The Blues gets the lion's share of the credit for rock & roll and everything that followed. But doesn't pop and rock owe much more to gospel?
Betteridge's law of headlines is an adage that states: "Any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no."
A majority of the stylistic elements that made rock and roll what it is are directly inherited from the blues. The emphasis on guitar, the song structures, the lyrical focus, innumerable other compositional elements, and so on. The blues has continued to be one of the primary outside influences feeding back into rock for the entirety of its existence. Blues-rock is one of the most common and influential genre fusions under the rock and roll umbrella. No doubt gospel was important too, but aside from being a foundational influence on some early innovators and a stylistic touchstone for a bunch of later songs, I fail to see how it has anywhere near the level of influence on rock that the blues has. Arguably the strongest direct gospel influence comes from the more blues and country inflected sides of gospel.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard a rock or pop musician mention gospel artists when reeling off their influences; plenty of blues though. There was Sister Rosetta Tharpe but she seemed to be an anomaly in the grand scheme of things.
Don't blues musicians mention the influence of church and gospel on them? And rock & rollers like Elvis, Jerry Lee & Little Richard are clearly influenced by gospel.
Well, one doesn't necessarily need to mention specific artists for gospel. I would say nearly as many early rock pioneers would say, "I grew up singing in the church" as would say, "it was Elmore James who most inspired me." Surely The Everlys, Little Richard, Elvis, Bo Diddley all would have claimed that it was church music that they first gravitated toward. Not a particular singer but the congregate singing itself. OP makes an interesting point.
This is all very US focused though - gospel and church music wasn’t very big in the UK where a lot of rock and pop developed, so once you get past the early 60s any influence would be much diminished. Influence on late 50s rock n roll might be different.
Yes, true for UK bands - but then factor back in American music that comes up subsequent or simultaneous to that - Motown, Stax, Atlantic Records, Dionne Warwick, and later The Jacksons, through all those disco songs - and again, it might all balance out once more. Not that there aren't blues influences, but I'd say many (if not most) of these artists would tell you they grew up singing in the church.
I was about to respond but you edited to add another line which is pretty much what I was going to say. I agree that there is very little blues influence in the music you mention.
If you have a familiarity with the enthusiastic worship found in Southern Pentecostal and Baptist Churches, then you can definitely see and hear their influence in early Rock & Roll via Elvis, Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis. I come from a Pentecostal background and I can see the influences.
Most of the people who wrote rock histories were not church people, at least not those churches. Where people are estatic. I'm hardly an expert on the many varieties of American church music, but I can clearly hear a direct and indirect influence on rock 'n roll and adjacent musics. More than blues? That's hard to quantify. What is the common unit of structure and style and attitude?
Great question and hard to answer with all of the music out there. However, I will say no that rock owes more or just as much to gospel as it does to blues. Someone above said soul, R and B owes more to Gospel and I agree. You have to look at the chords and harmonies of gospel for reference. When you do that, you will see that rock and pop does not use those traits of gospel as frequently as it does the blues.
Also I think ones answer depends on one's definition of rock 'n roll. Ironically, either a very narrow or a very wide one will be more likely to answer yes to this question.