Bibliography of books consulted for the Freedom Songs project, Stanford University, Summer 2007

 

  1. From My People: 400 Years of African American Folklore, Daryl Cumber Dance, ed., W.W. Norton & Company Ltd., London, 2002. 

 

            736 pages.

 

            Chapter 2, pp. 77-104, covers Folk Music: Spirituals and Other Freedom Songs. Short history of “I’ll Overcome Some Day”/”We Shall Overcome”, pp. 101-104.

 

  1. Freedom’s Coming: Religious Culture and the Shaping of the South from the Civil War through the Civil Rights Era, Paul Harvey, University of North Carolina Pres, Chapel Hill, 2005.

 

            338 pages.

 

            Brief history of “I Will Overcome”, page 175.

 

  1. If You Don’t Go, Don’t Hinder Me: The African American Sacred Song Tradition, Bernice Reagon, University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, 2001.

 

            155 pages.

 

            Four chapters are titled:

·        Twentieth-centuiry Gospel: As the People Moved They Sand a New Song

·        The African American Congregational Song Traditions: Deacon William Reardon Sr., Master Songleader

·        Spirituals: An African American Communa Voice

·        Freedom Songs: My African American Singing and Fighting Mothers

 

  1. Songs of the Civil Rights Movement, 1955-1965, Dissertation for University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Bernice Johnson, 1975.

 

            229 pages.

 

            Five chapters are titled:

·        Songs as Oral History

·        The Historical Roots of Civil Rights Movement Protest Songs

·        The Evolution of a Freedom Song: “We Shall Overcome” (pp. 65-89).  She traces “We Shall Overcome” to “I’ll Be All Right”, not only to “I’ll Oversome Some Day”, where most historians stop.

·        The Musical Record: Bus Boycotts, Sit-ins and Freedom Rides

·        The Musical Record: Grassroots and Beyond

 

            Extensive bibliography.  Appendices of original and contemporary music, both sheet music and lyrics. 

 

  1. My Soul Is Rested: The Story of the Civil Rights Movement in the Deep South, Howell Raines, R.R. Donnelley & Sons Company, Harrisonburg, Virginia, 1983.  Also subtitled: Movement Days in the Deep South Remembered.

 

            488 pages.

 

            “We Shall Overcome” discussed in four places, in the context of discussing the personal history, taken as oral histories, of individual freedom fighters.

·        John Lewis

·        Connie Curry

·        James Farmer

·        Nelson Benton

 

 

  1. The Music of Black Americans: A History, Eileen Southern, W.W. Norton & Company, New York, 1971.

 

            602 pages.

 

            Brief history of “We Shall Overcome” pp.546-548, tracing path from “I’ll Overcome Some Day”, attributed to Charles Tindley’s 1900 gospel version.

 

Collections of Songs

 

·        Traditional Black Sacred Music from 16th c – Emancipation

·        Other collections of Plantation Songs/Slave Songs/Work Songs, primarily 19th c. but also covering early 20th c. (10)

·        Hampton Singers (1)

·        Fisk Jubilee Singers, post-Emancipation – late 19th c. (1)

·        Georgia Sea Island Singers (1)

·        Freedom Singers, 1960s (2)

·        Fisk Jubilee Singers, contemporary collections (1)


Interestingly, of the 16 volumes of song collections, only the 1960s Freedom Songs collections include “We Shall Overcome”, suggesting that “I’ll Overcome Some Day” is not the only root song for “We Shall Overcome”, but can also be traced to “I’ll Be All Right”, as described by Bernice Reagon in her dissertation.    So far, I have not found “I’ll Be All Right” in the early- to mid-19th c. collections.   Two questions arise: what are the roots of “I’ll Be All Right”?  What other songs (if any) are also root songs for “I’ll Overcome Some Day”/”We Shall Overcome”?

 

Histories and Other Studies

 

  1. Slave Spirituals and the Jubilee Singers, Michael Cooper, Clarion Books, New York, 2001.

 

            86 pages.

 

            Traces spirituals to Africa and the forced journeys over the seas (pp. 1 – 15) and earliest days of music among slaves in 16th c. (pp. 16 – 26).  Quote from Desmond   Tutu on “We Shall Overcome”: “When we sing ‘We Shall Overcome,’ what we will overcome is injustice, is apartheid, is separation – all that is dehumanizing.”     (page 71)

 

  1. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Written by Himself, Frederick Douglass, William Andres and William McReely, Editors, W.W. Norton & Company, New York, 1997.

 

            188 pages.

 

            Frederick Douglass’ narrative is 82 pages long, and this edition includes 8 articles that provide context (pp. 83 – 132), and 6 essays of criticism (pp. 133 – 173).            Includes chronology and selective bibliography.

 

  1. The Souls of Black Folk, W.E.B. Du Bois, Edited by Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Terri Hume Oliver, W.W. Norton & Company, New York, 1999.

 

            374 pages.

 

            The text of The Souls of Black Folk is 166 pages long, and is followed by 7 articles of political and personal context (pp. 167 – 220), 5 essays of early criticism (pp. 221 – 235), and 7 essays of modern criticism (pp. 236 – 364).  Includes chronology and selected bibliography.

