Gospel music is a traditional genre of Christian music and a cornerstone of Christian media, characterized by dominant vocals (often with strong harmonies) and lyrics that reflect Christian teachings and values. The creation, performance, significance, and even the definition of gospel music vary according to culture and social context. Gospel music is composed and performed for many purposes, including aesthetic pleasure, and also religious or ceremonial purposes, and as an entertainment product for the marketplace. Gospel music can be traced to the early 17th century. 

White gospel music emerged from the intersection in the19th and early 20th centuries of various European American musical traditions, including Protestant Christian hymnody, revival-meeting spirituals, and assorted popular styles. This musical combination yielded a form that—despite many developments—has maintained some distinct qualities. The music is generally strophic (in verses) with a refrain, and its texts typically depict personal religious experiences and stress the importance of salvation. Most of the repertoire is set in a major key and is arranged in four-part harmony—similar in style to barbershop singing—with the melody in the top voice. Early gospel hymns had a relatively straightforward rhythmic and harmonic structure (using three basic chords: I, IV, and V), but as the tradition absorbed more influences from popular music, both its rhythmic and its harmonic vocabulary expanded.

In the first decades of the 19th century, gospel songs were transmitted through Sunday-school hymnbooks. Among the most widely used song collections during this period were those compiled by Lowell Mason, William B. Bradbury, Robert Lowry, and William Howard Doane. Fanny Crosby was the leading writer of gospel hymn texts. After the American Civil War (1861–65), the Sunday-school repertoire was appropriated and expanded to serve the Protestant revival movement, especially in urban areas. Singer and composer Phillip D. Bliss was among the most important figures in this endeavour, as were evangelist Dwight L. Moody and his musical collaborator Ira D. Sankey. Together, Moody and Sankey employed the Sunday-school hymns and new gospel compositions in their church services as major instruments of edification and conversion, thus playing a critical role in the establishment of gospel music as a legitimate means of ministry.