We Shall Overcome

"We Shall Overcome" is a protest song that became a key anthem of the US civil rights movement. The lyrics of the song are derived from a gospel song by Reverend Charles Tindley. Pete Seeger took the song into the folk tradition and this led to the popularization of the song. Since its rise to prominence, the song, and songs based upon it, have since been used in a variety of protests worldwide.

Origins

The phrase is derived from the lyrics to a 1901 hymn or gospel musical composition by Rev. Charles Tindley of Philadelphia. Tindley was a African Methodist Episcopal Church minister who composed many hymns and lyrics, some 50 of which are known to have survived. The lyrics to "We Shall Overcome" were combined with Tindley's original melody at a later date. The new lyrics contained the repeated line "I'll overcome someday," but more likely a later gospel song containing the line "Deep in my heart, I do believe / I'll overcome someday." However, there are also earlier acknowledgments of the song, with Pete Seeger, one of the first artists to record it, noting that various versions can be traced to integrated meetings of black and white coal miners in the early 1900s and to black churches in the 1800s.^[1]

According to James J. Fuld, Charles Albert Tindley wrote words that are similar to the song we now know, but his tune was different.^[2] Sometime between 1900 and 1946, someone married Tindley's words to a 1794 hymn called "O Sanctissima." Atron Twigg is possibly responsible for the change.^[3]

Role of Highlander Folk School

In the fall of 1945 in Charleston, South Carolina, members of the Food and Tobacco Workers Union (who were mostly female and African American), began a 5-month strike against the American Tobacco Company . To keep up their spirits during the cold, wet winter of 1945-46, one of the strikers, a woman named Lucille Simmons, sang a slow "long meter style" version of the gospel hymn, "We'll Overcome" (I'll Be All Right") to end each day's picketing. Union organizer, Zilphia Horton, who was the wife of the co-founder of the Highlander Folk School (later Highlander Research and Education Center), learned it from Simmons. Horton was (1935-56) the music director at Highlander, and it became her custom to end group meetings each evening at Highlander by leading the song. During the Presidential Campaign of Henry A. Wallace, "We Shall Overcome" was printed in Bulletin No. 3 (Sept., 1948), 8, of People's Songs with an introduction by Horton saying that she had learned it from the CIO Food and Tobacco Workers' Union. Pete Seeger, a founding member, and for three years Director of People's Songs, learned it from Horton's version in 1947.^[4] In 1950, the CIO's Department of Education and Research released the album, Eight New Songs for Labor, sung by Joe Glazer ("Labor's Troubador"), and the Elm City four (songs on the the album were: "I Ain't No Stranger Now," "Too Old to Work," "That's All," "Humblin' Back," "Shine on Me," "Great Day," "The Mill Was Made of Marble," and "We Will Overcome").

Pete Seeger (or someone else, possibly Waldemar Hille, Editor of Music of the People's Songs Bulletin, Seeger himself isn't sure and writes that it may have been Highlander's director of Adult Literacy programs, Septima Clark), changed "We Will Overcome" to "We Shall Overcome." Pete added some verses ("We'll walk hand in hand", "The whole wide world around"). Frank Hamilton, a folk singer from California who was a member of People's Songs and the Weavers, learned it from Pete's singing. His friend, fellow-Californian Guy Carawan, learned it from Hamilton's. When he succeeded Horton as music director in 1959, Carawan reintroduced the song at Highlander. It was the young student-activists at Highlander, many of them teenagers, who gave the song the words and rhythms we know it by today, when they sang it to keep their spirits up in the early Civil Rights moment during the frightening police raids on Highlander and their stays in jail in the early Civil Rights Movement. Because of this, Carawan was reluctant to claim credit for the song's widespread popularity. In the PBS video We Shall Overcome, Julian Bond credits Carawan with teaching and singing the song at the founding meeting of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in Raleigh, N.C., in 1960. From there, it spread orally and became an anthem of Southern African American labor union and civil rights activism.^[5] Seeger has, on occasion, in concert, also publicly credited Carawan with the primary role in teaching and popularizing the song within the Civil Rights Movement.

