WEEK 4: WORK SONGS, SPIRITUALS & GOSPEL

Horace Pippin, Domino Players, oil on board, 1943

Worksongs, Spirituals and Gospel

Download: 
S&P Work Songs / Spirituals / Gospel:
https://berkeley.box.com/s/1t39p985qfw9qju1bjxo
These songs will be important for the rest of the semester and beyond.

Reading: Leroi Jones (Amiri Bakara): Blues People reader pps. 117-146. It's one of the best chapters in the Reader. So give it some time! You should also take a look at W.E.B Dubois, Souls of Black Folk, particularly what he writes about Sorrow Songs--and the Black American experience in general. Published in 1903.  This is an important book. Here's the online text: Souls of Black Folk.
Read Leroy Jones for Week 4, Dubois for Week 5.
Remember, this is a two-week theme, with projects both weeks.

Songs. For our S&P class, the songs themselves are the best introduction. Some are on your original S&P CD, which you've already downloaded, and some on the new download above. Make a playlist--and listen up! Note that the lyrics are all in your tan S&P songset.

Here are the songs I want to be able to sing together (they're all on the downloads just mentioned). I haven't had a chance to make them into links--so you'll need to make playlist from the downloads.

Mary Don't You Weep    (Swan Silvertone's version, on your S&P CD)
Lay My Burden Down    (Mississippi John Hurt's version, on your S&P CD)
Do Lord    (also on S&P CD)

and these four from your new download, above (S&P Work Songs / Spirituals / Gospel):

Balm in Gilead   (Paul Robeson's version)
Swing Low Sweet Chariot    (Paul Robeson's version)
Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child    (Paul Robeson's version)
Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen   (Marian Anderson's version)

I want you to listen to all the songs on new download, but concentrate on the ones above for singing.

Project.  For Week 4 (this coming week), I want you to dive into the breadth of this material, as reflected music-wise on the download. Then chose one song in particular for your project. (During Week 5, the following week, we'll concentrate on Mary Don't You Weep--where it comes from, in its many versions, and what it represents. But this first week, listen to the new download, go for range, and then focus on song of your choice.) Note: there are many wonderful songs on the download that you can choose to work from for your project, in addition to the ones above. For example:

Look Down That Lonesome Road  (this is an amazing song, listen carefully to the call and response form, and the poignancy of the verses. Lomax recording, 1930s.)
John the Revelator (Blind Willie Davis version)
If You See My Saviour (the song is by the Reverend Thomas Dorsey, whose version is available on youtube, see below). Here sung by Alex Bradford. This is pure Gospel music.
Coming in on a Wing and a Prayer,  by John Spence, from Andros Island in the Bahamas... A World War II song recast by a powerful Caribbean guitar-playing musician...

YES, this is a lot of material.  I want you to begin to absorb it, and to keep on returning to it over the course of the term. These African American songs will be one of our key sources!
__________

Here are some related YouTube videos:

Spirituals:
 ▶ Negro spirituals - YouTube

Work songs:
 ▶ Work Songs in a Texas Prison - YouTube
 ▶ Gandy Dancers - YouTube

Gospel:
There are also MANY gospel songs on youtube--it's a whole world unto itself. Look up the difference between "spirituals" and "gospel songs" and consider.

Let's start with a example by the Rev. Thomas Dorsey, one of the Gospel song originators, in an audio recording made when he was young (he published the song in 1929):

 ▶ Thomas Dorsey- If You See My Savior - YouTube

Here's the same song, some fifty years later, in a version from the documentary, Say Amen Somebody. (The film is an excellent  treatment of the Rev. Dorsey's life--and of gospel music as a whole--and this segment in particular remains a treasure.) Rev. Thomas Dorsey singing with Miss Sally Martin--you'll hear their real-time conversation, and see their personalities shining through: 

https://berkeley.box.com/s/yp0m9rei0s850nqv5xhtoqzlesr9w1ue

(The YouTube version was deleted--as happens--so I've given you a Box link to the footage.)
_____

And finally, another compelling gospel song in a verison by a young girl in the Adventist Church:  
 ▶ Four Days Late - YouTube   (Alisa) The Story of Jesus and Lazarus. Four Days Late has a backstory which I'll present in class. Also, it will figure again  in Week 4 when we look at Mary Don't You Weep.