Biography
The publishing credit Reverend Jackson, attached to gospel numbers including “Memphis Bound,” never carried the same authenticity or esteem granted to fully identified artists such as Reverend Charlie Jackson or Reverend Lucille L. Jackson. That plain credit nevertheless served as one of several fabricated identities employed by publisher and producer Joe Davis. Assuming the title of a clergyman apparently posed no special difficulty for Davis, who elsewhere released material under the names of his spouses or adopted the comical pseudonym E.V. Body. Under the Reverend Jackson alias he shared authorship with pianist Frank Banta on “Memphis Bound,” yet claimed sole credit for the 1926 gospel anthem “I’m Gonna Die with My Staff in My Hand,” a piece occasionally misinterpreted as a tribute to corporate oversight. By the 1930s Davis had ceased issuing his own gospel compositions; one of his publishing associates, composer and performer Porter Grainger, later adopted the abbreviated credit Jackson, stripped of both a given name and clerical designation.
Singles