A History of "We Shall Overcome"

Bruce Springsteen's rendition

History

The song derives from a gospel song, possibly a 1903 song by Rev. Charles Tindley of Philadelphia containing the repeated line "I'll overcome some day", but more likely a later gospel song containing the line "Deep in my heart, I do believe / I'll overcome some day."

In Charleston, South Carolina in 1946, striking employees of the American Tobacco Company, mostly African American women, were singing hymns on the picket line. A woman named Lucille Simmons sang a slow "long meter style" version of the song, as "We'll Overcome". Zilphia Horton, a white woman and the wife of the co-founder of the Highlander Folk School (later Highlander Research and Education Center) learned it from her. The next year she taught it to Pete Seeger. [Dunaway, 1990, 222-223], [Seeger, 1993, 32]

Pete Seeger (or someone else, he himself isn't sure and writes that it may have been Highlander's Septima Clark) changed "We will overcome" to "We shall overcome"; Seeger added some verses ("We'll walk hand in hand", "The whole wide world around") and taught it to Californian singer Frank Hamilton, who taught it to Guy Carawan, who re-introduced it to Highlander in 1959. From there, it spread orally and became an anthem of southern African American labor union and civil rights activism. [Dunaway, 1990, 222-223], [Seeger, 1993, 32] Seeger has, on occasion, credited Carawan with authorship.

From 1963 on, the song was associated with Joan Baez, who recorded it and performed it at a number of Civil Rights marches and years later at the 1969 Woodstock festival.

On March 16, 1965, President Lyndon Johnson used the phrase "We shall overcome" in a speech before Congress [1]. Only a few days before, "Bloody Sunday" had occurred on the Selma to Montgomery marches.

Farmworkers in the United States sang the song in Spanish during the strikes and grape boycotts of the late 1960s.

Bruce Springsteen re-interpreted the song, which has been included on Where Have All the Flowers Gone: A Tribute to Pete Seeger, and his 2006 album We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions.

The song later found its way to South Africa in the later years of the anti-apartheid movement. [Dunaway, 1990, 243]

In India, its literal translation in Hindi "Hum Honge Kaamyab / Ek Din" became a patriotic/spiritual song during the 1980s, particularly in schools, and the song's popularity has continued to endure.

In the Bengali-speaking region of India and in Bangladesh there are actually two versions, both of which are incredibly popular among school-children and political activists. "Amra Karbo Joy" (a literal translation) was translated by the Bengali folk singer Hemanga Biswas and re-recorded by Bhupen Hazarika. Another version, translated by Shibdas Bandyopadhyay, "Ek Din Surjyer Bhor" (literally translated as "One Day The Sun Will Rise") was recorded by the Calcutta Youth Choir during the 1971 Bangladesh War of Independence and became one of the largest selling Bengali records of all time. It was a particular favourite song of Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and regularly sung at public events after Bangladesh gained independence.

In the Indian State of Kerala, the traditional Communist stronghold, the song became popular in college campuses in late 1970s. It was the struggle song of the Students Federation of India SFI, the largest student organisation in the country. The song translated to the regional language Malayalam as Njangal Vijayikkum...... Oru Nal by N. P. Chandrasekharan, then activist of SFI, in 1980. The translation followed the same tune of the original song. Later it was published in Student, the monthly of SFI in Malayalam, in September 2006. It was in connection with the Diamond Jubilee of the rebirth of the song as a protest song through the lips of Lucille Simmons.

External links

Susanne´s Folksong-Notizen, excerpts from various articles, liner notes, etc. about "We Shall Overcome".
Musical Transcription of "We Shall Overcome". Based on recording of SNCC Freedom Singers with Pete Seeger.
NPR news article including full streaming versions of Pete Seeger's classic Carnegie hall live recording and Bruce Springsteen's tribute version.
"Something about that song haunts you" essay on the history of "We Shall Overcome," Complicated Fun, June 9, 2006

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Shall_Overcome