Agnes Brown's music is meant to incite more than applause from her audience. When she sings, with her unique blend of grace and exuberance, she is celebrating her faith, freedom and Alberta roots. "To me, of all the music, gospel is the real thing," says Brown. "Other types of singing can eventually vanish, but gospel can speak to the young and to the old. We take it as a ministry. It's much more than just entertainment."

Whether singing solo or in a group, or directing a church choir, the 70-year-old Sherwood Park resident has been spreading the good news through the songs of her ancestors for over 60 years.

But the history of Alberta's black gospel music doesn't begin with the woman dubbed "Edmonton's Queen of Gospel Music." It goes back two generations further, to 1910, when her grandparents immigrated from the U.S. to Alberta's Amber Valley (formerly known as Pine Creek).

Calgary-based author and filmmaker Cheryl Foggo wrote a book entitled Pourin' Down Rain about her African-American family, who were among the first black settlers in Alberta. She says that by the time her grandparents and Brown's settled in northern Alberta, black pioneers had already been a part of the province's landscape since the late 1870s, but the biggest wave arrived in the early 1900s. Many of these settlers made the 3,500-kilometre journey from Oklahoma, which prior to joining the union was a sanctuary for former slaves escaping Jim Crow laws that imposed "separate but equal" status for blacks. "They owned property [in Oklahoma], and had more human rights than what was offered in other southern states," Foggo explains.

But after Oklahoma became a state in 1907, blacks became the target of heinous racism, including attacks by lynch mobs. About that time, newspaper ads highlighting cheap land in northern Alberta were circulating in Oklahoma, and many African-Americans seized the opportunity to immigrate. Some came to Edmonton, but most went to rural Alberta to become farmers in communities such as Amber Valley, Campsie, Wildwood (formerly Junkins) and Breton (formerly Keystone).

The transition to Canadian life was not always easy. Discrimination, harsh climate and inferior farmland made the initial move difficult. But the struggle was eased by a strong faith in their Christian beliefs - and music.

When Brown thinks back to her life growing up in Amber Valley, she remembers the sounds of powerful vocals, rhythmic clapping and lively instruments in her house, school and church. She began singing when she was seven and by the time she was 13, Brown, her mother and three sisters formed a gospel group called the Sneed Family Singers.

The performances were so energetic, Brown recalls, that the singers would sometimes kick off their shoes in a burst of inspiration and passion. Even if the shoes landed on the audience, they would respond with enthusiasm. "It really sparked them," she remembers.

"Quite a few bands cropped up in the '30s, '40s and '50s, when [black] people were more  affluent and could afford instruments," says Foggo.

But as black Albertans continued to gain wealth, the churches and gospel bands they inspired began to disappear. "People just integrated into the larger communities. As social conditions improved for blacks, they joined other congregations and moved to different neighbourhoods."

The Sneed Family Singers stopped performing in 1991 after decades of presenting their talent across the continent, in churches and music venues.

Brown still directs choirs and leads praise and worship sessions at her church and - on special occasions - sings the good news when she collaborates with the Black Pioneer Heritage Singers, one of the few remaining traditional gospel bands on the Prairies. Director Junetta Jamerson founded the group in 2003
to revive the magic once felt in every black community in Alberta.

The eight-person band has performed in cities across Canada, and in 2005, they entertained Queen Elizabeth II with a special performance at the Winspear Centre. The Black Pioneer Heritage Singers has become one of the most respected gospel groups in the country, receiving the award for Best Gospel Album in 2009 from the Gospel Music Association of Canada. The group is distinct for its repertoire, which is mostly traditional gospel - songs with minimal instruments, just some drums, bass, piano and clapping - not contemporary gospel,  which glistens with more funk and R&B. The group often uses a style of singing called call and response, where one person leads and the congregation follows. Over a century ago, this technique provided a way for slaves to communicate with one another in the fields. Sometimes the songs were speckled with messages about escaping through the Underground Railroad.

Through its songs, the group pays homage to its ancestors and their Alberta roots. One example is "Amber Valley Pine," an original song from the award-winning album Ain't That Good News, in which group member Linda Peko Campbell remembers growing up in the village. She sings, "Lord we made history in the Amber Valley Pine."

Quenten Brown, Agnes's 41-year-old nephew, is also member of the Black Pioneer Heritage Singers. In the '70s, the piano prodigy was performing with the Sneed Family Singers at the age of 10, even though he had to sit on a stack of chairs to reach the church's piano keys.

"If you look in the bible, [music is] very important; it's a way for people to worship. King David wrote a lot of the songs and he was a musician," says Quenten. "For me, music is a way to give back to [God because of] what He has blessed me with."

Like Quenten Brown and Jamerson, most of the group's members are direct descendants of Alberta's first black pioneers, and with the addition of Jamerson's daughter Sierra, the lineage presses on. Their backgrounds help recreate an authenticity that reconnects some African-Canadians to their ancestry. Quenten says the Black Pioneer Heritage Singers bring their own stories to the music because of their personal experiences in past black communities, or the experiences of their ancestors.

"When we recreate a [classic] song, it's a natural process. A group member will recall it from years past and raise it, and we'll fall in after listening," says Jamerson, who notes that some arrangements have changed over the decades, and "maybe even some of the words."

Despite the traditional lean, some of the Heritage Singers' new material does include traces of gospel sub-genres such as quartet music and rural blues. "All of these styles are part of African-American music, and we dig it all," explains Jamerson.

Foggo says only a few churches in the province have maintained the tradition of gospel choirs - Calgary's Bridgeland Seventh-day Adventist Church, which has a gospel choir called the 4Gs, for example, and the Standard Church of America, Calgary's first black church. For the most part, the traditional sounds of groups like the Heritage Singers have become rare. Now, when people speak of gospel music, they often mean contemporary Christian music, which can have anything from a bluegrass influence to a country feel to a hip-hop vibe.

For Quenten Brown, it doesn't matter what kind of music is used to sing praise. He thinks it's great to hear so many different types of music in a celebration of faith. His aunt Agnes agrees. When she performs, she doesn't worry about the music being flawless and traditional, she just wants the joy of her faith to shine through and inspire others.