The Historical Context of "Lift Every Voice and Sing"

From CNN, Professor Rudolph P. Byrd responds to an unenlightened article posted by Timothy Askew discussing James Weldon Johnson's masterpiece, "Lift Every Voice and Sing." Professor Byrd's article "Song reflects racial pride, never intended as anthem," on 30 July 2010:

In a recent article on CNN.com, Timothy Askew, author of "Cultural Hegemony and African American Patriotism: An Analysis of the Song 'Lift Every Voice and Sing,' " makes certain claims regarding James Weldon Johnson's hymn that are not only historically inaccurate, but also are potentially harmful to Johnson's legacy as a pioneering figure in the modern civil rights movement.

"Askew decided the song was intentionally written with no specific reference to any race or ethnicity," the article stated. Nothing could be further from the truth.

James Weldon Johnson

The agnostic Johnson carefully reconstructs the genesis and context for the composition of his hymn in his autobiography "Along This Way." There he writes: "A group of young men decided to hold on February 12 [1900] a celebration of Lincoln's birthday. I was put down for an address, which I began preparing; but I wanted something else also."

Along with his address, Johnson initially was interested in writing a commemorative poem in honor of Abraham Lincoln but abandoned that idea for lack of time, and instead composed with his younger brother J. Rosamond Johnson "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing."

"Lift Every Voice and Sing Sheet Music"

As Johnson composed his loving tribute to his race and nation, he wept: "I could not keep back the tears, and made no effort to do so." On the occasion of its debut, the hymn was sung by 500 African-American children, many of whom were students at Stanton School, Johnson's alma mater and where, at the time, he was principal.

The context then for the composition of "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing" was an early Black History Month celebration organized by the black leadership of Jacksonville, Florida, decades before this tradition was institutionalized by the African-American historian and Harvard Ph.D Carter G. Woodson.

Musical Composer J. Rosamond Johnson, (James Weldon Johnson's Younger Brother)

Not only does Askew mistakenly claim that Johnson composed his hymn without any "specific reference to any race or ethnicity," but he applies this erroneous, ahistorical and decontexualized reading to the lyrics themselves.

"Some people argue lines like 'We have come, treading our path through the blood of the/slaughtered,' signify a tie to slavery and the black power struggle. But in all essence," asserts Askew, "there is no specific reference to black people in this song."

While there is no specific reference to African-Americans in the hymn, the genesis and context make it impossible to ignore the centrality of the history of African-Americans and their heroic movement from slavery to freedom in a democratic republic that for centuries countenanced the contradiction of slavery, and later, segregation, to the hymn's inspiration and composition.

Without this context, which Askew surely must know, such a phrase as "the blood of the/slaughtered" cannot be fully understood. In his commentary on the hymn, Johnson observed that "the American Negro was, historically and spiritually, immanent. ..."

Timothy Askew

By ignoring the context and Johnson's own commentary, Askew is able to advance his wrongheaded interpretation of this hymn, which the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People adopted as its official song in 1920.

Askew is correct in stating that "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing" "lends itself to any people who have struggled." Of course, this is true of all great works of art that emerge from the specific experience of a people and that rise to the level of universalism. Johnson understood and appreciated this dimension of the hymn.

"Recently I spoke for the summer labor school at Bryn Mawr College," he wrote in his autobiography, "and was surprised to hear it ["Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing"] fervently sung by the white students there and to see it in their mimeographed folio of songs."

As this story reveals, Johnson's hymn is not only part of the rich cultural background of African-Americans, but it is also part of the cultural background of all Americans.

In his eagerness to enter the debate regarding whether or not "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing" should be sung as the black national anthem, Askew fails to offer an important clarification, which is that Johnson always regarded the song he composed with his younger brother Rosamond as a hymn, not an anthem. The Johnson brothers understood that there was only one national anthem: Francis Scott Key's "The Star-Spangled Banner."

While "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing" was widely sung, even during Johnson's lifetime, as the "Negro National Anthem" he never encouraged this practice, but recognized it for what it was -- the spontaneous response of African-Americans who found in this hymn a source of racial pride.

