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78-416: Over My Head may refer to: Songs [ edit ] "Over My Head", a spiritual song which provides the basis for " Up Above My Head ", recorded by Sister Rosetta Tharpe among others "Over My Head" (Fleetwood Mac song) , 1975 " Over My Head (Better Off Dead) ", a 2003 song by Sum 41 " Over My Head (Cable Car) ", a 2005 song by The Fray "Over My Head",

156-579: A "new repertoire for the concert stage" by applying their Western classical education to the spirituals. While the spirituals were created by a "circumscribed community of people in bondage", over time they became known as the first "signature" music of the United States. The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians —one of the largest reference works on music and musicians, —itemized and described "spiritual" in their electronic resource, Grove Music Online —an important part of Oxford Music Online , as

234-568: A "type of sacred song created by and for African Americans that originated in oral tradition. Although its exact provenance is unknown, spirituals were identifiable as a genre by the early 19th century." They used the term without the descriptor, "African American". The term "negro spirituals" is a 19th century word "used for songs with religious texts created by African Enslaved in America". The first published book of slave songs referred to them as "spirituals". In musicology and ethnomusicology in

312-433: A 1994 album by Gerry Rafferty Over My Head (EP) , a 2016 EP by Jaymay "Over My Head" ( Haven ) , an episode of Haven See also [ edit ] Over Your Head , a home improvement reality television series Topics referred to by the same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title Over My Head . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change

390-557: A Heaven up there." Each additional verse is the same as the first, the word "music" replaced with another word (such as "singing," "shouting," et cetera). In the years following the song's introduction many have added more replacement words, which extend the song's length. The line "Up above my head / I hear music in the air" was later used by The Trammps in their 1977 hit " Disco Inferno ". Spiritual (music) Spirituals (also known as Negro spirituals , African American spirituals , Black spirituals , or spiritual music )

468-587: A Professor in the Musicology, Ethnomusicology and Theory Department at the Lamont School of Music at the University of Denver , founded "The Spirituals Project" to preserve and revitalize the "music and teachings of the sacred folk songs called spirituals," "created and first sung by African Americans in slavery". Spirituals were created by a "circumscribed community of people in bondage", over time they became known as

546-470: A Rolling", and " Steal Away To Jesus ", and others that Willis and his wife had sung. The Jubilee Singers popularized Willis' songs. The original Fisk Jubilee Singers, a touring a cappella male and female choir of nine students of the newly established Fisk school in Nashville, Tennessee who were active from 1871 to 1878, popularized Negro spirituals. The name "jubilee" referred to the "year of jubilee" in

624-608: A call for a mixed (male and female) jubilee singers ensemble that would tour on behalf of the university. The full mixed choir became too expensive to tour, and was replaced by John Work II's male quartet. The quartet received "widespread acclaim" and eventually made a series of best-selling recordings for Victor in December 1909, February 1911, for Edison in December 1911, for Columbia is October 1915 and February 1916, and Starr in 1916. John Work Jr.—also known as John Work II—spent three decades at Fisk University, collecting and promulgating

702-663: A catalyst in the early years of the American abolitionist movement, according to the OCLC entry. Slave songs were called " Sorrow songs " by W.E.B. Du Bois in his 1903 book, The Souls of Black Folk . Hansonia Caldwell, the author of African American music, spirituals: the fundamental communal music of Black Americans and African American music: a chronology : 1619–1995 , said that spirituals "sustained Africans when they were enslaved." She described them as "code songs" that "would announce meetings, as in " Steal Away ", and describe

780-730: A group in Hampton, Virginia at what is now known as Hampton University . They were the first ensemble to "rival the Jubilee Singers". With Robert Nathaniel Dett (1882–1943) as conductor until 1933, Hampton Singers "earned an international following." The first formal a capella Tuskegee Quartet was organized in 1884 by Booker T. Washington , who was also the founder of the Tuskegee Institute. Since 1881, Washington had insisted that everyone attending their weekly religious services should join in singing African American spirituals. The Quartet

858-489: A hymn from Alabama—"Wear a starry crown". He also notes that both these songs have a "threefold repetition and a concluding line." In the latter, we find the "familiar swing and syncopation" of the African American. Spirituals were not simply different versions of hymns or Bible stories, but rather a creative altering of the material; new melodies and music, refashioned text, and stylistic differences helped to set apart

