Photo courtesy of the artist

2004 NEA National Heritage Fellow Charles "Chuck" T. Campbell Rochester, NY Gospel steel guitarist

Charles "Chuck" T. Campbell is known as a master of the sacred steel. This form of music originated in the House of God, a Holiness-Pentecostal church founded in 1903 by a Tennessee street preacher named Mary Magdalene Lewis Tate. In the 1930s a number of these churches began using the electric steel guitar to function as the central musical instrument of the religious service, easing the congregants through contemplative moments and propelling them to ecstatic celebration at other times. Charles Campbell, whose father was a bishop in the church, began playing steel guitar at age 11 and today is recognized as a great innovator and teacher in the tradition. Campbell developed a unique tuning and set-up for the pedal steel that is today emulated by a new generation of steel players. While younger players like Robert Randolph have taken the sacred steel sound into the secular world of arena concerts, Charles Campbell continues to teach the young and pay tribute to the elders. At the same time, he continually looks for new ways to give the steel guitar a personal voice of celebration and praise.

 
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NEA Heritage Fellows
1982-2012: 
BY YEAR | ALPHA