Widespread adaptation

From 1963, the song was often associated with Joan Baez, who recorded it and performed it at a number of Civil Rights marches and years later at the 1969 Woodstock Festival.^{[citation needed]} On March 15, 1965, President Lyndon Johnson used the phrase "We shall overcome" in a speech before Congress.^[6] Only a few days before, "Bloody Sunday" had occurred on the Selma to Montgomery marches. The melody alone is used in William Rowland's Symphony #4 in which it is quoted with due credit to Tinsley and a set of variations and arrangements are developed from it for the fourth movement of this work. This is in the great tradition of composers of symphonic works using such works in their works such as Charles Ives (America Gem of the Ocean, Swing Low Sweet Chariot) and various hymns), Shostakovitch, who quotes a number of well known works in his Symphony #15, Tchaikovsky who uses the Russian Hymn and French National Anthem in his 1812 Overture, Beethoven--who quotes God Save the King in some of his works, Dvorak--who quotes in full "Going Home" et al.

The Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association used the phrase during marches and named the organizations' retrospective autobiography We Shall Overcome - The History of the Struggle for Civil Rights in Northern Ireland 1968-1978.^[7]^[8] The film Bloody Sunday depicts march leader MP Ivan Cooper and his marches singing the song shortly before the Bloody Sunday shootings.

Farmworkers in the United States sang the song in Spanish during strikes and grape boycotts of the late 1960s.^{[citation needed]}

Bruce Springsteen re-interpreted the song, which has been included on Where Have All the Flowers Gone: A Tribute to Pete Seeger, and his 2006 album We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions.

In 1999, National Public Radio included this song in the "NPR 100," in which NPR's music editors sought to compile the one hundred most important American musical works of the 20th century.^[9]

The song found its way to South Africa in the later years of the anti-apartheid movement.^[10] The song was notably sung by the U.S. Senator for New York Robert F. Kennedy, who led anti-apartheid crowds in choruses from the rooftop of his car while touring the country in 1966.^[11]

It was also the song Abie Nathan chose to play as the Voice of Peace on October 1, 1993.^{[citation needed]}

"In Prague in 1989, during the intense weeks of the Velvet Revolution, hundreds of thousands of people sang this haunting music in unison in Wenceslas Square, both in English and in Czech. With special emphasis on that glorious phrase 'I do believe.' This song’s message of hope and faith in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds gave these protesters the strength to carry on until the evil powers-that-be finally gave up hope themselves. Ironically, the song had been introduced and popularized here thanks to the globetrotting efforts of Pete Seeger, who had been a card-carrying member of the Communist Party of the USA from 1942-1950. In the Prague of 1964, Seeger was stunned to find himself being whistled and booed by crowds of bold Czechs when he spoke out against the Vietnam War. But those same crowds loved, learned, and never forgot his rendition of 'We Shall Overcome.' History is full of such rich ironies … if only you are willing to see them."(Mark Allen, Prague Symphony, 2008)^{[citation needed]}

In India, its literal translation in Hindi "Hum Honge Kaamyab / Ek Din" became a patriotic/spiritual song during the 1980s, particularly in schools, and the song's popularity has continued.

In Bengali-speaking India and in Bangladesh there are two versions, both popular among school-children and political activists. "Amra Karbo Joy" (a literal translation) was translated by the Bengali folk singer Hemanga Biswas and re-recorded by Bhupen Hazarika. Another version, translated by Shibdas Bandyopadhyay, "Ek Din Surjyer Bhor" (literally translated as "One Day The Sun Will Rise") was recorded by the Calcutta Youth Choir arranged by Ruma Guha Thakurta during the 1971 Bangladesh War of Independence and became one of the largest selling Bengali records. It was a favourite of Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and regularly sung at public events after Bangladesh gained independence. ^{[citation needed]}

In the Indian State of Kerala, the traditional Communist stronghold, the song became popular in college campuses in late 1970s. It was the struggle song of the Students Federation of India SFI, the largest student organisation in the country. The song translated to the regional language Malayalam by N. P. Chandrasekharan, an activist of SFI, in 1980. The translation followed the same tune of the original song. Later it was also published in Student, the monthly of SFI in Malayalam.^{[citation needed]}