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936-520: A musical form that is indigenous and specific to the religious experience African slaves and their descendants in the United States. Pitts said that they were a result of the interaction of music and religion from Africa with music and religion of European origin. In a May 2012 PBS interview, Uzee Brown, Jr. said that spirituals were the "survival tools for the African slave". Brown said that while other similarly-oppressed cultures were "virtually wiped out",

1014-425: A population of 2.5 million—was one of the largest African kingdoms. For a brief period, King João I of Kongo , who reigned from 1470 to 1509, had voluntarily converted to Catholicism, and for close to three centuries—from 1491 to 1750—the kingdom of Kongo had practiced Christianity and was an "independent [and] cosmopolitan realm." The descendants of the rice-plantation enslaved Gullah people—whose country of origin

1092-435: A song by The Aliens "Over My Head", a song by Asaf Avidan from Gold Shadow "Over My Head", a song by Brian Littrell from Welcome Home "Over My Head", a song by David Gray, a B-side of the single " Babylon " "Over My Head", a song by Furslide from Adventure "Over My Head", a song by Icehouse from Man of Colours "Over My Head", a song by James Marriott from Are We There Yet? "Over My Head",

1170-417: A song by King's X from Gretchen Goes to Nebraska "Over My Head", a song by Lit from the soundtrack of the film Titan A.E. "Over My Head", a song by Moloko from I Am Not a Doctor "Over My Head", a song by Pere Ubu from The Modern Dance "Over My Head", a song by Powderfinger from Internationalist "Over My Head", a song by Ray Davies from Other People's Lives "Over My Head",

1248-441: A song by Red House Painters from Ocean Beach "Over My Head", a song by Richard Marx from Inside My Head "Over My Head", a song by Robert Calvert from Hype "Over My Head", a song by Semisonic from All About Chemistry "Over My Head" (Toni Basil song) , 1983 "Over My Head" (Alabama Shakes song) , 2015 "Over My Head" (Echosmith song) , 2018 Other media [ edit ] Over My Head (album) ,

1326-409: A wider, even international, audience. At first, major recording studios were only recording white musicians performing spirituals and their derivatives. That changed with Mamie Smith 's commercial success in 1920. Starting in the 1920s, the commercial recording industry increased the audience for the spirituals and their derivatives. Black composers, Harry Burleigh and R. Nathaniel Dett , created

1404-563: Is Sierra Leone —were unique, because they had been much more isolated on the islands off the coast of South Carolina. Gullah spirituals are sung in a creole language that was influenced by African American Vernacular English with the majority of African words coming from the Akan , Yoruba and Igbo . The institution of slavery in the United States ended with the conclusion of the US Civil War in 1865. The domestic slave trade that emerged after

1482-434: Is a genre of Christian music that is associated with African Americans , which merged varied African cultural influences with the experiences of being held in bondage in slavery, at first during the transatlantic slave trade and for centuries afterwards, through the domestic slave trade. Spirituals encompass the "sing songs", work songs , and plantation songs that evolved into the blues and gospel songs in church. In

1560-557: Is a type of religious folksong that is most closely associated with the enslavement of African people in the American South. The songs proliferated in the last few decades of the eighteenth century leading up to the abolishment of legalized slavery in the 1860s. The African American spiritual (also called the Negro Spiritual) constitutes one of the largest and most significant forms of American folksong." The transatlantic slave trade

1638-488: Is an important, interdependent, dynamic, and "unbroken conceptual relationship between African and African American music". Enslaved African Americans "in the plantation South drew on native rhythms and their African heritage." According to a May 2012 PBS interview, "spirituals were religious folks songs, often rooted in biblical stories, woven together, sung, and passed along from one slave generation to another". According to Walter Pitt 's 1996 book, spirituals are

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1716-654: Is described by a United Nations report as the largest forced migration in recorded human history. As a direct result of the transatlantic slave trade, the greatest movement of Africans was to the Americas — with 96 percent of the captives from the African coasts arriving on cramped slave ships at ports in South America and the Caribbean Islands. From 1501 to 1830, four Africans crossed the Atlantic for every one European, making

1794-431: Is not used. We must treat spirituals "in such manner that it can be presented in choral form, in lyric and operatic works, in concertos and suites and salon music". R. Nathaniel Dett was a mentor to Edward Boatner (1898–1981), an African American composer who wrote many popular concert arrangements of the spirituals. Boatner and Willa A. Townsend published Spirituals triumphant old and new in 1927. Boatner "maintained

1872-501: The Billboard " Race Records " chart in late 1948. The song is formed in the traditional call and response format, with Tharpe singing a short line followed by Knight's "response" of the same line. There are seven lines (save responses) in each verse—the first six in call and response, and the seventh sung in unison. Tharpe's biographer, Gayle Wald , describes Tharpe's performance as "an ear-popping display of vocal fireworks", singing

1950-829: The Old Testament —a time of the emancipation of slaves. On January 9, 1866, shortly after the end of the American Civil War (1861 to May 9, 1865), the American Missionary Association founded the Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, the historically black college . As a school-fundraiser, the Fisk Jubilee Singers had their first tour on what is now called Jubilee Day—October 6, 1871. The first audiences were small, local, and skeptical, but by 1872, they performed at Boston's World Peace Festival and at

2028-548: The United States Congress outlawed the international slave trade in 1808, and lasted until the U.S. Civil War, destroyed generations of African American families. Slavery in the United States differed from the institution in other regions of the Americas, such as the West Indies , Dutch Guiana and Brazil . In the U.S., the enslaved had higher rates of survival and thus there was a "high and sustained natural increase in

2106-509: The blues emerged from the spirituals songcraft. Prior to the end of the US Civil War and emancipation, spirituals were originally an oral tradition passed from one slave generation to the next. Biblical stories were memorized then translated into song. Following emancipation, the lyrics of spirituals were published in printed form. Ensembles such as the Fisk Jubilee Singers —established in 1871—popularized spirituals, bringing them to

2184-476: The "first seven spirituals in this collection" were "regularly sung at church". In 1869, Colonel Thomas Wentworth Higginson , who commanded the first African-American regiment of the Civil War, the 1st South Carolina Volunteers—"recruited, trained, and stationed at Beaufort, South Carolina " from 1862 to 1863. Higginson admired the former slaves in his regiment saying, "It was their demeanor under arms that shamed

2262-464: The "jubilee songcraft" of the original Fisk Jubilee Singers and in 1901 he co-published New Jubilee Songs as Sung by the Fisk Jubilee Singers with his brother, Frederick J. Work. From 1890 through 1919, "African Americans made significant contributions to the recording industry in its formative years", with recordings by the Fisk Jubilee Singers and others. In 1873, the Hampton Singers formed

2340-654: The 1800s, the majority of enslaved people in the British West Indies and Brazil had been born in Africa, whereas in the United States, they were "generations removed from Africa." In his 1845 Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave , an essay on abolition and a memoire, Frederick Douglass (1818–1895)—a great orator—described slave songs as telling a "tale which was then altogether beyond my feeble comprehension; they were tones, loud, long and deep, breathing

2418-480: The 1850s, had heard two workers enslaved by the Choctaw people, —an African-American family— father Wallace Willis and daughter Minerva Willis —singing "their favorite plantation songs" from their cabin door in the evenings. They had learned the songs in "Mississippi in their early youth." Reid provided the Jubilee Singers with the lyrics of " Swing Low, Sweet Chariot ", Roll, Jordan, Roll , "The Angels are Coming", "I'm

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2496-405: The 1968 TV special, Elvis . It was inserted in the gospel medley with the songs: "Where Could I Go But To The Lord" and "Saved". A blues version of the song was done by the American singer and musician Ruthie Foster on her 2007 album; The Phenomenal Ruthie Foster . Vanessa Collier also recorded the song for her 2017 album, Meeting My Shadow . A roots reggae version also exists recorded by

2574-472: The 1990s, the single term "spirituals" is used to describe "The Spirituals Project". The US Library of Congress uses the phrase "African American Spirituals", for the numbered and itemized entry. In the introductory phrase, the singular form is used without the adjective "African American." Throughout the encyclopedic entry the singular and plural form of the term, is used without the "African American" descriptor. The LOC introductory sentence says, "A spiritual

