{"id":2307,"date":"2017-10-24T01:39:38","date_gmt":"2017-10-24T06:39:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/?p=2307"},"modified":"2017-10-24T01:41:31","modified_gmt":"2017-10-24T06:41:31","slug":"william-arms-fishers-goin-home-somehow-a-negro-spiritual","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/2017\/10\/24\/william-arms-fishers-goin-home-somehow-a-negro-spiritual\/","title":{"rendered":"William Arms Fisher’s “Goin’ home”: somehow a “Negro spiritual”"},"content":{"rendered":"

This week while browsing the Sheet Music Consortium<\/em> my eye was caught by a particular title: \u201cGoin\u2019 home: Negro spiritual from the largo of the New World Symphony, op. 95.\u201d I was curious as to what this material could be \u2013 was the New World Symphony based on a spiritual?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

William Arms Fisher<\/p><\/div>\n

I was surprised to learn that this title was in fact invoking a song written to the music of the largo from Dvorak\u2019s famous American symphony. The lyrics to \u201cGoin\u2019 home\u201d were written and set to music by William Arms Fisher in 1922, after the premier of the \u201cNew World Symphony\u201d in 1893. Fisher was a student of Dvorak\u2019s at the National Conservatory, and later went on to become a music editor, historian, and songwriter. He wrote on the impact and importance of 18th<\/sup> and early 19th<\/sup> century American music, and also compiled anthologies of Irish songs and Negro spirituals. Fisher is however most well known for the setting of \u201cGoin\u2019 home\u201d at hand.<\/p>\n

In his forward to \u201cGoin\u2019 home,\u201d Fisher writes about his inspiration for writing lyrics to go with the second movement of the New World Symphony:<\/p>\n

\u201cThat the lyric opening theme of the Largo should spontaneously suggest the words \u201cGoin\u2019 home, Goin\u2019 home\u201d is natural enough, and that the lines that follow the melody should take the form of a negro spiritual accords with the genesis of the symphony.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

“Goin’ home” title page<\/p><\/div>\n

In this statement by Fisher, as in the symphony as a whole, we see a blending of genres, a crossing of Dvorak\u2019s European symphonic traditions with pastoral and folk-y American inspiration. Fisher believed that the homesick, almost tragic qualities of the English horn melody in the largo movement embodied Negro spirituals, which thus called him to interweave the spiritual with the symphony. However, is \u201cGoin\u2019 home\u201d a Negro spiritual if Fisher wrote the lyrics and Dvorak wrote the music?<\/p>\n

This brings up the question of authorship for me, and the author\u2019s\/composer\u2019s intentions while writing the music. First of all, Fisher chose to write the lyrics in a dialect, which was a conscious decision on his part. It seems to me like an effort to be more authentic and true to the style in which he was writing, a style rooted in a tradition and experience he did not share. Fisher\u2019s outsider and dangerously essentialized perspective of black people is shown here in the introduction to his anthology entitled \u201cNegro spirituals.\u201d He writes that black people were:<\/p>\n

\u201cGiven an ingenuous native capacity for rhythmic musical expression, the gift of improvisation, a primitive but intense emotionalism, a condition of life that ranged from the most na\u00efve light-heartedness to tragic somberness, and an utter dependence for consolation upon faith in invisible realities, often tinged with lingering elements from a barbaric past, and you have that truly unique product \u2013 the Spiritual with its background of torch-lit groves, swaying bodies and half-closed eyes.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Sheet music to “Goin’ home”<\/p><\/div>\n

In this quote Fisher throws one stereotype after another at his reader, while attempting to recognizing the greatness of the genre. So since the spiritual is, as Fisher asserts, \u201ca truly unique product\u201d then why did Fisher not have any qualms about writing music for this genre? Lastly, as I watch videos and listen to recordings of \u201cGoin\u2019 home\u201d being performed, I am reminded of the commercial purposes that this setting of text to already established music serves. The vocal version of this piece increases its accessibility, and provides many more opportunities for performance and commercial consumption. Fisher builds on the success of Dvorak, in a time where it would\u2019ve been prudent to expand the boundaries of this symphonic work.<\/p>\n

Sources<\/span><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Beckerman, Michael. “The Real Value of Yellow Journalism: James Creelman and Anton\u00edn Dvor\u00e1k.” Musical Quarterly 77, no. 4 (1993): 749. http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/pdf\/742357.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3A44e9b3926e7a50b8f624e4eafb225c8b<\/a><\/li>\n
  2. Dvorak, Antonin and New W. Symphony. 95 Adelaide: Cawthornes Ltd, 1922. (retrieved October 23, 2017). http:\/\/nla.gov.au\/nla.obj-166692271\/view?partId=nla.obj-166692390#page\/n1\/mode\/1up<\/a><\/li>\n
  3. Karl Kroeger. “Fisher, William Arms.” Grove Music Online<\/em>. Oxford Music Online<\/em>. Oxford University Press, accessed October 24, 2017, http:\/\/www.oxfordmusiconline.com\/subscriber\/article\/grove\/music\/0974<\/a><\/li>\n
  4. “The Looking Glass.” The Crisis<\/em>, February 1927, 210-11.<\/li>\n
  5. “[Front Matter].” In Seventy Negro Spirituals, edited by William Arms Fisher, 1-42. Oropesa, Castilla-La Mancha: Oliver Ditson &, 1926. http:\/\/search.alexanderstreet.com\/view\/work\/bibliographic_entity%7Cdocument%7C3399955<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    This week while browsing the Sheet Music Consortium my eye was caught by a particular title: \u201cGoin\u2019 home: Negro spiritual from the largo of the New World Symphony, op. 95.\u201d I was curious as to what this material could be … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2567,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[381,886,28,382,885,887],"class_list":["post-2307","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dvorak","tag-goin-home","tag-negro-spirituals","tag-new-world-symphony","tag-sheet-music-consortium","tag-william-arms-fisher"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7jEhR-Bd","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2307","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2567"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2307"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2307\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2339,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2307\/revisions\/2339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}