Recognizing the African American Spritual as a National Treasure

RECOGNIZING THE AFRICAN AMERICAN SPIRITUAL AS A NATIONAL TREASURE

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of legislation that would recognize the African American spiritual as a national treasure, and would like to say thank you to my colleague from Georgia (Mr. Lewis) with whom I introduced this legislation in the Congress, as well as my colleagues on the floor this morning, the gentlewoman from California and the gentleman from Michigan, and also the chairman, Mr. Miller, for bringing the bill to the floor.

Mr. Speaker, even though they sprang from one of the darkest periods of our Nation's history, a period of turmoil that Americans still live with to this day, as we all know, African American spirituals have inspired many of America's most remarkable and enduring musical accomplishments. Name the modern music form, and it owes a debt to the spiritual. Jazz, blues, rock and roll, gospel all trace their origins to this particular musical heritage. Today people around the world play, listen to, and find the deepest of inspiration in the music of Africans who lived their lives in slavery.

In so many ways this is a uniquely American music, one born of our uniquely American experience, reminding us who we are, where we come from, and all that we are capable of as a society and as a Nation.

The African American spiritual is as poignant and powerful a genre of music as any in history. And throughout history the African American spiritual has been kept alive through that oral tradition. For certain, this was so before the abolition of slavery in 1865 when these songs provided comfort and an outlet for spiritual yearning for so many, but also in the years immediately following abolition when few wished to sing African American spirituals, so acute was the pain and anguish they called to mind.

Thankfully there were some who recognized in the power of these songs the collective experiences from which they came and their intrinsic cultural and musical value. And by the late 19th and early 20th century, the spiritual was kept alive by churches and singing groups like the Fisk Jubilee Singers, who traveled and performed these remarkable pieces in the face of hostility and intolerance. Indeed, in 1872, the Jubilee Singers sang at the World Peace Festival in Boston and were invited to perform at the White House that year by no less than President Grant himself.

Today African American spirituals are not only performed in spirituals and concert halls across the world, they are also studied by sociologists and musicologists across the country. The University of Denver's Spirituals Project puts it aptly in its mission statement: ``Spirituals uplift in times of crisis, heal, comfort, inspire, and instill hopes and dreams, thereby transforming individuals, communities, and whole societies.'

And in much the same spirit of the Fisk Jubilee Singers, I want to say thank you to a good friend, a musicologist himself, for bringing to my attention the need for the Congress to honor this vital piece of our national heritage, Calvin Earl. As the youngest of nine children in North Carolina, Calvin taught himself the guitar at age 7, forming his first rhythm and blues group while serving in the Army before spending several decades performing jazz and big band music. Since 1989, Calvin has dedicated himself to preserving and sharing spirituals with a new generation of Americans. Traveling the country, he builds on the traditional words and melodies to illuminate the history and complexity of this unique art form.

It was from Calvin that I learned about this remarkable tradition, how spirituals enabled slaves to teach their children, record their history, and surreptitiously communicate with one another. Indeed, songs such as ``Wade in the Water,' ``The Gospel Train,' and ``Swing Low, Sweet Chariot' all reference the Underground Railroad. Another, ``Follow the Drinking Gourd,' even contained a coded map to the Underground Railroad. As these songs were spontaneous, their authors are not known, though they were the inspiration for the writers of the first gospel songs, from Charles Albert Tindley to Harry Thackert Burleigh to John Rosamond Johnson.

Mr. Speaker, no less than Frederick Douglass remarked that such spirituals ``told a tale of woe which was then altogether beyond my feeble comprehension. They were tones loud, long, and deep. They breathed 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.'

Indeed, in so many ways the African American spiritual embodies who we are as Americans. The impact it has made on the cultural heritage of America, and indeed every American, is incalculable. I thank all who have allowed us to bring this resolution for consideration today. I urge my colleagues to support honoring this national treasure and this timeless reminder of the enduring human spirit.

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