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Gospel Truths

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It has been said that America's greatest contribution to music is jazz. However, that means leaving out another distinctly indigenous form of music: gospel songs and spirituals...and hymns rooted in the Bible Belt. In American opera, these are usually not interpolations of genuine songs but invented by the composer, who uses them not only to express characters' emotional state or religious beliefs, but to stamp a strong imprint of place and time and social position within the story. In many cases, such songs are a means to express the solidity of a specific community, be they a majority, as in the Southern Baptists of Floyd's Susannah, or a minority, such as the black field workers in Blitzstein's Regina. Interestingly, in most of such instances we see very little of local government in any political or militaristic sense: when a figure of authority appears in the cast, he is a preacher.

An exception to that - and containing some of the best examples of pastiche spirituals to be had in all of opera -- is Gershwin's 1935 Porgy and Bess. A complete score of the opera, which alas is often presented with cuts that eliminate some of this very music, presents six soloists (two sopranos, an alto, a tenor, and two basses) in something of a mini-song cycle of spirituals that open Act II while nearly the entire cast huddles in Serena's room as a huge storm blows up outside. The people are singing to drown out the sound of the storm as well as to give themselves comfort and courage in the face of it. The prayers begin with "Oh, Doctor Jesus, look down on me wit' pity. Put Yo' lovin' arms thru de roof of dis house"...moves along to "Oh, Lawd above, we knows You can destroy, but we also knows You can raise, an' we's beseechin' You to raise Yo' fallen chillen"..."Oh, Hev'nly Father, hab mercy on we"..."Professor Jesus, teach Yo' ignorant chillen how to combat de fires an' torments"...the especially poignant "Oh, Captain Jesus, find it in Yo' heart to save us, I's given You six chillen to add to Yo' legions"...and finally, "Oh, Father, what die on Calbery, we's dependin' on You."

But let us not forget that earlier, in Scene 2 of Act I, in that same room, the murdered Robbins had been laid out, a saucer on his chest to collect burial money from his mourners, who sing, "He's a-gone, gone, gone, gone, gone, gone, gone," a refrain that develops into a gospel song, "Overflow, overflow, oh fill up de saucer till it overflow" in which Porgy himself takes a strong solo turn. The mood of the scene is broken briefly by two white "authority" figures -- a detective and a policeman -- who are clearly corrupt as well as condescending (a clever touch in the recent NYCO production, is that one of them blatantly pockets some of the money from saucer...). A reprise of those "gones" when the men have exited launches Serena's wail-like, "My man's gone now," followed by Bess's far more upbeat "Oh, the train is at the station...an' it's headin' for the Promise' Lan'." In creating such a rich panorama of sentiment and melodies, Gershwin understood that there are many different moods and styles of gospel songs and spirituals, while demonstrating in a cohesive fashion his characters' powerful and yet intimate confidence in Jesus and the Lord.

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