The Negro Spiritual invites speculations on the human condition in its most extreme circumstances. Whatever essence one assigns the genre—whether these are songs of hope, survival, art, spirit, exploitation, delusion, enablement, triumph, defeat, slavery, fortitude, comfort, despair (and the list goes on)—the power of the language, the resonance of the themes, the rhythms of grief and hope—the tearful beauty of the music—all of it still calls to us today, and, dare I say, describes our grief, our lostness, our burden (even the burden of hope)?
At the risk of perpetuating exploitation by appropriation, or other misuse, I wish to argue, perhaps irreverently, that the greatest Negro Spiritual was composed by an individual who neither had been a slave, nor had lived through the period of slavery. The author was royalty, in fact, a duke, if somewhat ironically: Duke Ellington. The song is “I Like the Sunrise.”
“I like the sunrise”: The expression stands in its simplicity, as though to say more is to say too much, to try too much. There’s a weariness here, but an inexorable hope too. Simple statements, simple logic—all in response to the heavy weight of the old day. But the hope must be sung, even if at a death march pace. This song captures exhaustion and hope in the most melancholy way imaginable.
I like the sunrise
Cause it brings a new day
I like a new day
It brings new hope, they say.
And so it goes. “They” say there’s hope. Is that hope to be discounted as the lies of the world? Whatever the words, whoever the speakers, there’s the sun blazing in the new sky. And that’s a whole different kind of assertion and invitation.
I like the sunrise
blazing in the new sky
Night time is weary
Oh, and so am I.Every evening I wish upon a star
That my brand new bright tomorrow
Isn’t very far.
When that heavy, blue curtain of night
Is raised up high, out of sight.I like the sunrise
So heavenly to see
I like the sunrise
I hope it lights for me.
The last line casts a horrible shadow of doubt: why hope that the sunrise “lights for me,” unless there is some threat that it indeed might not light, not for me? Regardless, I hope for the sunrise . . . and a new day.