“Can I get a witness?”: Soul and salvation in Memphis music

Soul music\u27s creation in the early 1960s was the result of a stylistic innovation in which young musicians blended the sounds of the African American church with the secular themes of rhythm and blues. But as religious musicians brought gospel and preaching into popular music, they often felt a conflict between their faith and their career. Memphis, home to several major soul labels and a center for many black churches, was an important site of this transformation in African American music. While the formation of soul music can be situated in its historical moment, the underlying cultural processes at work in its development remain in use in contemporary Memphis. My ethnographic research in Memphis has revealed a persistent religious worldview among musicians, even in the nightclub or juke joint. This dissertation treats the processes by which soul musicians—both past and present—negotiate their faith in a secular context