Baptists, music, and World War II

Baptist History and Heritage, Summer-Fall, 2001 by William J. Reynolds

In 1934, Laurens Hammond and fellow engineer John Hanert obtained a patent for an electronic instrument by which sound is produced by rotating tone wheels. The next year they began manufacturing the Hammond Organ, Model A, an instrument that coupled ninety-one of the tone wheels to two five-octave manuals and a two-octave pedal. (13) The Hammond Organ, and other electronic organs that followed, such as Wurlitzer, Baldwin, and Allen, provided pipe-organ-like sound for a reasonable price for many churches whose only keyboard instrument had been a piano.

Concerning the state of music in Southern Baptist churches in the 1930s, Hugh McElrath has said that few churches had any trained music leadership; many churches had no choirs; what music training there was could be found only outside the churches. Congregational singing was confined to some two dozen gospel songs and a handful of eighteenth-century hymns; and corporate worship in many churches of the 1930s was "without form and void." (14)

In the midst of this situation, the First Baptist Church, Bessemer, Alabama, invited Mrs. Jessie Kaye-Smith to be the minister of music in April 1937. (15) Her salary was $100 per month. She soon had five age-group choirs singing regularly in the church services. T. L. Holcomb, head of the Baptist Sunday School Board, preached one Sunday in this church and was greatly impressed with the music program. He sent Harold Ingraham, editor of the Sunday School Builder, to Bessemer to prepare an article for his periodical. The article in the December 1937 issue described the music program and featured pictures of the five robed choirs. Among the questions Dr. Holcomb raised were these:

* What would it mean to your church if the choir sustained a vital relationship to every organization in the church?

* What would it mean to the worship hours in your church if members of every department or age group were included in the choir?

* What would it mean toward developing an appreciation of church music if the boys and girls were trained and led to participate?

* What would a continuous program of musical training mean to your church?

* What would be the result in interest and attendance if the choir in every church in the Southern Baptist Convention were increased to twice its present size?

* What would be the effect on congregational singing five years hence if every age group in your church should be carefully taught church music?

* Are you willing to read and study these questions prayerfully, and then confer with those most interested to see if you can improve the music of your church?

The visit to Bessemer inspired Holcomb to think of the church music possibilities as never before.

In the mid-thirties, more resolutions or reports were offered at the annual meetings of the Southern Baptist Convention. A motion made by E. O. Sellers of New Orleans Seminary provided for a committee to make a survey of music needs and make recommendations. (16) The result of this survey released in 1939 revealed: