https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwWhu8tw4nU&ab_channel=THEJINGLEQUEEN
In 1985 Miller Lite asked me to come up with a “meaningful” project for Black History Month. I decided to arrange and record a celebratory contemporary version of “Lift Every Voice and Sing”. I called good friends Al Green and Deniece Williams who agreed to sing the duet, backed by Patti Austin, Roberta Flack, Melba Moore and myself. The band consisted of the studio musicians who made up John Belushi and Dan Ackroyd’s Blues Brothers Band, along with other notable musicians, including the late great Yogi Horton and jazz legend Jon Faddis. One of my favorite arrangers, Leon Pendarvis penned the charts and was Musical Director. Husband and wife actors Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee provided the voice-over narration for the commercials. Recorded in New York at Clinton Studios, it started out as a jingle but ended up a full length recording. This is the actual video from the recording session. Al was 8 hours late, which is why it’s dark when he’s arriving. It’s a fun-filled sneak peek inside what goes on (or used to go on) in the recording studio. Enjoy!
Lift Every Voice and Sing
BeBe Winans
Lift every voice and sing, till earth and Heaven ring,
Ring with the harmonies of liberty;
Let our rejoicing rise, high as the listening skies,
Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.
Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us,
Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us;
Facing the rising sun of our new day begun,
Let us march on till victory is won.
Stony the road we trod, bitter the chastening rod,
Felt in the days when hope unborn had died;
Yet with a steady beat, have not our weary feet,
Come to the place for which our fathers sighed?
We have come over a way that with tears has been watered,
We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered;
Out from the gloomy past, till now we stand at last
Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast.
God of our weary years, God of our silent tears,
Thou Who hast brought us thus far on the way;
Thou Who hast by Thy might, led us into the light,
Keep us forever in the path, we pray.
Lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met Thee.
Lest our hearts, drunk with the wine of the world, we forget Thee.
Shadowed beneath Thy hand, may we forever stand,
True to our God, true to our native land.