John Robert Bradley

Bradley was born in Memphis in 1919, and at twelve was noticed by Lucie Campbell, who put him in her Good Will Singers quartet. His first record, on Apollo in 1950, included Didn't My Lord Deliver Daniel. He studied classical music in New York and lived six years in London, where he sang German Lieder in concert but never recorded that repertoire. After Campbell's death he succeeded her as director of music for the National Baptist Convention. Mahalia Jackson said nobody need mess with Amazing Grace after Bradley. He died in Nashville in 2007.

What the plaque says

John Robert Bradley Born in Memphis, Tennessee to John and Lela Ellis Bradley on October 5, 1919, John Robert Lee Bradley was known as "Mr. Baptist". A protégé of Luci E. Campbell, the National Baptist Convention's, U. S. A., Inc., Music Director and pioneering gospel songwriter, J. Robert Bradley began singing at the age of 12 in Memphis. Campbell introduced the young singer to the National Baptist Convention and made him the lead singer in her newly organized Good Will Singers Quartet that toured nationally. His Memphis pastor and songwriter the Rev. W. Herbert Brewster nurtured Bradley. Known for his rich baritone voice, he received voice lessons from Charles Faulkner Bryan, head of Tennessee Polytechnic Institute's (now Tennessee Technological University) music division. Assisted by Campbell and Baptist leader and pastor Dr. A. M. Townsend, Bradley studied voice with the Wagnerian singer, Edythe Walker in New York, where he made his Carnegie Hall debut. Continued: In 1955 he made his Royal Albert Hall debut in London with the British royal family in attendance. Bradley also studied at London's Trinity College and sang for BBC radio. The renowned singer recorded his first gospel single for the Apollo label in 1950 and went on to record for Decca. Later he recorded for Nashboro and Spirit Feel/Shanachie. After the 1963 demise of Lucie Campbell, Bradley succeeded her as director of music for the National Baptist Convention, U. S. A., Inc. A favorite singer of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., he was knighted in Liberia by President William Tolbert in 1975. Mahalia Jackson noted, "Nobody need mess with 'Amazing Grace' after Bradley..." A member of Spruce Street Baptist Church, Sir J. Robert Bradley died on May 3, 2007. He was eulogized at Spruce Street and buried next to his mother in Greenwood Cemetery on May 7, 2007.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Fisk University and Jubilee Hall — 0.8 mi
  The 1866 school for freed people whose Jubilee Singers paid for Jubilee Hall, a National Historic Landmark, and whose students helped start Nashville's sit-ins.
• Tennessee State Capitol — 1.2 mi
  William Strickland's Greek Revival capitol on Nashville's Capitol Hill, finished in 1859 and built from the bottom up with the labor of enslaved men.
• Civil Rights Room at the Nashville Public Library — 1.3 mi
  A room in the downtown library with a circular lunch counter, a timeline and oral histories of the 1960 Nashville sit-ins, a few blocks from the stores where they began.
• National Museum of African American Music — 1.4 mi
  A downtown Nashville museum, opened in 2021, tracing gospel, blues, jazz, rhythm and blues and hip-hop through Black history from 1619 to 2016.

More markers nearby

• Grace M. Eaton/Grace M. Eaton Dayhome — 0.3 mi
• William Edmondson — 0.3 mi
• First State Penitentiary — 0.5 mi
• Bethlehem Centers of Nashville 100th Anniversary (1894-1994) — 0.5 mi