Historic Bibliographies and Reference Aids

A Brief List of Material on the Negro Spiritual

Compiled by: Archive of Folk Culture staff
Publication Date: July 19, 1972

Allen, William Frances, Charles Pickard Ware, and Lucy McKim Garrison.
Slave Songs of the United States. Revised edition, New York: Oak Publications, 1965. Reprint of 1867 edition, New York: Peter Smith, 1951.

Ballanta(-Taylor), Nicholas George Julius.
Saint Helena Island Spirituals. New York: G. Schirmer, Inc., 1925.

Barton, William E.
Old Plantation Hymns: A Collection of Hitherto Unpublished Melodies of the Slave and Freedman, with Historical and Descriptive Notes. Boston: Lamson, Wolffe and Co., 1899.

Boatner, Edward and Willa A. Townsend.
Spirituals Triumphant Old and New. Nashville: National Baptist Convention, 1927.

Chambers, Henry Alban.
The Treasury of Negro Spirituals. New York: Emerson Books, Inc., 1963.

Courlander, Harold.
Negro Folk Music, U.S.A. New York: Columbia University Press, 1963. Pp. 35-79, "Anthems and Spirituals as Oral Literature."

Dixon, Christa.
Wesen and Wandel Geistlicher Volkslieder: Negro Spirituals. Wuppertal: Jugenddienst-Verlag, 1967.

Epstein, Dena J.
"Slave Music in the United States Before 1860: A Survey of Sources." Music Library Association Notes, volume 20, number 2, Spring 1963, pp. 195-212; volume 20, number 3, Summer 1963, pp. 377-390.

Fenner, Thomas P., Frederic G. Rathburn, and Bessie Cleaveland.
Cabin and Plantation Songs as Sung by the Hampton Students. New York: B. P. Putnam's Sons, 1901.

Fisher, Miles Mark.
Negro Slave Songs in the United States. Reprint editions, New York: Russell and Russell, 1968.

Gordon, Robert Winslow.
"The Negro Spiritual." The Carolina Low-Country, by the Society for the Preservation of Spirituals, New York: Macmillan Co., 1931, pp. 191-222.

Grissom, Mary Allen.
The Negro Songs of a New Heaven. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1930.

Hagen, Rochus, A. M.
"Abriss der Geschichte der Spiritualforschung." Jahrbuch für Musikalische Voks- und Völkerkunde, volume 4, 1968, pp. 59-97.

Handy, William C.
W. C. Handy's Collection of Negro Spirituals. Two volumes, New York: Handy Brothers Music Co., 1938.

Hays, Roland.
My Songs: Aframerican Folk Songs. Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1948.

Jackson, Bruce.
"The Glory of the Lord." In Our Living Traditions: An Introduction to American Folklore, edited by Tristam Potter Coffin, New York: Basic Books, 1968, pp. 108-119.

Jackson, George Pullen.
White and Negro Spirituals. New York: J. J. Augustin, 1944.

Johnson, Guy B.
"The Negro Spiritual: A Problem in Anthropology." American Anthropologist, volume 33, number 2, April-June 1931, pp. 157-171.

Johnson, James Welson and J. Rosamond.
The Books of American Negro Spirituals: Including the Book of American Negro Spirituals and the Second Book of Negro Spirituals. New York: The Viking Press, 1940. Reprinted, 1969.

Katz, Bernard, ed.
Social Implications of Early American Negro Music. New York: Arno Press & The New York Times, 1969. Includes reprinting of John Lovell, Jr., article listed above.

Kennedy, R. Emmet.
Mellows: A Chronicle of Unknown Singers. New York: Albert and Charles Boni, 1925.

More Mellows. New York: Dodd, Mead and Co., 1931.

Krehbiel, Henry Edward.
Afro-American Folksongs: A Study in Racial and National Music. Reprint Edition, New York: Frederick Ungar, 1962.

Lehmann, Theo.
Negro Spirituals: Geschichte und Theologie. Berlin: Echart-Verlag, 1965.

Locke, Alain.
The New Negro: an Interpretation. Reprint edition, with a new introduction by Allan H. Spear, New York and London: Johnson Reprint Corp., 1968. Pp 199-213, "The Negro Spirituals."

[no author]
Look Away: 56 Negro Folk Songs. Delaware, Ohio: Cooperative Recreation Service,
1960.

Lovell, John, Jr.
"The Social Implications of the Negro Spiritual," Journal of Negro Education, volume 8, number 4, October 1939, pp. 634-643.

"Reflections on the Origins of the Negro Spiritual." Negro American History Forum. (Indiana State University, Terre Haute), volume 3, number 3, Fall 1969, pp. 91-97.

Black Song: The Forge and the Flame: The Story of How the Afro-American Spiritual Was Hammered Out. New York: Macmillan; London: Collier-Macmillan, 1972.

Marsh, J. B. T.
The Story of the Jubilee Singers: Including their Songs. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1903.

McIlhenny, E. A.
Befo' de War Spirituals. Boston: Christopher Publishing House, 1933.

Odum, Howard W. and Guy B. Johnson.
The Negro and his Songs: A Study of Topical Negro Songs in the South. Reprint edition, foreword by Roger D. Abrahams, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, Inc., 1964.

Parrish, Lydia.
Slave Songs of the Georgia Sea Islands. Reprint edition, foreword by Bruce Jackson, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, Inc., 1965.

Scarborough, Dorothy.
On the Trail of Negro Folk-Songs. Reprint edition, foreword by Roger D. Abrahams, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, Inc., 1963.

White, Newman Ivey.
American Negro Folk-Songs. Reprint edition, foreword by Bruce Jackson, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, Inc., 1965.

Wilgus, D. K.
Anglo-American Folksongs Scholarship Since 1898. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1959. Pp. 345-364; "The Negro-White Spiritual."