Talk:Sister Rosetta Tharpe/Archive 1

References, citations
I notice that this largely lacks inline citations, though the references given seem to be pretty much the right ones. If someone wants to try citing more precisely for some of this, but doesn't want to slog through entire biographies, Tharpe's biographer Gayle Wald also wrote a shorter piece:


 * Gayle Wald, "Sister Rosetta Tharpe and the Prehistory of 'Women In Rock'", p. 56–67 in Eric Weisbard, ed., This is Pop, Harvard University Press, 2004. ISBN 0-674-01321-2 (cloth), ISBN 0-674-01344-1 (paper).

I hope that might be useful to someone. - Jmabel | Talk 22:09, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Birth year discrepency
Tharpe's IMDb listing gives her year of birth as 1921; did she ever trim a few years off her age (as so many other performers did)? 68.146.41.232 04:52, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Sister Rosetta Tharpe
Sister Rosetta Tharpe was a great woman.She love tho sing.She was boron on 1915 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.45.184.253 (talk) 21:40, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Link is incorrect
As of 29 April 2012, the only album referenced under the Discography heading, Gospel Train, points to Gospel_Train, an article about a traditional African-American spiritual, not about her album, and not mentioning her or her album. As my inaugural wiki edit, this is all I can manage; I hope someone else will fix the actual problem. Couldn&#39; git my real name (talk) 04:47, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks - I've corrected the link, but there is a job there waiting for someone, to create a decent discography for her. I may make a start on it later.  Ghmyrtle (talk) 08:57, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Who is Sister Katy Marie?
Is this another name for Sister Rosetta Tharpe? The rest of the internet thinks so but it's not mentioned anywhere on her Wikipedia page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.204.169.188 (talk • contribs) 04:18, 5 January 2015‎
 * Apparently so - "Around the time Rosetta first recorded with Marie Knight for Decca, she cut two titles in Los Angeles for Down Beat/Swing Time as Sister Katy Marie, one of which was a re-recording of the duo's first number for Decca: When I Come To The End Of My Journey."   The reason was that she was exclusively contracted to Decca at the time.  Probably worth a sentence, in my view.  Ghmyrtle (talk) 08:29, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

"Godmother of Rock and Roll"
This source says she "played a vital role in the conception of Rock & Roll as a genre of music." Is that a WP:RS? Martinevans123 (talk) 13:49, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
 * In what sense? We can say that a site describes her as "the Godmother of Rock and Roll", but I don't know whether any other sites use the same term...  and articles here should not make such a claim themselves.  She was definitely a "godmother", and certainly played a vital role in the emergence of r&r...  but she was not unequivocally the godmother.   If "the conception of rock & roll as a genre" can be said to have started anywhere, it was with Alan Freed - but there were many parents and grandparents.   Ghmyrtle (talk) 14:44, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
 * I've just added her at Honorific nicknames in popular music, where there are no requirements for exclusivity. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:53, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
 * ..and as my good deed for the day I've put her in the correct alphabetical order.   : - )    Ghmyrtle (talk) 14:59, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
 * You just have to be clever don't you, Ghm!! (Obviously I had to leave something for you to do....) Martinevans123 (talk) 15:36, 15 March 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 1 one external link on Sister Rosetta Tharpe. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20160106203952/http://www.will.uiuc.edu/media/aftmag070222.mp3 to http://www.will.uiuc.edu/media/aftmag070222.mp3

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true or failed to let others know (documentation at ).

Cheers.—cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 11:54, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

"Down by the Riverside" recording date
The text says she recorded it on December 2, 1948, but also describes it as a 1944 hit. The Library of Congress gives the date of the record as 1944. Is the 1948 date a mistake, or did she re-record it then? Unless the correct date is December 2, 1944, the parenthetical statement is irrelevant. Jwicklatz (talk) 21:49, 13 April 2016 (UTC)

I found that confusing as well, and for an introductory paragraph, that level of discographical detail bogs down the flow for the reader. One could simply say "her 1940s recording of Down by the Riverside" if it looks like the Library of Congress made an error with respect to the year. Also, in the "Recording Career" section, people who are not record collectors (and especially readers who have English as a second language) probably won't understand the jargon "sides" to refer to individual recorded performances. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 148.87.23.10 (talk) 20:40, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

needs cleanup
Unfounded hyperbole is not protected by being in the lede section.

Hyperbolic statements in the article body (e.g. "It has been suggested Tharpe had little choice in the material") need to be not just ascribed to a source but directly (and briefly) quoted. Barring that, paraphrase the statement such that it is simple and factual, lacking in melodrama and speculation. Weeb Dingle (talk) 18:36, 7 April 2019 (UTC)

Gospel Train?
The article said this:
 * "In 1946, Tharpe saw Marie Knight perform at a Mahalia Jackson concert in New York. Tharpe recognized a special talent in Knight. Two weeks later, Tharpe showed up at Knight's doorstep, inviting her to go on the road. They toured the gospel circuit for a number of years, during which they recorded hits such as "Up Above My Head" and "Gospel Train". "

But I can see no evince that Tharpe ever recorded a single by that name; the EP and the album that she did record don't actually include that song. However, the Marie Knight article says this: ".. and Knight's solo version of "Gospel Train" reached No. 9 on the R&B chart in 1949." It's here (apparently properly licensed to YouTube and which seems to have been this Decca ‎– 48092 Shellac 10"), but that's not the one described at The Gospel Train. So I have removed the link. Martinevans123 (talk) 19:33, 1 July 2019 (UTC)