• NEWS
  • REVIEWS
  • INTERVIEWS
  • EVENTS
  • VIDEOS

Subscribe to Updates

Get the latest creative news from Blues Scene about music & art.

UK Blues Awards Nominee Elles Bailey Premieres First Single From New Deluxe Album

March 30, 2023

An Q&A with Otis Taylor, New Album ‘BANJO’ Out Now

March 29, 2023

Marty Stuart Releases New Song, ‘Sitting Alone,’ From First Album in Six Years

March 29, 2023

Debra Devi, Danielia Cotton, Katie Henry, The Outcrops to Play at Bowery Electric NYC

March 28, 2023
Facebook Twitter Instagram
Facebook Twitter Instagram Vimeo
American Blues SceneAmerican Blues Scene
  • NEWS
  • REVIEWS
  • INTERVIEWS
  • EVENTS
  • VIDEOS
American Blues SceneAmerican Blues Scene
Home»News»Gaye Adegbalola Releases Significant Single ‘Lift Every Voice and Sing’
News

Gaye Adegbalola Releases Significant Single ‘Lift Every Voice and Sing’

"In it we rejoice for our survival; we document our difficult past; and, we pray for continued progress. A friend challenged me to play it and I proudly perform it here, solo." Gaye's new single significantly celebrates Black History Month.
Lauren LeadinghamBy Lauren LeadinghamFebruary 24, 2023Updated:February 24, 2023No Comments3 Mins Read
Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIn Tumblr Email VKontakte WhatsApp
Share
Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Email

Blues Music Award winner, multi-instrumentalist and composer Gaye Adegbalola is celebrated for blues songs filled with scathing social commentary dressed in humor. Her album addressing LGBTQ issues, Gaye Without Shame, was nominated for a BMA; and her children’s CD, Blues in All Flavors, won the Parents’ Choice Gold Award. In 2019 she released The Griot (pronounced GREE – OH), which is best described as “topical blues for topical times.” Gaye continues to be a mouthpiece for the marginalized, and by definition of what constitutes a storyteller, singer, musician, and oral historian, she is indeed entirely a griot. 

In the summer of 2021, Gaye Adegbalola’s Freedom Songs were released as three singles. Her single “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” the second from Freedom Song Trilogy Vol. II, is out today via VizzTone Label Group. This February release significantly celebrates Black History Month. Originally a hymn written as a poem by NAACP leader James Weldon Johnson, it was set to music written by brother J. Rosamond Johnson in the early 1900s and became known as the Black National Anthem. 

Gaye tells of the song’s history as a poem of inspiration and liberty, in an introduction to the song which is included in the longer version. “An anthem is the uplifting song of a people,” Gaye explains, “full of pride, patriotism and power. In it we rejoice for our survival; we document our difficult past; and, we pray for continued progress.  A friend challenged me to play it and I proudly perform it here, solo. Resa Gibbs joins me on vocals.”

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 people sighed

We have come 

Over a way that with tears has been watered

We have come

Shredding our past through the blood of the slaughtered

Gaye has received the Kristen Lems “Social Change Through Music” Award at the National Women’s Music Festival in 2018 and, in 2019 the “Koko Taylor Queen of the Blues Award” for preserving traditional blues from the Jus’ Blues Foundation. 

Along with her music recognitions she is a former Virginia State Teacher of the Year (8th grade science) and has been honored as an OUTstanding Virginian by Equality Virginia. The Library of Virginia has recognized her as one of the 2018 Virginia Women in History Honorees (along with Barbara Kingsolver, Rita Dove and others).

“Life Every Voice and Sing” Single

Anthem Black History Month Freedom Song Trilogy Gaye Adegbalola Lift Every Voice and Sing Single VizzTone Label Group
Share. Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIn Tumblr Email WhatsApp
Previous ArticleDani Wilde Releases Single ‘Vagabond Child’
Next Article Musical Nomad Ry Bradley Comes Home to the Blues With New Single, ‘Miss Treat Me Right’
Lauren Leadingham

Director of Content

Related Posts

UK Blues Awards Nominee Elles Bailey Premieres First Single From New Deluxe Album

March 30, 2023

Marty Stuart Releases New Song, ‘Sitting Alone,’ From First Album in Six Years

March 29, 2023

Exclusive: Big Al and the Heavyweights ft. Jason Ricci Premiere Video for ‘Alright With Me’

March 23, 2023

Exclusive: Dean Zucchero Premieres New Single ‘Big Boss Boy’ ft. Johnny Rawls

March 14, 2023

Comments are closed.

Advertisment
Facebook Twitter Instagram Pinterest
  • Home
  • News
  • Reviews
  • Interviews
  • Events
  • Videos
  • About

Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.