The English used in this article or section may not be easy for everybody to understand. Within twenty years it was being sung over the South and in some other parts of the country." Recognition In the years that followed, "Lift Every Voice and Sing" was sung within Black communities Johnson wrote that "the school children of Jacksonville kept singing it they went off to other schools and sang it they became teachers and taught it to other children. Īfter the Great Fire of 1901, the Johnsons moved to New York City to work on Broadway. Rosamond Johnson later wrote music to go with the poem. "Lift Every Voice and Sing" was first recited by a group of 500 students in 1900. However, amid the ongoing civil rights movement Johnson decided to write a poem which was themed around the struggles of African Americans after the Reconstruction era (including the passage of Jim Crow laws in the South). James Weldon Johnson–Chair of the Florida Baptist Academy in Jacksonville, Florida, wanted to write a poem in memory of Abraham Lincoln's birthday. Different African American singers and musicians have also performed it. It has been part of 42 different Christian hymnals. In 1917, the NAACP began to promote the hymn as a " Negro national anthem". It has been popular in Black communities since then. Images in the hymn are from the book of Exodus in the Bible, where the people are freed from slavery, and led to the "promised land". It is a prayer of thanksgiving, faithfulness, and freedom. The hymn is from the point of view of African Americans, in the late 19th century. James Weldon Johnson wrote the words of the hymn.
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