Pentecostals throughout Jamaica and the Jamaican diaspora use music to declare what they believe and where they stand in relation to religious and cultural outsiders. Yet the inclusion of secular music forms like ska, reggae, and dancehall complicated music's place in social and ritual practice, challenging Jamaican Pentecostals to reconcile their religious and cultural identities. Melvin Butler journeys into this crossing of boundaries and its impact on Jamaican congregations and the music they make. Using the concept of flow, Butler's ethnography evokes both the experience of Spirit-influenced performance and the transmigrations that fuel the controversial sharing of musical and ritual resources between Jamaica and the United States. Highlighting constructions of religious and cultural identity, Butler illuminates music's vital place in how the devout regulate spiritual and cultural flow while striving to maintain both the sanctity and fluidity of their evolving tradition.Insightful and original, Island Gospel tells the many stories of how music and religious experience unite to create a sense of belonging among Jamaican people of faith.

Melvin L. Butler is an associate professor of musicology at the Frost School of Music at the University of Miami and a saxophonist with Brian Blade and the Fellowship Band and many other artists.

"In this groundbreaking and insightful book, Melvin Butler takes his readers on a journey into the sound worlds and ritual practices of Jamaican Pentecostal communities." --New West Indian Guide

"In a field dominated by studies of secular popular music, more focus on sacred traditions is overdue and welcomed. We owe great thanks to Michael Butler for bringing us inside these Jamaican and Brooklyn churches to share the songs and stories of a community of worshipers who practice the complex interweaving of belief, ritual, and musical praxis." --Gotham Center for New York City History

"Island Gospel is a much-needed and important contribution to Pentecostal studies and ethnomusicology. . . . The book offers insights that will be useful to scholars and students across a wide range of fields and disciplines. " --Journal of Folklore Research