Dos Vatos Palabras

By Ron Wynn

Nashville City Paper 

The spirituals are among the earliest music forms developed in this nation, and a genre that’s been an inspirational source for millions of people around the world.

    Yet there’s also less attention being paid to this great art form, something that filmmaker and producer Eren McGinnis and others such as Dr. Everett McCorvey and Dr. Hope Koehler want to correct. McGinnis’ new documentary work The Spirituals, which debuts tonight at 9:30 on NPT, Channel 8, includes riveting performances by the American Spiritual Ensemble, which was founded and is now directed by Dr. McCorvey.

    Its stars include Dr. Koehler, a Lipscomb graduate and former resident of Nashville who is particularly excited about the documentary.

    “In many ways you can trace the history of almost every popular musical style to the spirituals,” Koehler said. “There’s the blues and jazz, which both have a direct link, and of course rock ‘n’ roll and R&B in large part are also very closely related. But unfortunately what’s happened in recent years has been there’s so much emphasis on and exposure for gospel that we’ve lost sight in some ways of just how revolutionary and important the spirituals have been in our history. Here’s a music developed by people who were wrenched from their homeland and prevented from using their own language or celebrating their native culture. Yet they were able to create something great by learning another language and also using it as both a way to make inspiring, reverent music and also create a code to enable others to escape. It’s an incredible story, and I hope that this documentary makes more people aware of it.”

    The Spirituals blends great footage of the American Spiritual Ensemble and historic performances from others with interview segments featuring musicologists at such black colleges and universities as Morehouse and Fisk (there were plenty of scenes and sequences shot locally that are included in the film). There are also excellent performances from choirs in such places as Gastonia, N.C. as well as moments from a stirring American Spiritual Ensemble concert in Spain.

    Dr. Koehler, now on the faculty at the University of Wisconsin-Superior and a longtime member of the Ensemble as well as a close friend of Dr. McCorvey, adds that while she’s a great admirer of the Fisk Jubilee Singers, she never saw them perform while a student in Nashville.

    “The Fisk Jubilee Singers deserve enormous credit for helping popularize the spiritual around the world,” Koehler said. “Somehow I never got a chance to hear them when I was a student, but I certainly know their music through recordings and they are a strong influence as well as a very important part of what’s made the spirituals so important in our heritage and history.” 

DVD copies of The Spirituals are also available online at www.dosvatos.com

By Karen W. Hubbard

Associate Professor Dance and Theatre Department

UNC Charlotte 

The Spirituals is an engaging audio-visual journey into the form and function of Negro spirituals. Comprised of historical reenactments, news file footage and personal reflection; the program unfolds seamlessly like a multi-textured quilt embroidered with rich, heartfelt vocals sung by the American Spiritual Ensemble. Noteworthy, are references to the secret meaning of Negro spirituals; the role played by Fisk Jubilee Singers, Hampton Singers and Tuskegee Singers in garnering public recognition of what is referred to as “music of the cotton fields”; and commentary on how black spirituals influenced renowned European composers.  When the landscape shifts away from the southern plantation a clear distinction is made between spirituals and gospel music; “We Shall Overcome” based on a Negro spiritual is acknowledged as the modern day Civil Rights Movement anthem.

As The Spirituals comes to an end and the credits are rolling; baritone/ASE Rehearsal Director Ricky Little walks (some times projected in slow motion) through fields, along country roads, across a bridge and on city streets as his voice is heard singing “I Want Jesus To Walk With Me.” Perhaps Little’s trek is a metaphor for the path traveled by Evertt McCovey whose inspiration it was to found the American Spiritual Ensemble in 1995.

The Spirituals is formatted into a twenty-six minutes program. This makes it perfect for use in the traditional classroom; there is time for discussion both before and after viewing the documentary. For dance creative process courses The Spirituals offers valuable possibilities for the exploration, invention and composition of movement. As well, documentary visuals and narrative provide deeper understanding of the cultural context in which the form evolved.When the documentary ends; it doesn’t let go and viewers will be delighted to discover additional material set in three parts: Additional Scenes, Photo Gallery and American Spiritual Ensemble Background.

As in the documentary, the sound of Negro spirituals sung by ASE is ever present.The Spirituals is a testament to McCovey’s vision to preserve Negro spirituals. Individuals newly introduced to Negro spirituals will find the program feels like a “new best friend”. Those who are already familiar with the subject will welcome The Spirituals like an old and dear family relation.

