Boots

e Roberta Martin Singers were an African-American gospel group based in the United States. The group was founded in 1933 by Roberta Martin, who in that same year had just become acquainted with the then new trend of Christian music known as gospel, which was different than the traditional spirituals which were popular at the time. Theodore Frye and Thomas A. Dorsey were directing a junior choir at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Chicago, Illinois, and asked Martin to serve as the accompanist. From this junior choir, Martin selected six young men at random to form a group, Eugene Smith, Norsalus McKissick, Robert Anderson, Willie Webb, James Lawrence, and WC Herman (who lost his life in World War Two). This group was named the Martin and Frye Singers, and in 1936, the group adopted the name of The Roberta Martin Singers. The Roberta Martin Singers (RMS) were well known for their unique sound, which contained no traditional bass, but a dark treble sound with the elasticity that the new music required. For a brief period of time, the group was known as the Martin and Martin Singers, when Sallie Martin joined Roberta’s group. That venture was short lived. In 1939, Anderson briefly left the group and returned in 1941 before departing for a final time in 1943, also in 1939, Martin added the first female voice to the group, Bessie Folk. By the mid 1940s, the RMS added two more women to their ranks, Delois Barrett (Campbell) and Sadie Durrah. The group toured the nation to great …