Black Gospel Music Restoration Project

Black Gospel Music Restoration Project

So I went to an event last week about the preservation of Black Gospel/Spiritual music and it was really interesting!

Here's an over view:

Robert Darden, a professor at Baylor University, talked about his project in preserving black sacred music in a presentation last week in La Rose theatre. Darden started by saying that sticks and stones break bones, but words can also hurt, and black culture experienced both of those things.

Black spirituals have African roots. In Africa there was no difference between sacred and profane so African music encompassed both. With the increase of slavery, this music moved to north america with the slaves. Spirituals became The Iliad of the slaves. Spirituals teach how to cook, read, and even served as encoded maps.

Slaves were taught a perverted form of religion based on “slaves obey your masters” scriptures. However, the slaves still managed to flesh out real Christianity. Darden observes that the slaves’ form of Christianity came as close as we’ve ever been to the Early Christian teachings. Spirituals from these times bring us closest to the roots of christianity.

Going back to African roots, Many slaves believed in High John, a conqueror, from Africa who whispered encouragements to beaten and suffering slaves.

Spirituals eventually morphed into Labor Union songs which were for both black and white people. These songs were eventually adopted to the civil rights movement.

From an editorial to a life’s work: Darden started this restoration project as an editorial idea, but he quickly became invested and desperate for help. In the incipient stages, he learned to “only trust a library” since people had serious doubts about his work. He’d say to possible supporters, somewhat desperately, “help me save this music and i’ll pay for it.”

Theses Songs follow through slavery and civil rights until now. Spirituals transform nations and hearts, as has been proven by many different racial movements in America. During the Black Lives Matter movement, spirituals made a comeback, showing up at funerals, churches, marches, and more.

In the end, Darden has an incredible digital collection of Black Gospel Music. He aims to preserve the music and therefore culture.