“Strange Things Happening Every Day” is a traditional African American spiritual. It was most famously, and influentially, recorded by Sister Rosetta Tharpe in late 1944, becoming a hit record in 1945. It was the first gospel record to cross over and become a hit on the “race records” chart, the term then used for what later became the R&B chart, and reached #2 on the Billboard “race” chart in April 1945. The recording has been cited as an important precursor of rock and roll. (More from Wikipedia)
So, you might well ask, what is the earliest song on the list of contenders for the first rock and roll record? According to Wikipedia, that would be the 1944 recording “Strange Things Happening Every Day” by Sister Rosetta Tharpe. As might be imagined from her name, Tharpe was a traveling evangelist who became the first superstar of gospel music in the 1930’s and 1940’s. As Wikipedia puts it, Sister Rosetta Tharpe was “willing to cross the line between sacred and secular by performing her music of ‘light’ in the ‘darkness’ of the nightclubs and concert halls with big bands behind her”. However, she never abandoned her first love of gospel music.
I first encountered Sister Rosetta Tharpe’s music on Michelle Shocked’s fascinating 2007 gospel CD, ToHeavenURide. The CD was recorded live at the Telluride Bluegrass Festival; the album name is a takeoff on the nickname for the festival, “To Hell You Ride”. Shocked launched her concert with a long introduction about Tharpe’s legacy and then performed “Strange Things Happening Every Day”. More recently, Sister Rosetta Tharpe was featured in the opening program on the 2013 season of the PBS series American Masters.
(June 2013/1)