And the fact that many African-Americans continue to sing this hymn as an expression of racial pride today represents a desire to remain connected to the history of slavery and the struggle for freedom while also affirming their national identity as Americans.

Let us be clear, Johnson was not a racial separatist. In his role as executive secretary of the NAACP, he was at the head of a national interracial coalition committed to the full realization of the promise of American democracy.

James Weldon Johnson

Askew's failure to provide this clarification leaves Johnson vulnerable to the charge of racial separatism, a stance that he steadfastly rejected throughout his life. This is a disservice to Johnson's legacy as both race man and patriot, not to mention to the truth.

There is the text and the context. A knowledge of the complex interplay between both is needed to appreciate the origins and continuing significance of Johnson's "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing." As reported in the earlier article, Askew fails to meet this widely accepted standard in scholarship, and in the process performs a certain violence upon a hymn cherished by many as well as Johnson's legacy.

Professor Rudolph P. Byrd

Rudolph P. Byrd is the Goodrich C. White Professor of American Studies and the founding director of the James Weldon Johnson Institute at Emory University.

James Weldon Johnson's "Lift Every Voice and Sing"

The Florida Times Union, guest column, "James Weldon Johnson's song the start of a legacy," by Jack Gailliard (a Jacksonville attorney).

On a brisk winter morning in early 1900, a young Jacksonville native paced the porch of his LaVilla home searching for inspiration.

He and his brother had decided to compose a song as their contribution to the upcoming Abraham Lincoln birthday celebration.

The first stanza was complete. It was now his burden to find words to fit two more stanzas into the meter of the first.

Working on the words

At this point he had abandoned pen and paper and was simply, as he would later recall in his autobiography, "repeating the lines over and over to myself, going through all the agony and ecstasy of creating."

Working his way through the last stanza, "I could not keep back the tears and made no effort to do so. I was experiencing the transports of the poet's ecstasy. Feverish ecstasy was followed by that contentment - that sense of serene joy - which makes artistic creation the most complete of all human experience:"

God of our weary years,

God of our silent tears,

Those who hast brought us thus far on the way

Thou who hast by Thy might

Led us into the light

Keep us forever in the path, we pray.

Lincoln's birthday arrived, and 500 school children sang "Lift Every Voice and Sing" in public celebration.

The brothers moved on to careers taking them far from Jacksonville, leaving their song to its own fate.

Adopted by NAACP

The children continued singing their new song. Later, it was adopted by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

"Lift Every Voice and Sing" continues to be sung as both inspiration and aspiration of the African-American experience. Yet, it was far from the only music composed by lyricist James Weldon Johnson and his younger brother, John Rosamond Johnson.

During the previous summer, Jim Johnson, as he was known to friends, had taken his summer break as principal of Stanton High School and, together with Rosamond, traveled to New York City with an opera they had composed. Although it was never staged, their opera opened doors to theater performers, composers and producers, Oscar Hammerstein amongst them.

Before returning to Jacksonville in the fall, the brothers had struck a partnership with Bob Cole, who "could write a play, stage it and play a part." Commencing with their reunion the following summer, this trio would combine to write and produce a series of musical comedy hits.

A new direction

At the end of their successful Broadway years, Rosamond Johnson and Cole continued their music careers in other venues, while Jim Johnson's path took several brilliant tangents. From educator to lawyer, to diplomat, to novelist, to poet, to godfather and anthologist of the Harlem Renaissance, he left an indelible mark.

His most vital role, however, lay in the nascent civil rights movement. He became the first member of his race to head the NAACP, which he transformed from a small, regional organization into a strong, national force.

In 1925, he founded its most effective weapon, the Legal Defense Fund.

It was through the fund that falsely accused African-Americans found Clarence Darrow and other attorneys by their side. The fund, in the hands of lawyers like Thurgood Marshall, relentlessly attacked Jim Crow laws, finally ending all school segregation.

