Go Tell It on the Mountain (song)

Last updated

Go Tell It on the Mountain
by unknown
Genre Christmas, spiritual
Related"Tell It on the Mountain" by Peter, Paul and Mary (1963)
Published1909
A recording of an arrangement of "Go Tell It on the Mountain" for congregational singing (2008)

"Go Tell It on the Mountain" is an African-American spiritual song which was likely derived from the oral tradition, but was originally published by John Wesley Work Jr., although there is some debate whether he was actually the first to write it. [1] This spiritual has been sung and recorded by many gospel and secular performers since considered a Christmas carol as its original lyrics celebrate the Nativity of Jesus:

Contents

Go tell it on the mountain, over the hills and everywhere;
go tell it on the mountain, that Jesus Christ is born.

An alternate final line omits the reference to the birth of Christ, instead declaring that "Jesus Christ is Lord". [2]

Due to the oral tradition of the song, "Go Tell It on the Mountain" has also been used as an Easter song, with the refrain taking the variant of:

Go, tell it on the mountain,

Over the hills and everywhere; Go, tell it on the mountain

That Jesus lives again

[3]

Publication history

The earliest known publication of the song is attributed to John Wesley Work, Jr. (1871-1925) who published the song in the New Jubilee Songs as Sung by the Fisk Jubilee Singers (1901). [4] Work grew up in Nashville where he garnered a love for music from his father who was a choir director. He earned his Master’s in Latin and went on to teach ancient Latin and Greek. However, his first love continued to be music, and he became the first African-American collector of Negro spirituals. Most African-American spirituals originated in oral tradition, but Work, through his extensive research, was able to compile many songs into the “New Jubilee Songs”. It was not until the second version he published that “Go Tell it On the Mountain” was included. [5] While many books and websites attribute the New Jubilee Songs as Sung by the Fisk Jubilee Singers to John Wesley Work, Jr. in 1901, some sources argue the origins lie with Frederick Jerome Work in 1902. [6]

Biblical references

"Go Tell It on the Mountain" references the Annunciation to the Shepherds described in the Gospel of Luke, hence the alternate title of "While shepherds kept their watching". The Nativity is also referenced in the final verse of the song:

Down in a lowly manger,

the humble Christ was born, and God sent us salvation, that blessed Christmas morn.

Verses: Luke 2:8-20 and Matthew 28:19

Recording artists

In 1963, the musical team Peter, Paul and Mary, along with their musical director Milt Okun, adapted and rewrote "Go Tell It on the Mountain" as "Tell It on the Mountain", their lyrics referring specifically to Exodus and using the phrase "Let my people go", but referring implicitly to the civil rights struggle of the early 1960s. This version became a moderately successful single for them (US No. 33 pop, 1964). Cash Box described it as "a rhythmic, updating of the folk oldie with a plaintive message-song motif." [7]

According to religious studies professor and civil rights historian Charles Marsh, it was African-American civil rights leader Fannie Lou Hamer who combined this song with the spiritual "Go Down Moses", taking the last line of the chorus, "let my people go" and substituting it in the chorus of "Go Tell It on the Mountain". [8] Marsh does not document this claim, but notes that Hamer was highly active in civil rights work beginning in the 1950s, and that the use of the Exodus story and the singing of spirituals played a central role in her activities.

In 1964, Simon & Garfunkel released their first studio album, Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M., which contains an arrangement by the duo.

Little Big Town's 2006 non-album single version reached No. 35 on the Hot Country Songs chart. [9]

Popular African-American Contemporary Christian music band Maverick City Music recorded and published their own version of “Go Tell it On the Mountain” in 2021.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Christmas carol</span> Song or hymn on the theme of Christmas

A Christmas carol is a carol on the theme of Christmas, traditionally sung at Christmas itself or during the surrounding Christmas holiday season. The term noel has sometimes been used, especially for carols of French origin. Christmas carols may be regarded as a subset of the broader category of Christmas music.

