Robert F. Darden
Robert F. Darden is emeritus professor of Journalism, Public Relations & New Media at Baylor University. He is the author of more than two dozen books, including the forthcoming “Soon & Very Soon: The Transformative Music and Ministry of Andraé Crouch,” for Oxford University Press with Dr. Stephen Newby. A former newspaper journalist and magazine editor (senior editor, The Wittenburg Door and gospel music editor, Billboard Magazine), Darden is the most awarded professor in Baylor history and was the recipient of the Cornelia Marschall Smith Award for Outstanding Professor. In 2020, he was named Baylor’s 27th Master Teacher, and the following year Darden was selected by the Minnie Stevens Piper Foundation as a Piper Professor for the state of Texas. He is the founder of the Black Gospel Music Preservation Program at Baylor, the world’s largest initiative to acquire, scan, digitize, catalog and make accessible America’s fast-vanishing legacy of vinyl from gospel music’s Golden Age. He earned a B.S. from Baylor University and a master’s degree in journalism from the University of North Texas. He lives in Waco, Texas.
