Spirituals
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Spirituals is a genre of Christian music that is associated with African Americans, which merged varied African cultural influences with the experiences of being held in bondage in slavery, at first d
Engraving of Douglass from his 1845 narrative
Portrait of James Weldon Johnson in 1932
Fisk Jubilee Singers, 1875
Photograph of Harry T. Burleigh, 1936
Wade in the Water
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"Wade in the Water" is an African-American spiritual, the lyrics of which were first co-published in 1901 in New Jubilee Songs as Sung by the Fisk Jubilee Singers by Frederick J. Work and his brother,
Spirituals
…Newshour, segment entitled "Singing in Slavery: Songs of Survival, Songs of Freedom" said that, while it is "has not been proven, it is believed"—that "Wade in the Water" was one of the songs associated with the Underground Railroad—a network of secret routes and safe houses used by slaves in the United States to find…
River baptism in North Carolina c. 1910
Harriet Tubman c. 1870. Photo by H. B. Lindsley.
Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (2011)