TO ORDER A DVD OF THE SPIRITUALS PLEASE VISIT:

www.dosvatos.com

by Dr. Audley C. Chambers

PhD Chairperson, Music Department

Associate Professor of Music History and Literature

Oakwood College

    The Spirituals—documentary, featuring the truly musically passionate group, The American Spiritual Ensemble, takes one on a 26-minute musical journey in time through plantation scenes shot in various locations of the old south depicting life from the colonial and antebellum period. The connection of the spirituals to the activities of the civil rights and the ensemble’s presentation of spirituals in churches and opera houses of the present day reveals the continuation and reception of this musical heritage.  Through the Spiritual Ensemble’s dynamic musical presentation of various types of spirituals, through their informal interviews with various members of the ensemble who personally informs the viewer about his or her ancestry’s relationship to this American art form, and through historical narrative grounded in scholarship and lithographs taken from historical archives, they develop and trace the significance of what the spirituals are truly about—messages of hope, encouragement, conviction during hard times, and aspirations of a better life to come. An additional benefit to The Spirituals—documentary is the bonus material separated from the main menu, which is divided into three programs: 1) Additional Scenes 2) Photo Gallery and 3) Information about The American Spiritual Ensemble.

Program one (Additional Scenes) lasting 20 minutes features the distinguished composer, conductor, and pianist, Roland Carter who is most especially noted as an authority on the performance and preservation of African American music. Along with Carter’s insight into the role and function of the spirituals, additional behind-the-scene footage of the ensemble during their tour of the American South and various cities in Spain develop a rare view of the impact of the spirituals on people’s lives near and far away from the shores of the United States. Rare pictures of the inside of the 16th Street Baptist church shown along with the singing of the spiritual “Give Me Jesus” sung by one of the ensemble members gives one a sense of the spirituals’ poignancy and reception then and now.

Program two (Photo Gallery) lasting just over five minutes presents a photo gallery of many members of the ensemble in various musical locale in and outside of the United States of America against the singing of an old spiritual “Guide my feet while I run this race.”

Program three (About the American Spiritual Ensemble) presents information on the founder of the American Spiritual Ensemble—Dr. Everett McCorvey—its members including the diva Angela Brown, and how they can be reached.

Although this documentary on the spirituals presents a comprehensive overview about their significance and the impact that this American Art form has on a culture past and present, the various spiritual renditions presented by this diverse group of professional “opera singers” is worthy of being in one’s collection. In addition to the DVD, its companion CD of the same name features 15 classic renditions, including some which are not on the DVD. This musical presentation through oral history, documents and sound will certainly be a documentary that can be used for discussions in any classroom setting dealing with the subject of spirituals and their impact on generations past and present.

TO ORDER A DVD OF THE SPIRITUALS PLEASE VISIT:  www.dosvatos.com

By Altha J. Cravey, Associate Professor

Geography Department UNC at Chapel Hill

This film will make you laugh and cry and empathize with Mexican migrants whose lives are caught up in the winds of globalization. Your students will identify with the hopes and dreams and fears of the families’ younger brother Marcelo as his story unfolds. They will want to know why Marcelo’s parents cannot make a good living in Mexico and why Marcelo feels compelled to risk life and limb in his “illegal” journey to Kentucky. The intimate family portrait highlights love, despair, loneliness, and resilience. In the classroom, the video can be linked to a discussion of migration, globalization, labor and immigration policy, transnational connections, or such topics as NAFTA, CAFTA, the Bracero Program, and Latinos. The human story of four brothers in the video will breath life into these abstract topics and will provoke your students to pursue a deeper understanding of Mexican immigration to the US. Class discussion can feature one or more topics and, depending on the nature of the course, you can adapt classroom activities, assignments, or individualized research.

The video will be useful and provocative for courses about globalization, migration, Latin America, or Latinos. It would also be effective in introductory courses on Human Geography, American Studies, or International Studies. The PBS website for the video has a wealth of resources that may be helpful in designing specific classroom activities.

TO ORDER A DVD OF BEYOND THE BORDER PLEASE VISIT:

www.dosvatos.com

by Dr. Joseph Nevins

Associate Professor of Geography

Vassar College 

Beyond the Border is a powerful and instructive look at the impact migration has had on one family that straddles the territorial boundary that unites and divides Mexico and the United States. In focusing on one of four brothers who have migrated from their home town in Michoacan, Mexico to rural Kentucky and telling the story of the larger family, the film offers a complex portrait of the human ties that bind seemingly distant locations across the U.S.-Mexico divide.

Both inspiring and sobering, this documentary poignantly illustrates how migration simultaneously maintains and tears apart a family, while demonstrating the rootedness of Mexican migrants in the U.S. socio-economic fabric. I strongly recommend this highly unique documentary for classroom use, and for high school and university library collections.

-Dr. Nevins is the author of Operation Gatekeeper: The Rise of the “Illegal Alien” and the Making of the U.S.-Mexico Boundary (Routledge 2002),and Dying To Live: A Story of U.S. Immigration in an Age of Global Apartheid (forthcoming in 2008 from City Lights Book). 

TO ORDER A DVD OF BEYOND THE BORDER PLEASE VISIT:

www.dosvatos.com