Customer Reviews

The Power And The Glory

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Paul was the son of a preacher man who had been born a slave, so it seems natural that when he decided to begin his concert and recording career around age 30, he would present a program of spirituals first. While the ones on this collection were sung in the mid-1940's, his first records came out in 1927 on RCA with many of the same selections. I became a Robeson fan when, as a white kid of 14 with racist leanings, I heard his version of "Get On Board, Little Children" on a Vanguard folk sampler I checked out of the library. It was 75 seconds of magic that started me on a life journey away from prejudice, and it's on this disc. Other great performances here include "By N By"; "Every Time I Feel the Spirit"; "I Got a Home in Dat Rock"; "No More Auction Block For Me;" "Ezekiel Saw the Wheel"; "Der's a Man Goin' Round, Takin' Names" and my second favorite of his spirituals, "Balm in Gilead." If you like Black spirituals, you won't find any performances better than his. Mahalia Jackson and Harry Belafonte are great artists, but Paul got there first. Forget his pro-Russian political problems which cost him the final ten years of his career and his proper place as one of the greatest early civil rights champions. These songs involve a MAN trying to come to terms with his religious training, his cultural history, his artistic sensibilities, his frustration at being demeaned due to skin color. In his adult life he was attracted to the Soviet model despite its faults because color prejudice did not seem to be one of Communism's problems. Here we hear a born-once Christian presenting the songs of a people often in despair, when in his off-stage life he endorsed a society in which atheism was a cardinal virtue. To say Robeson was complex and conflicted would be to state the obvious. Also obvious is that he had a love for this material that transcends politics and eras. If you buy this disc, I think your love for the quality of his renditions and selections will also transcend politics, eras, race, and recording techniques.

As a little child I grew up listening to these songs by Paul Robeson. The records are long gone, and imagine my surprise when I see them on CD! It's wonderful that another generation of children can be listening to these wonderful songs. I always thought that if God sang, he would sound like this!

Powerful spirituals--you feel the anguish, the joy, the strength!

beautiful. true. moving. ask your kids to turn off that techno noise for a while, sit down, focus, and really listen... they just might discover a treasure.

There are few voices that are "pure," and few songs that exhibit such purity. I'm reminded of "My Girl" by the Temptations as one of those combinations of purity. In this album, Paul Robeson captured purity a couple of times. You know the songs. You heard them as a kid. They are part of our culture, part of our humanity, reflective of a difficult time, and they remind us of how far we have come and how far we have yet to go.

Robeson's voice is rich, pure, and resonant. The only fear I had (a fear I have with the digitization of any old recording) was the quality of the CD. Have no fear--it's crystal clear.

Why not 5 stars? It's a personal preference: I would have liked to have swapped out a few songs for some others. Still, a majority of the songs are just wonderful...pure.

His best album is "Ol' Man River", this one is ok, and has some good songs not on Ol Man River. Paul Robeson is one of the greatest singers of all time. His best songs include Shenandoah, Just a wearyin for you, water boy, deep river, joshua fit the battle of jericho. Other good songs include By and By, go down Moses, swing low sweet chariot. The more you listen to Robeson, the better he sounds. Robeson is the American equivalent of the Irish Tenor John McCormack. If you like one, you will like the other.

I cannot say better than Brian Foster. I agree with his assessment entirely. Try, Green Pastures, Big Fella, "Paul Robeson" (the CD), and The Voice of The Mississippi, and then see how you feel about The Power & the Glory.

So many covers of spirituals try to impress by larding them up with hundred-strong choruses and banks of strings. Robeson's pure strong voice and the simple piano accompaniment take you back to the awe-inspiring sources of the music: African-American slaves dealing with the most awful forms of oppression, with dignity, faith and hope. This album is a great introduction to spirituals, and also really ROCKS in places. My daughter's 4th grade Sunday school class had never heard "Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho" before, and LOVED IT -- the boys especially wanted to play it over and over!

In my opinion, these simple and beautiful arrangements far surpass Robeson's later and more overtly political work -- these songs make the strongest possible case for the dignity of the human spirit under the most difficult conditions.