Spirituals is a genre of Christian music that is associated with African Americans, which merged sub-Saharan African cultural heritage 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 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 of slavery for many. Many new derivative music genres emerged from the spirituals songcraft.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Rutter</span> English composer, conductor and arranger

John Milford Rutter is an English composer, conductor, editor, arranger, and record producer, mainly of choral music.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Swing Low, Sweet Chariot</span> African-American spiritual song

"Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" is an African-American spiritual song and one of the best-known Christian hymns. Originating in early oral and musical African-American traditions, the date it was composed is unknown. Performances by the Hampton Singers and the Fisk Jubilee Singers brought the song to the attention of wider audiences in the late 19th century. J. B. T. Marsh includes an early version of text and tune in his 1876 publication The Story of the Jubilee Singers, with Their Songs. The earliest known recording of "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" was recorded in 1894, by the Standard Quartette.

John Wesley Work III was an American composer, educator, choral director, musicologist and scholar of African-American folklore and music.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fisk Jubilee Singers</span> African-American a cappella ensemble

The Fisk Jubilee Singers are an African-American a cappella ensemble, consisting of students at Fisk University. The first group was organized in 1871 to tour and raise funds for college. Their early repertoire consisted mostly of traditional spirituals, but included some songs by Stephen Foster. The original group toured along the Underground Railroad path in the United States, as well as performing in England and Europe. Later 19th-century groups also toured in Europe.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michael, Row the Boat Ashore</span> Folk song based on a Sea Islands spiritual

"Michael, Row the Boat Ashore" is a traditional African-American spiritual first noted during the American Civil War at St. Helena Island, one of the Sea Islands of South Carolina. The best-known recording was released in 1960 by the U.S. folk band The Highwaymen; that version briefly reached number-one hit status as a single.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wade in the Water</span> African American jubilee song

"Wade in the Water" is an African American jubilee song, a spiritual—in reference to a genre of music "created and first sung by African Americans in slavery." The lyrics to "Wade in the Water" were first co-published in 1901 in New Jubilee Songs as Sung by the Fisk Jubilee Singers by Frederick J. Work and his brother, John Wesley Work Jr., an educator at the historically black college in Nashville, Tennessee, Fisk University. Work Jr. (1871–1925)—who is also known as John Work II—spent thirty years collecting, promoting, and reviving the songcraft of the original Fisk Jubilee Singers, which included being a member and director of the Fisk Jubilee Quartet. The Sunset Four Jubilee Singers made the first commercial recording of "Wade in the Water" in 1925—released by Paramount Records. W. E. B. Du Bois called this genre of songs the Sorrow Songs. "Wade in the Water" is associated with songs of the Underground Railroad.

"Mary Don't You Weep" is a Spiritual that originates from before the American Civil War – thus it is what scholars call a "slave song", "a label that describes their origins among the enslaved", and it contains "coded messages of hope and resistance". It is one of the most important of Negro spirituals. It is listed as number 11823 in the Roud Folk Song Index.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">We Are Climbing Jacob's Ladder</span> Song

We Are Climbing Jacob's Ladder is an African American slave spiritual based in part on the Biblical story of Jacob's Ladder. It was developed some time before 1825, and became one of the first slave spirituals to be widely sung by white Christians. A number of artists have recorded notable versions of it, and it was used as one of the main themes in the critically praised documentary The Civil War.

"This Little Light of Mine" is an African-American song from the 1920s. It was often reported to be written for children in the 1920s by Harry Dixon Loes, but he never claimed credit for the original version of the song, and researchers at the Moody Bible Institute, where Loes worked, said they have found no evidence that he wrote it. It was later adapted by Zilphia Horton, amongst many other activists, in connection with the civil rights movement.

