Margaret Pleasant Douroux

21 March 1941—

MARGARET PLEASANT DOUROUX, born 21 March 1941 in Los Angeles, is the daughter of Earl Amos Pleasant (1918–1974) and Olga Mae Williams (1920–2006), one of six siblings. Earl was a singer who toured with Mahalia Jackson before he became the founder (1945) and longtime pastor of Mount Moriah Baptist Church in Inglewood, CA. Olga was a capable accompanist, and from a young age, Margaret likewise took an interest in music; she played piano for Sunday School classes until she was able to play for adult choirs. Through her father’s musical connections, Margaret met influential gospel musicians such as Mahalia Jackson, Joe May, Sally Martin, Thurston Frazier, and James Cleveland.

In 1963, she married Donald Douroux, a brick mason and bass player, and they had one daughter, Mardy. She earned a degree in music from Cal State L.A. (1963), plus a master’s degrees from the University of Southern California (1968, 1973) and a doctorate from the University of Beverly Hills (1979). After the death of her father and her mentor Thurston Frazier in 1974, a schism in the church led her to join her brother Earl in starting a new church, Greater New Bethel Baptist Church in Inglewood, California, in 1976. At the time, she was a school psychologist for Los Angeles City Schools. She had previously worked as an elementary school teacher and a guidance counselor.

Her career as a songwriter began in 1970 when she wrote “Give Me a Clean Heart,” which was recorded by James Cleveland. She reached a wider audience when five of her songs were recorded by Tammy Faye Bakker in 1980 on the album The Lord’s On My Side. The financial success of that album allowed Douroux to leave her school position and pursue her music ministry full-time.

In 1983, Douroux founded a historical operation called the Heritage Music Foundation. She described its mission as follows:

The mission of the Heritage Music Foundation is to nurture and preserve the legacy of gospel music, and its goal is to build a Gospel House in which to perform gospel music, create a hall of fame, record, and teach.

Her Gospel House vision never came to fruition, but some of the Foundation’s archives were transferred to UCLA for preservation and digitization in 2004. Douroux retired as music director of Greater New Bethel in 2015. Her works generally fall into the categories of gospel choir literature or congregational song, but “If it had not been for the Lord” has a hymn-like, strophic quality, and it is a psalm paraphrase.

by CHRIS FENNER
for Hymnology Archive
25 February 2025

Featured Hymns:

If it had not been for the Lord

Discography:

The Way of the Word (1981) LP
with the Greater New Bethel Adult Choir

Signs of the Advent (1987) LP

Already Done (1997) CD/VHS
with the Heritage Mass Choir

Heritage in Worship (2006) CD/DVD
Heritage Music Foundation Mass Choir

see also:

Give Me a Clean Heart (1971)
James Cleveland & The Southern California Community Choir

I Give My All to You (1980)
GMWA Mass Choir, Philadelphia

The Lord’s On My Side (1980)
Tammy Faye Bakker

Related Resources:

Margaret Douroux, A Study of the Effect of the Cytomegalic Inclusion Disease upon the Intellectual, Social and Emotional Development of the School Age Children, thesis (USC, 1973): WorldCat

Margaret Douroux, About My Father’s Business (Los Angeles, 1977): WorldCat

Margaret Douroux, Principles That Motivate and Enhance Education Among Black Children, dissertation (University of Beverly Hills, 1979).

Too Close to Heaven: The Story of Gospel Music. 3 parts. VHS. (Princeton, NJ: Films for the Humanities & Sciences, 1997): WorldCat

Margaret Douroux, “Gospel in Los Angeles,” classroom lecture (1997): Archive.org

Karin Patterson, Interview of Margaret Douroux, video (Los Angeles: UCLA, 2008): Archive.org

Damian DéMond Price, Give Me a Clean Heart: The Life and Music of Margaret Pleasant Douroux, dissertation (Lynchburg, VA: Liberty, 2020): Liberty

Margaret Douroux, Hymnary.org: https://hymnary.org/person/Douroux_Margaret

Carlton Young, “Margaret Douroux,” Canterbury Dictionary of Hymnology: http://www.hymnology.co.uk/m/margaret-pleasant-douroux