2652-508: The 19th century but of unknown authorship, contains many of the same lines as "Up Above My Head" – "Over my head / I hear music in the air../ There must be a God somewhere" – and may be presumed to be its origin. Civil rights leader Bernice Johnson Reagon changed the traditional words of the song in 1961, to "Over my head / I see freedom in the air...". In 1995, the National Association for Music Education (then known as

2730-431: The African slave survived because of spirituals by "singing through many of their problems", by creating their own "way of communicating". Enslaved people introduced a number of new instruments to America: the bones, body percussion, and an instrument variously called the bania, banju, or banjar, a precursor to the banjo but without frets. They brought with them from Africa long-standing religious traditions that highlighted

2808-688: The Bible as a source of inspiration. They prefer "heart religion" to "book religion". Barton, who attended services with African Americans, said that they did not sing the "ordinary" hymns that strengthened "assurance by a promise of God in Holy Scripture"; rather, in the African-American hymns, they appeal to a more personal "revelation from the Lord." He cites the examples of "We're Some of the Praying People" and

2886-619: The Bible, they began to see parallels to their own experiences. The story of the exile of the Jews and their captivity in Babylon, resonated with their own captivity. The lyrics of Christian spirituals reference symbolic aspects of Biblical images such as Moses and Israel's Exodus from Egypt in songs such as " Michael Row the Boat Ashore ". There is also a duality in the lyrics of spirituals. They communicated many Christian ideals while also communicating

2964-484: The British act Matumbi on their 1978 album Seven Seals , which was produced by Dennis Bovell . The song was covered by Rhiannon Giddens on her solo album Tomorrow Is My Turn . "Up above my head ( up above my head ) I hear music in the air ( I hear music in the air ) Up above my head ( up above my head ) I hear music in the air ( I hear music in the air ) I really do believe ( I really do believe ) There's

3042-634: The Fisk Jubilee Singers began touring, creating more interest in the "spirituals as concert repertory". By 1872, the Jubilee Singers were publishing their own books of songs, which included " The Gospel Train ". Reverend Alexander Reid had attended a Fisk Jubilee Singers' performance in 1871, and suggested they add several songs to their repertoire. Reid, who had been a superintendent at the Spencerville Academy in Oklahoma in Choctaw Nation territory in

3120-703: The Hoochie Coochie Men) in June 1964. It was as the B-side to United Artists UP 1056). Al Hirt released a version of the song in 1964 on his album, Sugar Lips . The song went to #12 on the Adult Contemporary chart and #84 on the Billboard Hot 100 . Hirt released a live version on his 1965 album, Live at Carnegie Hall . It was produced by Chet Atkins . This song was also performed by Elvis Presley in

3198-598: The Music Educators National Conference) published a list of songs that "every American should know", which included "Over My Head". The recording by Sister Rosetta Tharpe and Marie Knight was made on November 24, 1947, in New York City for Decca Records . Besides Tharpe (vocals, guitar) and Knight (vocals), other musicians on the record were Sam Price (piano), George "Pops" Foster (bass), and Wallace Bishop (drums). The record reached number 6 on

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3276-606: The Underground Railway, and were oral until the end of the US Civil War . Following the Civil War and emancipation, there has been "extensive collection and preservation of spirituals as folk song tradition". The first collection of Negro spirituals was published in 1867, two years after the war had ended. Entitled Slave Songs of the United States , it was compiled by three northern abolitionists— Charles Pickard Ware (1840–1921), Lucy McKim Garrison (1842–1877), William Francis Allen (1830–1889) The 1867 compilation built on

3354-420: The United States in 1929, which made "spirituals available to solo concert singers as art songs for the first time". R. Nathaniel Dett (1882–1943) is known for his arrangements that incorporated the music and spirit of European Romantic composers with African-American spirituals. In 1918, he said, "We have this wonderful store of folk music—the melodies of an enslaved people" but it will be of no value if it

3432-539: The White House, and in 1873 they toured Europe. In their early days, the Jubilee Singers did not sing the slave songs. Sheppard—who also composed and arranged music—explained how slave songs, like those published in the 1867 Slave Songs , had not initially been part of the Singers' repertoire because the songs, "were sacred to our parents, who used them in their religious worship and shouted over them." Shephard said that, "It

