1872–1962

Introduction

portrait

Born: March 21, 1872, Nor­ris­town, Penn­syl­van­ia.

Died: No­vem­ber 2, 1962, Or­lan­do, Flo­ri­da.

Buried: Green­wood Un­ion Ce­me­te­ry, Rye, New York.

Pseudonyms

illustration

Biography

Meredith’s fa­ther played the vio­lin, and his mo­ther sang in the church choir.

By age 10, Is­aac was tak­ing or­gan les­sons. By age 12, he was sing­ing al­to in the choir at the Oak Street Me­tho­dist Church in Nor­ris­town.

At 13, he was con­vert­ed by the per­son­al in­vi­ta­tion of his bro­ther. For a num­ber of years, he sang to pri­son­ers in the coun­ty jail each Sun­day morn­ing. In the sum­mer of 1891, while va­ca­tion­ing in Ocean Grove, New Jer­sey, a Dr. Mun­hall in­vit­ed him to sing in ev­an­gel­is­tic meet­ings.

Shortly there­af­ter, he en­tered ev­an­gel­ism & be­gan writ­ing Gos­pel songs. In 1893, he and Grant Tul­lar found­ed the Tul­lar-Me­re­dith mu­sic pub­lish­ing house. Me­re­dith him­self com­posed ov­er 1,000 songs.

During World War I, he served in France with the Young Men Chris­tian’s As­so­cia­tion. Af­ter the war, in ad­di­tion to his mu­sic bu­si­ness, he served as mu­sic di­rect­or for (at va­ri­ous times) the Bush­wick Ave­nue Me­tho­dist Church, Brook­lyn, New York; and the Ped­die Me­mo­ri­al Bap­tist Church and Cen­ten­ary Me­tho­dist Church, New­ark, New Jer­sey.

Works

Sources

Music