Copyright and royalties

Under US Copyright Law, the music of "We Shall Overcome" is the intellectual property of Rev. Charles Tinsley and any family members of successive generations or the African Methodist Episcopal Church if Tinsley so assigned it. As the work was composed in 1901, it is now in the public domain. However, Seeger's arrangement and words belong to him et al. Current (2008) US Copyright Law provides 100 years for musical works before they become public domain. Copyright on the song as arranged by Seeger is held by Pete Seeger, Guy Carawan, and Frank Hamilton, who share the artists' half of the rights, and TRO (The Richmond Organization, which includes Ludlow Music, Essex, Folkways Music, and Hollis Music), which holds the publishers rights. Pete Seeger explained that he took out a defensive copyright on advice of his publisher, TRO, to prevent someone else from doing so and "At that time we didn't know Lucille Simmons' name."^[12] All royalties go to the "We Shall Overcome" Fund, administered by Highlander and used to give small grants for cultural expression involving African Americans organizing in the U.S. South.^[13]

Notes

^ We Shall Overcome, Bruce Springsteen's official website.
^ The Book of World-Famous Music: Classical, Popular, and Folk (1966; Dover, 1995).
^ Tindley
^ Dunaway, 1990, 222-223; Seeger, 1993, 32; see also, Robbie Lieberman, My Song is My Weapon: People's Songs, American Communism, and the Politics of Culture, 1930-50 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, [1989] 1995) p.46, p. 185
^ Dunaway, 1990, 222-223; Seeger, 1993, 32.
^ Lyndon Johnson, speech of March 15, 1965, accessed March 28, 2007 on HistoryPlace.com
^ CAIN: Civil Rights Association by Bob Purdie
^ CAIN: Events: Civil Rights - "We Shall Overcome" published by the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA; 1978)
^ The NPR 100 The most important American musical works of the 20th century
^ Dunaway, 1990, 243.
^ Thomas, Evan. Robert Kennedy : His Life. New York: Simon & Schuster. p. 322. ISBN 0-7432-0329-1.
^ Seeger, 1993, p. 33
^ Highlander Reports, 2004, p. 3.

External links

Authorized Profile of Guy Carawan with history of the song, "We Shall Overcome"
Freedom in the Air: Albany Georgia. 1961-62. SNCC #101. Recorded by Guy Carawan, produced for the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee by Guy Carawan and Alan Lomax. “Freedom In the Air . . . is a record of the 1961 protest in Albany, Georgia, when, two weeks before Christmas, 737 people brought the town nearly to a halt to force its integration. The record’s never been reissued and that’s a shame, as it’s a moving document of a community through its protest songs, church services, and experiences in the thick of the civil rights struggle.”—Nathan Salsburg, host, Root Hog or Die, East Village Radio, January 2007.
Susanne´s Folksong-Notizen, excerpts from various articles, liner notes, etc. about "We Shall Overcome".
Musical Transcription of "We Shall Overcome," based on a recording of Pete Seeger's version, sung with the SNCC Freedom Singers on the 1963 live Carnegie Hall recording, and the 1988 version by Pete Seeger sung at a reunion concert with Pete and the Freedom Singers on the anthology, Sing for Freedom, recorded in the field 1960-88 and edited and annotated by Guy and Candie Carawan, released in 1990 as Smithsonian-Folkways CD SF 40032.
NPR news article including full streaming versions of Pete Seeger's classic Carnegie hall live recording and Bruce Springsteen's tribute version.
"Something about that song haunts you" essay on the history of "We Shall Overcome," Complicated Fun, June 9, 200
"Howie Richmond Views Craft Of Song: Publishing Giant Celebrates 50 Years As TRO Founder", by Irv Lichtman, Billboard, 8, 28, 1999. Excerpt: "Key folk songs in the [TRO] catalog, as arranged by a number of folklorists, are 'We Shall Overcome,' 'Kisses Sweeter Than Wine' 'On Top Of Old Smokey,' 'So Long, It's Been Good To Know You,' 'Goodnight Irene,' 'If I Had A Hammer,' 'Tom Dooley,' and 'Rock Island Line.'"

References

Dunaway, David, How Can I Keep from Singing: Pete Seeger, (orig. pub. 1981, reissued 1990). Da Capo, New York, ISBN 0-306-80399-2.
Seeger, Pete and Blood, Peter (Ed.), Where Have All the Flowers Gone?: A Singer's Stories, Songs, Seeds, Robberies (1993). Independent Publications Group, Sing Out Publications, ISBN 1-881322-01-7
___, "The We Shall Overcome Fund". Highlander Reports, newsletter of the Highlander Research and Education Center, August-November 2004, p.3.
We Shall Overcome, PBS Home Video 174, 1990, 58 minutes.