3510-451: The church." The article described how, "through the use of metonymy (substituting associated words to ostensibly alter the semantic content), spirituals acted as a form of religious education, able to speak simultaneously of material and spiritual freedom", for example in the spiritual, "Steal Away to Jesus". In William Eleazar Barton's (1899–1972) Old Plantation Hymns , the author wrote that African American "hymns seldom make allusion to

3588-462: The continent. From 1501 through 1867, approximately "12.5 million Africans" from "almost every country with an Atlantic coastline" were kidnapped and coerced into slavery, according to the 2015 Atlas based on about 35,000 slaving voyages. Roughly 6% of all enslaved Africans transported via the trans-Atlantic slave trade arrived in the United States , both before and after the colonial era ;

3666-412: The demographics of the Americas in that era more of an extension of the African diaspora than a European one. The legacy of this migration is still evident today, with large populations of people of African descent living throughout the Americas. Millions more remained enslaved in Africa, where slavery was a complex and deeply-rooted part of culture going back centuries before widespread European presence on

3744-604: The entire collection of Charles P. Ware , who had mainly collected songs at Coffin's Point, St. Helena Island , South Carolina , home to the African-American Gullah people originally from West Africa. Most of the 1867 book consisted of songs gathered directly from African Americans. By the 1830s at least, "plantation songs", "genuine slave songs", and "Negro melodies", had become extraordinarily popular. Eventually, "spurious imitations" for more "sentimental tastes" were created. The authors noted that "Long time ago", "Near

3822-481: The first "signature" music of the United States. Forbidden to speak their native languages, they generally converted to Christianity. With narrow vocabularies, they used the words they did know to translate biblical information and facts from their other sources into song. J.H. Kwabena Nketia (1921–2019) described by the New York Times in 2019, as a "pre-eminent scholar of African music", said in 1973 that there

3900-537: The first African enslaved peoples to the New World, in the 1560s, and until the 1700s Mexico was the primary destination for African Enslaved people under Spanish control. The first African enslaved people in what is now the United States arrived in 1526, making landfall in present-day Winyah Bay , South Carolina in a short-lived colony called San Miguel de Gualdape under control of the Spanish Empire . They were also

3978-566: The first enslaved Africans in North Americas to stage a slave rebellion . In 1619, the first slave ship had carried twenty people from the west central African kingdom of Kongo —to a life of enslavement in what is now, Mexico. The Kingdom of Kongo, at that time stretched over an area of 60,000 miles (97,000 km) in the watershed of the Congo River —the second longest river in Africa—and had

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4056-537: The first time". Burleigh arranged spirituals with a classical form. He was also a baritone, who performed in many concert settings. He introduced classically trained artists, such as Antonín Dvořák to African-American spirituals. Some believe that Dvorak was inspired by the spirituals in his Symphony From the New World . He coached African-American soloists, such as Marian Anderson , as solo classical singers. Others, such as Roland Hayes and Paul Robeson continued his legacy. Burleigh published Jubilee Songs of

4134-430: The gospel song. In the fields, it became the blues." Hansonia Caldwell, who was a professor of music at California State University, Dominguez Hills (CSUDH) from 1972 to 2011, also oversaw an Archive of Sacred Music at CSUDH—an extensive collection of music, books, periodicals, documents, audio & visual materials, and oral histories." "The African American spiritual (also called the Negro Spiritual) constitutes one of

4212-559: The hardship that was a result of being an enslaved. The river Jordan in traditional African American religious song became a symbolic borderland not only between this world and the next. It could also symbolize travel to the north and freedom or could signify a proverbial border from the status of slavery to living free. Syncopation, or ragged time, was a natural part of spiritual music. Songs were played on African-inspired instruments. African-American spirituals have associations with plantation songs, slave songs, freedom songs, and songs of

4290-520: The importance of authenticity regarding the collection and transcription of spirituals, but also clearly identified with the new, stylized and polished ways in which they were arranged and performed". William L. Dawson (1876 – 1938), a composer, choir director, music professor, and musicologist , is known, among other accomplishments, for the world premiere by the Philadelphia Orchestra of his 1934 Negro Folk Symphony which

