Deep River is a popular African American spiritual. Historians do not know when it was first composed or the name of the composer, though it was first written down by the 1870’s. It was first performed in the 1870’s by the Fisk Jubilee Singers. The group sang “Deep River” in concerts as they toured to raise money for Fisk University in Nashville.
Like other spirituals, “Deep River” emotionally expresses a hope for freedom from bondage. The word “campground” in the song is another term for “freedom.” Also like other spirituals, “Deep River” has roots in the Bible, as in its reference to crossing the River Jordan.
Although “Deep River” ranks among the most famous spirituals today, it did not gain widespread popularity until the second decade of the 1900’s. Probably the best known arrangement of the song was created for solo voice and piano in 1916 by the African American composer Harry Thacker Burleigh. The spiritual has been performed in motion pictures and is sung as the closing spiritual in A Child of Our Time (1944), an oratorio by the British composer Sir Michael Tippett.
Versions of the words to “Deep River” vary somewhat. One popular version follows:
Deep river, my home is over Jordan, Deep river, Lord, I want to cross over into camp-ground. Deep river, my home is over Jordan. Deep river, Lord, I want to cross over into camp-ground. Oh, don’t you want to go to that gospel feast, That promised land where all is peace? Oh deep river, Lord, I want to cross over into camp-ground.
See also Spiritual ; Tippett, Sir Michael .
