1851–1921

Introduction

portrait
portrait

Born: De­cem­ber 13, 1851, Un­ion­town, Ohio.

Died: June 10, 1921, Wes­ley Hos­pi­tal, Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois. He was on an ev­an­gel­ism tour with Gyp­sy Smith at the time of his death.

Buried: Oak Woods Ce­me­te­ry, Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois.

portrait
illustration

Biography

Edwin was the son of Jo­shua J. Ex­cell, a Ger­man Re­formed Church pas­tor, and Em­i­ly O. Hess, and hus­band of Eli­za Jane Bell (mar­ried 1871).

He start­ed his work­ing life as a brick­lay­er and plas­ter­er. His love of mu­sic called, though, and he went to Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois, to stu­dy un­der George Root.

Excell lat­er found­ed sing­ing schools at va­ri­ous lo­ca­tions in Am­er­ica, and ex­pand­ed in­to the re­li­gious field, work­ing with ev­an­gel­ist Sam Jones for two dec­ades.

Excell worked at a mu­sic pub­lish­ing house in Chi­ca­go, and wrote ov­er 2,000 Gos­pel songs.

Works

Sources

Lyrics

Music