Glory, Glory, Hallelujah!: A Song History
"Glory, Glory" is an African American spiritual about the relief of having laid one's burdens down, and Hymnary.org credits its words to the spiritual tradition and its tune to the spirituals, with no named author.[1] The Traditional Ballad Index files it as "Since I Laid My Burden Down," lists "Glory, Glory Halleluiah" among its alternate titles, shows several old records issued as "When I Lay My Burden Down," and gives its earliest date as a 1928 recording.[2] The same index cross-references it to "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" for its tune.[2]
Hendrick Hondius I, A River Landscape with the Baptism of the Eunuch, pen and brown ink, brown and blue wash, ca. 1605–25. A biblical riverside baptism, shown for its subject; it has no connection to the song.
That 1928 recording was made in Chicago on December 4 by Elders McIntorsh and Edwards with Sisters Johnson and Taylor, and OKeh issued it as record 8698.[3] Harry Smith later included it in his 1952 Anthology of American Folk Music, and the Smithsonian Folkways reissue notes identify the two men as Church of God in Christ elders who spent part of the mid-to-late 1920s around Memphis.[4] The index also lists recordings by Rev. Clayborn and Roosevelt Graves (both recorded in 1929), the Bessemer Sunset Four (1930), and Roy Acuff (1940), along with a 1942 recording of Turner Junior Johnson.[2] Mississippi John Hurt sang it as "Since I've Laid This Burden Down" at an April 1965 concert at Oberlin College, later issued on The Best of Mississippi John Hurt.[5] The Bahamian guitarist Joseph Spence recorded his own fingerpicked treatment of the spiritual,[6] which appears on The Complete Folkways Recordings 1958, a collection that grew from Sam Charters's first sessions with him on Andros Island in July 1958.[7]
Hymnary.org indexes the spiritual in fifteen hymnals, the earliest being Songs of Zion (1981), with others including Lift Every Voice and Sing II (1993) and the African American Heritage Hymnal (2001).[1] Maureen Sellers includes it, under the title "Glory, Glory, Hallelujah!", in Simply Gospel, Book Three, a collection of spirituals, hymns, and old-time gospel songs in DAD tuning for novice to intermediate mountain dulcimer players, published by Fingers Of Steel.[8]
Sources
- Hymnary.org: "Glory, Glory Hallelujah".
- The Traditional Ballad Index: "Since I Laid My Burden Down".
- Discography of American Historical Recordings: "OKeh matrix W402160. Since I laid my burden down / Elders McIntorsh and Edwards ; Sisters Johnson and Taylor".
- Smithsonian Folkways: "Anthology of American Folk Music" (liner notes).
- Smithsonian Institution: "The Best of Mississippi John Hurt [sound recording]".
- Smithsonian Folkways: "(Glory, Glory) When I Lay My Burden Down" (Joseph Spence).
- Smithsonian Folkways: "Joseph Spence, The Complete Folkways Recordings 1958".
- Fingers Of Steel: "Maureen Sellers, Simply Gospel, Book Three".
- Image: Hendrick Hondius I, A River Landscape with the Baptism of the Eunuch, pen and brown ink, brown and blue wash, ca. 1605–25. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.