4368-399: The importance of storytelling. Evidence of the vital role African music has played in the creation of African American spirituals exists, among other elements, in the use of "complex rhythms" and "polyrhythms" from West Africa. According to the beliefs of slave religion—the "material and the spiritual are part of an intrinsic unity". Music, religion, and everyday life are inseparable in

4446-631: The lake where drooped the willow", and "Way down in Raccoon Hollow" were borrowed from African-American songs. There had been a renewed interest in these songs through the Port Royal Experiment (1861 - ), where newly-freed African American plantation workers successfully took over operation of Port Royal Island plantations in 1861, where they had formerly been enslaved. Northern abolitionist missionaries, educators and doctors came to oversee Port Royal's development. The authors noted that, by 1867,

4524-563: The largest and most significant forms of American folksong," according to a Library of Congress 2016 article. Spirituals were originally oral, but by 1867 the first compilation, entitled "Slave Songbook", was published. In the book's preface, one of the co-compilers, William Francis Allen, traced the "development of Negro Spirituals and cultural connections to Africa." The 1867 publication included spirituals that were well-known and regularly sung in American churches but whose origins in plantations, had not been acknowledged. Allen wrote that, it

4602-427: The link to point directly to the intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Over_My_Head&oldid=1247118518 " Category : Disambiguation pages Hidden categories: Short description is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages Up Above My Head The spiritual " Over My Head ", apparently dating from

4680-564: The music as distinctly African-American. The First Great Awakening , or "Evangelical Revival"—a series of Christian revivals in the 1730s and 1740s swept Great Britain and its North American colonies , resulted in many enslaved people in the colonies being converting to Christianity. During that time northern Baptist and Methodist preachers converted African Americans, including those who were enslaved. In some communities African Americans were accepted into Christian communities as deacons. From 1800 to 1825 enslaved people were exposed to

4758-525: The narrative of the Awakening for their own "religious purposes". By the 17th century, enslaved Africans were familiar with Christian biblical stories, such as the story of Moses and Daniel, seeing their own stories reflected in them. An Africanized form of Christianity evolved in the slave population with African American spirituals providing a way to "express the community's new faith, as well as its sorrows and hopes." As Africans were exposed to stories from

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4836-421: The nation into recognizing them as men." He mingled with the soldiers and in published his 1869 memoir Army Life in a Black Regiment in which he included the lyrics of selected spirituals. During the Civil War, Higginson wrote down some of the spirituals he heard in camp. "Almost all their songs were thoroughly religious in their tone, ...and were in a minor key, both as to words and music." Starting in 1871,

4914-409: The nineteenth century, the word "spirituals" referred to all these subcategories of folk songs. While they were often rooted in biblical stories, they also described the extreme hardships endured by African Americans who were enslaved from the 17th century until the 1860s, the emancipation altering mainly the nature (but not continuation) of slavery for many. Many new derivative music genres such as

4992-477: The opening line "so fierce and smooth at the same time that it anticipates 1960s soul ." She comments that "especially in the driving instrumental bridge between verses, 'Up Above My Head' leaves the Sanctified Church behind and charts a straight course toward rhythm and blues ," adding that the song "had an undeniable energy that paralleled the collective optimism of black people in the post-war years." It

5070-449: The path for running away, as in " Follow the Drinkin' Gourd ". " Go Down Moses " referred to Harriet Tubman – that was her nickname—so that when they heard that song, they knew she was coming to the area...I often call the spiritual an omnibus term, because there are lots of different [subcategories] under it. They used to sing songs as they worked in the fields. In the church, it evolved into

5148-446: The prayer and complaint of souls boiling over with the bitterest anguish. Every tone was a testimony against slavery, and a prayer to God for deliverance from chains… Those songs still follow me, to deepen my hatred of slavery, and quicken my sympathies for my brethren in bonds." His Narrative , which is the most famous of the stories written by former enslaved at that time, is one of the most influential pieces of literature that acted as

5226-424: The religious music of camp meetings on the ever-expanding frontier. As African religious traditions declined in America in the 18th and 19th centuries, more African Americans began to convert to Christianity. In a 1982 "scathing critique" of Awakening scholars, Yale University historian, Jon Butler, wrote that the Awakening was a myth that has been constructed by historians in the 18th century who had attempted to use

