Lift Every Voice and Sing
10/09/21 01:53
I’m trying to remember when I first was asked to rise and sing “Lift Every Voice and Sing.” I’m sure it was during the time that we were attending graduate school in Chicago. It may have been during a visit to Jesse Jackson’s Operation Push. It might have been while attending a worship service at Trinity United Church of Christ. I know that we also sang it in worship at the Chicago Theological Seminary Chapel. The hymn appears in the New Century Hymnal of the United Church of Christ, published in 1995. I wasn’t party to all of the discussions that led to the creation of that hymnal, but my friend Art Clyde was the editor and Jeffrey Radford, then director of music at Trinity UCC, was on the committee.
Radford was a 19-year-old pianist who directed a community choir when he inquired about his group using Trinity Church as a place to rehearse. Over the next thirty years, he and the 70-voice Trinity Choral Exchange became instrumental in the worship at Trinity. We first met back when I was a seminary student and he was brand new on the staff of Trinity. Over the years our paths crossed many times. It is easy for me to imagine Radford proposing Lift Every Voice and Sing as a congregational hymn, then sitting at a piano and leading the hymnal committee in singing the song until there wasn’t a dry eye in the room. He knew how to exercise the power of music in ways that are nearly impossible to describe. But if you were there when he was playing and singing, you never forgot the experience.
Whenever I first heard it and however the hymn made it into the hymnal of our church, it has become, over the years, a powerful expression of faith for Christians of many different races and ethnic backgrounds. The song is challenging with changes in meter, key and style. In Rapid City we had musicians who were up to the task and we sang the hymn in worship on several occasions.
Last night when the Dallas Cowboys met the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in this year’s National Football League opening game football fans around the world heard the Florida A&M University choir sing Lift Every Voice and Sing. It is going to be a part of opening ceremonies at NFL games throughout the season. The hymn, revered in African-American churches is being exposed to a much wider, much broader audience.
Lift every voice and sing
Till earth and heaven ring
Ring with the harmonies of Liberty
Let our rejoicing rise
High as the listening skies
Let it resound loud as the rolling sea
The bridge, accompanying the first two verses, includes a marching pace with a string of low notes and contains a half step modulation. It takes a person trained in music, or someone who grew up singing the song over and over again to get it right.
Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us
Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us
Facing the rising sun of our new day begun
Let us march on till victory is won
The hymn began as a poem written by James Weldon Johnson. It was set to music by Johnson’s brother, J. Rosamond Johnson. The lyrics were written for an event honoring President Abraham Lincoln. The middle two verses and bridge reflect the history of African American salves brought to this continent and the struggles for freedom, liberty and equality. They make firm reference to the sacrifices made and the pain of our history.
Stony the road we trod
Bitter the chastening rod
Felt in the days when hope unborn had died
Yet with a steady beat
Have not our weary feet
Come to the place for which our fathers sighed?
We have come over a way that with tears has been watered
We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered
Out from the gloomy past
Till now we stand at last
Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast
God of our weary years
God of our silent tears
Thou who has brought us thus far on the way
Thou who has by Thy might Led us into the light
Keep us forever in the path, we pray
Lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met Thee
The hymn ends with a deeply religious and a deeply patriotic verse pledging complete dedication to God and country.
Lest, our hearts drunk with the wine of the world, we forget Thee
Shadowed beneath Thy hand
May we forever stand
True to our God
True to our native land
Our native land
Our national anthem, The Star Spangled Banner, is often considered to be not only an anthem, but also a hymn. It appears in many contemporary hymnals and is sung on special occasions, including patriotic holidays, in churches. The battle-themed anthem, a product of the War of 1812, features words written by Francis Scott Key and set to music by John Stafford Smith. The original title of the poem, “Defence of Fort M’Henry,” was written on September 14, 1814 after Key had witnessed the bombardment of British Naval Forces upon Baltimore Harbor.
At Fort Meade, in the Black Hills of South Dakota, there is a plaque that claims that the movement to make The Star Spangled Banner our national anthem began on the parade grounds of that Fort back in 1892. Whatever the actual history, it wasn’t until 1931 that President Hoover signed the bill making the song our national anthem. The tradition of singing the anthem at sports events didn’t start until World War II, when it was adopted as part of the opening ceremonies of baseball games. As that tradition nears 80 years, it is now being joined, for this year’s NFL games at least by the hymn that has been dubbed by some as the African American National Anthem.
