil Harris and His Choir

Fort Worth’s Galatian Baptist Church tears into the old camp-meeting song, “Down by the Riverside.”

SHOUT! Black Gospel Music Moments - "Pray on My Child" by Rev. Milton Brunson and the Thompson Community Singers

That’s the powerful voice of Maggie Bell on the Rev. Milton Brunson and the Thompson Community Choir’s version of “Pray on My Child.”

SHOUT! Black Gospel Music Moments - "No Hiding Place" by The Doves

The otherwise unknown Evening Doves deliver a spirited, rollicking version of the traditional gospel song “No Hiding Place."

SHOUT! Black Gospel Music Moments - "No Friend Like the Lord" by The Silver Bells

The unknown Silver Bells of Macon, Georgia’s “No Friend Like the Lord” is a masterclass in a cappella doo-wop styled gospel singing.

SHOUT! Black Gospel Music Moments - "No Cross, No Crown" by Brooklyn All Stars

The Brooklyn All Stars were New York’s best-known gospel group, singing hits like the slow and stately “No Cross, No Crown.”

SHOUT! Black Gospel Music Moments - "No Coward Soldiers" by The Caravans

The Caravans ruled the Gospel Highway in the 1950s and ‘60s with songs like the upbeat “No Coward Soldiers.”

SHOUT! Black Gospel Music Moments - "Jericho March" by Grace Emmanuel Singers

The music of Daddy Grace’s United House of Prayer for All People is an ecstatic rave-up, fueled by a dozen honking trombones!

“Shout! Black Gospel Music Moments” is produced by KWBU and the Black Gospel Music Preservation Program at Baylor University Libraries.