 

  1. Work Songs, Ted Gioia, Duke University Press, Durham, 2006.

 

            352 pages.

 

            Wonderful history of songs arranged loosely in these categories: Hunter, Cultivator, Herder, Thread and Cloth, Sea and Shore, Lumberjack, Take This       Hammer!, Cowboy, Miner, Prison, Labor Movement and Songs of Work, Music and the Modern Worker.   Included appendix of recommended listening, and bibliography.  

 

  1. Ev’ry Time I Feel the Spirit: 101 Best-loved Psalms, Gospel Hymns, and Spiritual Songs of the African-American Church, Gwendolim Sims Warren, Henry Holt and Company, New York, 1997.

 

            370 pages.

 

            Short histories of 101 songs arranged in these categories: The Negro Spirituals (32 songs); The Gospel Songs (27 songs); The Euro-American Hymns (27 songs); Contemporary Songs (15 songs).   Along with discussion of each song, its sheet music and lyrics are given.  None of “I’ll Be All Right”, “I’ll Overcome Some Day”, and “We Shall Overcome” is discussed, unfortunately.

 

  1. Falling Pieces of the Broken Sky, Julius Lester, Arcade Publishing, Little, Brown and Company, New York, 1990.

 

            276 pages.

 

            Short essays on: Writers and Writings (including Thomas Merton!) (9), Race (5), and Falling Pieces of the Broken Sky (histories of struggle) (21).

 

  1. Look Out, Whitey! Black Power’s Gon’ Get Your Mama!, Julius Lester, The Dial Press, Inc., New York, 1968.

 

            152 pages.

 

            The first chapter (30 pages)  is titled “We Shall Overcome” and focuses on the 1960s SNCC movement, with Julius Lester’s inimitable energy, and disinterest in being what today is called politically correct.

 

  1. Search for a New Land: History as Subjective Experience, Julius Lester, The Dial Press, New York, 1969.

 

            195 pages.

 

            Poems and personal observations, stories and history of the struggle. 

 

  1. And All Our Wounds Forgiven, Julius Lester, Arcade Publishing, New York, 1994.

 

            228 pages.

 

            Wonderful biography of John Calvin Marshall’s life.  Quoting from the   publisher’s description on the book jacket, this story is “told in four alternating        voices: that of John Calvin Marshall’s wife, Andrea: of Lisa Adams, the young             white woman who as a student at Fisk University first heard Marshall speak and fell under his spell, later becoming his trusted aide and passionate mistress; of Bobby Card, a black civil rights leader operating in the heart of darkness – the Deep South of the 1960s – as Marshall’s chief lieutenant in the field; and finally,             of Marshall himself.”  

 

  1. This Little Light of Mine: The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer, Kay Mills, Dutton, a division of Penguin Books, New York, 1993.

 

            390 pages.

 

            Fannie Lou Hamer was one of the foremost Freedom Singers of the 1960s struggle and the song “We Shall Overcome” is specifically called out in the          recounting of five different protests. 

 

  1. American Roots Music, Robert Santelli, Holly George-Warren and Jim Brown, Editors, Harry N. Abrams, Inc., New York, 2001.

 

            232 pages.

 

            The Library of Congress classification reads: “Based on the PBS series and a collaboration between: the Library of Congress, the Smithsonian Institution, the          Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum, Experience Music Project, and Ginger Group Productions, with major support from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Public Broadcasting Service, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and AT&T.”   Discusses the roots of American music in spirituals, blues, jazz, Cajun and Zydeco, Tejana (Mexican Texas), Native tongues, Country, Mojo (blues), and finally Rock and Roll. 

 

  1. Somebody’s Calling My Name: Black Sacred Music and Social Change, Wyatt Tee Walker, Judson Press, Valley Forge, 1990.

 

 208 pages.                                

 

Starts with chapter on African Roots, and a chapter called “The Oral Tradition Sails West”, about the difficult journeys.  This is a musicology, unlike almost all the previously listed books, which fall more in the category of history.

 

  1. We Shall Overcome: A Spirituality of Liberation, Michael Worsnip and Desmond van der Water, Editors, Cluster Publications, Pietermaritzburg, 1991.

 

139 pages.

 

8 essays by different people on the relationship of the stuggle, spirituality and (in many cases) singing and music.

 

  1. Development Arrested: The Blues and Plantation Power in the Mississippi Delta, Clyde Woods, Verso, London, 1998.

 

342 pages.

 

History of the Mississippi Delta, including stories of song and music, but mainly focused on the blues.   The book is dedicated to Fannie Lou Hamer, with several other people, and includes an account of her life and singing, and of the Freedom Singers. 

 

  1. Folk Song of the American Negro, John Wesley Work, Negro Universities Press, Nashville, 1915.

 

131 pages.

 

An important early history of Negro spirituals, including a chapter on “African Song”, and a chapter on “Transmigration and Transition of Song.”  He grouped the songs into these categories: Joy Songs, Sorrow Songs, Sorrow Songs with Note of Joy, Songs of Faith, Songs of Hope, Songs of Love, Songs of Determination, Songs of Adoration, Songs of Patience, Songs of Courage, songs of Humility.  Discusses birth and growth of certain songs (about 20, but some in more depth than others).  Short history of the original Jubilee Singers.