This season the hymn will reach the ears of many who have never heard it. May it inspire us all to continue the journey towards a more perfect union as we lift our voices together and sing.
Radford was a 19-year-old pianist who directed a community choir when he inquired about his group using Trinity Church as a place to rehearse. Over the next thirty years, he and the 70-voice Trinity Choral Exchange became instrumental in the worship at Trinity. We first met back when I was a seminary student and he was brand new on the staff of Trinity. Over the years our paths crossed many times. It is easy for me to imagine Radford proposing Lift Every Voice and Sing as a congregational hymn, then sitting at a piano and leading the hymnal committee in singing the song until there wasn’t a dry eye in the room. He knew how to exercise the power of music in ways that are nearly impossible to describe. But if you were there when he was playing and singing, you never forgot the experience.
Whenever I first heard it and however the hymn made it into the hymnal of our church, it has become, over the years, a powerful expression of faith for Christians of many different races and ethnic backgrounds. The song is challenging with changes in meter, key and style. In Rapid City we had musicians who were up to the task and we sang the hymn in worship on several occasions.
Last night when the Dallas Cowboys met the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in this year’s National Football League opening game football fans around the world heard the Florida A&M University choir sing Lift Every Voice and Sing. It is going to be a part of opening ceremonies at NFL games throughout the season. The hymn, revered in African-American churches is being exposed to a much wider, much broader audience.
Lift every voice and sing
Till earth and heaven ring
Ring with the harmonies of Liberty
Let our rejoicing rise
High as the listening skies
Let it resound loud as the rolling sea
The bridge, accompanying the first two verses, includes a marching pace with a string of low notes and contains a half step modulation. It takes a person trained in music, or someone who grew up singing the song over and over again to get it right.
Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us
Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us
Facing the rising sun of our new day begun
Let us march on till victory is won
The hymn began as a poem written by James Weldon Johnson. It was set to music by Johnson’s brother, J. Rosamond Johnson. The lyrics were written for an event honoring President Abraham Lincoln. The middle two verses and bridge reflect the history of African American salves brought to this continent and the struggles for freedom, liberty and equality. They make firm reference to the sacrifices made and the pain of our history.
Stony the road we trod
Bitter the chastening rod
Felt in the days when hope unborn had died
Yet with a steady beat
Have not our weary feet
Come to the place for which our fathers sighed?
We have come over a way that with tears has been watered
We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered
Out from the gloomy past
Till now we stand at last
Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast
God of our weary years
God of our silent tears
Thou who has brought us thus far on the way
Thou who has by Thy might Led us into the light
Keep us forever in the path, we pray
Lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met Thee
The hymn ends with a deeply religious and a deeply patriotic verse pledging complete dedication to God and country.
Lest, our hearts drunk with the wine of the world, we forget Thee
Shadowed beneath Thy hand
May we forever stand
True to our God
True to our native land
Our native land
Our national anthem, The Star Spangled Banner, is often considered to be not only an anthem, but also a hymn. It appears in many contemporary hymnals and is sung on special occasions, including patriotic holidays, in churches. The battle-themed anthem, a product of the War of 1812, features words written by Francis Scott Key and set to music by John Stafford Smith. The original title of the poem, “Defence of Fort M’Henry,” was written on September 14, 1814 after Key had witnessed the bombardment of British Naval Forces upon Baltimore Harbor.
At Fort Meade, in the Black Hills of South Dakota, there is a plaque that claims that the movement to make The Star Spangled Banner our national anthem began on the parade grounds of that Fort back in 1892. Whatever the actual history, it wasn’t until 1931 that President Hoover signed the bill making the song our national anthem. The tradition of singing the anthem at sports events didn’t start until World War II, when it was adopted as part of the opening ceremonies of baseball games. As that tradition nears 80 years, it is now being joined, for this year’s NFL games at least by the hymn that has been dubbed by some as the African American National Anthem.
This season the hymn will reach the ears of many who have never heard it. May it inspire us all to continue the journey towards a more perfect union as we lift our voices together and sing.