On that lofty pinnacle of transformative civil rights achievement - not only for one racial group but whose precedents remain in the service of any devalued citizen - James Weldon Johnson stands among the likes of Marshall, Martin Luther King, Jr., Lyndon Johnson and A. Philip Randolph (another champion of racial equality with Jacksonville connections.)

Honest Abe, the supreme wordsmith of American presidents, would have rejoiced.

(source: Florida Times Union, Jack Gailliard is a Jacksonville attorney.)

LIFT EVERY VOICE AND SING

Gospel Soul Sound of Sam Cooke

The Rolling Stones reports: In the Fifties and Sixties, Sam Cooke helped invent soul music by merging gospel sounds with secular themes. Cooke's pure, elegant crooning was widely imitated, and both his voice and his suave, sophisticated image influenced generations of soul men.

One of eight sons of a Baptist minister, Cooke was born on January 22, 1931, in Clarkesdale, Mississippi, and grew up in Chicago. As a teenager, he became lead vocalist of the Soul Stirrers (which later included Johnnie Taylor), with whom he toured and recorded for nearly six years. By 1951 Cooke was a top gospel artist, already boasting his now-famous phrasing and urban enunciation.Hoping not to offend his gospel fans, Cooke released his pop debut, "Lovable" (1956), as Dale Cooke, but Specialty Records dropped him for deserting the Soul Stirrers. He released his own "You Send Me" the following year, and the 1.7-million-selling Number One song was the first of many hits. In the next two years his several hits — "Only Sixteen" (Number 28, 1959), "Everybody Likes to Cha Cha" (Number 31, 1959) — concentrated on light ballads and novelty items. He signed to RCA in 1960 and began writing bluesier, gospel-inflected tunes.

Beginning with his reworking of "Chain Gang" (Number Two) in August 1960, Cooke was a mainstay in the Top 40 through 1965, with "Wonderful World" (Number 12, 1960), "Sad Mood" (Number 29, 1961), "Twistin' the Night Away" (Number Nine, 1962), "Bring It On Home to Me" (Number 13, 1962), "Another Saturday Night" (Number 10, 1963), and "Shake" (Number Seven, 1965).
The nature of Cooke's death on December 11, 1964, tarnished his image. Bertha Franklin, the manager of the Hacienda motel in L.A., claimed she shot and killed the singer in self-defense after he'd tried to rape a 22-year-old woman and then turned on Franklin. The coroner ruled it a justifiable homicide. There still remain questions about the circumstances surrounding Cooke's demise.

Two months after his death, "Shake" peaked at Number Seven on the singles chart. The posthumously released "A Change Is Gonna Come," which Cooke wrote after hearing Bob Dylan's "Blowin' in the Wind," hit Number 31 in 1965. It represented a return to Cooke's roots, placing him back in the spiritual setting from which he had first emerged just nine years earlier. The song has a long legacy in social movements; it was played in Spike Lee's 1992 biopic Malcolm X and quoted by President Barack Obama in his 2008 victory speech.

Cooke also was a groundbreaking independent black-music capitalist. He owned his own record label (Sar/Derby), music publishing concern (Kags Music), and management firm. His hits have been covered widely by soul and rock singers — "Shake," for instance, has been interpreted by Otis Redding and Rod Stewart — and his influence can be heard in the music of artists as varied as Michael Jackson, Al Green and the Heptones. Rappers including the Roots, Nas and the late Tupac Shakur also have invoked Cooke's name in their songs. Cooke was one of the first inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1986; three years later the Soul Stirrers entered separately.

(source: Rolling Stones, Portions of this biography appeared in The Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll (Simon & Schuster, 2001). Mark Kemp contributed to this article.)



Deep Soul The Up Rising Of Sam Cooke Part 1


Deep Soul The Up Rising Of Sam Cooke Part 2


Deep Soul The Up Rising Of Sam Cooke Part 3


Deep Soul The Up Rising Of Sam Cooke Part 4


Deep Soul The Up Rising Of Sam Cooke Part 5


Deep Soul The Up Rising Of Sam Cooke Part 6