"Children, Go Where I Send Thee" is a traditional African-American spiritual song. Among the many different versions of the song, a defining feature is the cumulative structure, with each number accompanied by a biblical reference. Today, many Americans know it as a Christmas carol.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Old-Time Religion</span> Song by Fisk Jubilee Singers (earliest attested)

("Give Me That") "Old-Time Religion" is a traditional Gospel song dating from 1873, when it was included in a list of Jubilee songs—or earlier. It has become a standard in many Protestant hymnals, though it says nothing about Jesus or the gospel, and covered by many artists. Some scholars, such as Forrest Mason McCann, have asserted the possibility of an earlier stage of evolution of the song, in that "the tune may go back to English folk origins". In any event, it was by way of Charles Davis Tillman that the song had incalculable influence on the confluence of black spiritual and white gospel song traditions in forming the genre now known as southern gospel. Tillman was largely responsible for publishing the song into the repertoire of white audiences. It was first heard sung by African-Americans and written down by Tillman when he attended a camp meeting in Lexington, South Carolina in 1889.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Annunciation to the shepherds</span> Scene from the Nativity

The annunciation to the shepherds is an episode in the Nativity of Jesus described in the Bible in Luke 2, in which angels tell a group of shepherds about the birth of Jesus. It is a common subject of Christian art and of Christmas carols.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Wesley Work Jr.</span> American musicologist

John Wesley Work Jr. was a musicologist, who was the first African-American collector of folk songs and spirituals, and also a choral director, educationalist singer and songwriter. He is now sometimes known as John Wesley Work II, to distinguish him from his son, John Wesley Work III.

<i>Bayard Rustin Sings a Program of Spirituals</i> 1952 studio album by Bayard Rustin

Bayard Rustin Sings Twelve Spirituals on The Life of Christ with readings from the Bible by James Farmer is a 10-inch LP released in 1952 by civil rights and peace activist Bayard Rustin on Fellowship Records, a label owned by the Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR), for which Rustin was working as a youth organizer. The album consists of Rustin singing a cappella spirituals in the tenor register with scripture reading by James Farmer. The album was recorded shortly before Rustin left for Africa on a trip for the FOR. Rustin also recorded Elizabethan Songs and Negro Spirituals, with harpsichord accompaniment by Margaret Davison. It was also released by Fellowship Records. Both of these recordings were combined on a compact disc, Bayard Rustin: The Singer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Christmas in Mexico</span> Overview of the role and celebration of Christmas in Mexico

Christmas in Mexico is observed from December 12 to January 6, with one additional celebration on February 2. Traditional decorations displayed on this holiday include nativity scenes, poinsettias, and Christmas trees. The season begins with celebrations related to the Virgin of Guadalupe, the Patroness of Mexico, followed by traditions such as Las Posadas and Pastorelas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Down in the River to Pray</span> Song

"Down in the River to Pray" is a traditional American song variously described as a Christian folk hymn, an African-American spiritual, an Appalachian song, and a Southern gospel song. The exact origin of the song is unknown.

Frederick Jerome Work was a collector, arranger ("harmonizer"), and composer of songs in the United States. He was part of a family of musicians and published a collection of "Negro spirituals" with his brother John Wesley Work.

"Rise Up, Shepherd, and Follow" is a song telling the story of Christmas morning, describing a "star in the East" that will lead to the birthplace of Christ. The title derives from a lyric repeated throughout the song. Depending on how the song is arranged and performed, it is known variously as a spiritual, hymn, carol, gospel song, or folk song.

References

  1. "Go Tell It on the Mountain - Lyrics, Hymn Meaning and Story".
  2. Epstein, Joseph (2006). The Yale Book of Quotations. Yale University Press. p. 278. ISBN   978-0-300-10798-2.
  3. "Go, Tell It on the Mountain".
  4. "Go, Tell It on the Mountain".
  5. "Go Tell It on the Mountain - Lyrics, Hymn Meaning and Story".
  6. "Go, Tell It on the Mountain".
  7. "CashBox Record Reviews" (PDF). Cash Box. February 29, 1964. p. 10. Retrieved January 12, 2022.
  8. Marsh, Charles (1997). God's Long Summer. Princeton. p. 47. ISBN   9780691130675.
  9. Whitburn, Joel (2008). Hot Country Songs 1944 to 2008. Record Research, Inc. p. 241. ISBN   978-0-89820-177-2.