5304-623: The remainder went to Brazil, the West Indies or other regions. The majority of these Africans came from the West African slave coast . Other sources estimate the Islamic slave trade enslaved similar numbers of Africans, with between 8 million and 17 million individuals taken from Africa between the 8th and 19th centuries along the Trans-Saharan trade routes. The Portuguese Empire transported

5382-481: The same thing." The lead "singer starts the words of each verse, often improvising, and the others, who "base" him, as it is called, strike in with the refrain, or even join in the solo, when the words are familiar." In their 1925 book, The Books of American Negro Spirituals , James Weldon Johnson and Grace Nail Johnson said that spirituals, which are "purely and solely the creation" of African Americans, represent "America's only type of folk music...When it came to

5460-467: The slave population for a more than a century and a half—with numbers nearly tripling by the end of the domestic slave trade in the 1860s." During that period, "approximately 1.2 million men, women, and children, the vast majority of whom were born in America," were displaced—spouses were separated from one another, and parents were separated from their children. By 1850, most enslaved African Americans were "third-, fourth-, or fifth-generation Americans." In

5538-549: The spirituals, and through them, religious ideals were infused into the activities of everyday life. The spirituals provided some immunity protecting the African American religion from being colonized, and in this way preserved the "sacred as a potential space of resistance". A 2015 article in the Journal of Black Studies said that it was not surprising therefore that "spirituals were sung primarily as rowing songs, field songs, work songs, and social songs, rather than exclusively within

5616-419: The spirituals. They brought spirituals to concert settings and mentored the next generation of professional spirituals musicians starting in the early 20th century. Harry Burleigh 's (1866–1949)—an African-American classical composer and baritone performed in many concert settings published Jubilee Songs of the United States in 1929, which made "spirituals available to solo concert singers as art songs for

5694-535: The use of words, the maker of the song was struggling under his limitations in language and, perhaps, also under a misconstruction or misapprehension of the facts in his source of material, generally the Bible." The couple were active during the Harlem Renaissance James Weldon Johnson was the leader of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Arthur C. Jones,

5772-437: Was almost impossible to convey the spirituals in print because of the inimitable quality of African American voices with its "intonations and delicate variations", where not "even one singer" can be "reproduced on paper". Allen described the complexity of songs such as "I can't stay behind, my Lord", or "Turn, sinner, turn O!" which have a "complicated shout" where there are no singing parts, and no two singers "appear to be singing

5850-513: Was formed to "promote the interest of Tuskegee Institute". In 1909 a new quartet was formed. The singers travelled intermittently until the 1940s. Like the Fisk Jubilee Singers, the Tuskegee Institute Singers sang spirituals in a modified harmonized style. African American composers— Harry Burleigh , R. Nathaniel Dett , and William Dawson, created a "new repertoire for the concert stage" by applying their Western classical education to

5928-546: Was only after many months that gradually our hearts were opened to the influence of these friends and we began to appreciate the wonderful beauty and power of our songs." Eventually their repertoire began to include these songs. By 1878 the Singers had disbanded. In 1890 the Singers legacy was revived when Ella Sheppard , Moore—one of the original nine Fisk Jubilee Singers—returned to Fisk and began to coach new jubilee vocalists, including John Wesley Work Jr. (1871–1925). In 1899, Fisk University president E. M. Cravath put out

6006-642: Was recorded as a duet by Frankie Laine and Johnnie Ray on October 17, 1956. The song formed part of a double A-side release in the UK in October 1957. The single combined "Good Evening Friends" with the more fully titled "Up Above My Head, I Hear Music in the Air" ( Philips PB 708), and peaked at number 25 in the UK Singles Chart . It was released as a duet by Long John Baldry and Rod Stewart (as Long John Baldry and

6084-471: Was revised with added African rhythms in 1952 following Dawson's trip to West Africa . One of his most popular spirituals is " Ezekiel Saw the Wheel ". The Fisk Jubilee Singers continue to maintain their popularity in the 21st century with live performances in locations such as Grand Ole Opry House in 2019 in Nashville, Tennessee. In 2019 Tazewell Thompson presented an cappella musical entitled Jubilee , which

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