This is one of my favorite spirituals. I have sang this before in my high school studio choir. We combined a Gospel choir with my last one, and we sang it for a church service. The soloist in this is amazing. I feel that spirituals have a haunting quality about them that is hard to find anywhere else. I go around singing this all the time. It is in b-minor usually, if anyone cares.
This is a website explaining some of the hidden meanings in African- American spirituals. Two types of coded spirituals were signal songs and map songs. They were there to help slave who wanted to escape to the North. They used these songs during meetings (usually church services) since most of the slave population was unable to write (and it would have been dangerous to write down escape routes). Signal songs had another message within them to tell the rest of the slave population that an escape was coming. Map songs actually planned out how to get North. "Follow the drinking gourd" is a very famous map song. This is the song were the Big Dipper was actually the "drinking gourd". This would help escaped slaves find the North Star.
This is a video of James Cotton and Muddy Waters playing together. I grew up in Mississippi, so I am quite familiar with music like this. My dad loves this kind of music, so I knew who James Cotton was before I knew who Britney Spears was. The blues are everywhere in Mississippi. From outdoor festivals to the State Fair, you can go and hear the Blues. Mississippi can have some negative connotations associated with it. However, I have found that Mississippi has a rich culture where are kinds of music are blended together.
Yes, B. B. King is from Mississippi. Yay!
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