Blessed Are (Artful Devotion)

Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.

Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied.

Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.

Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man! Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets.

—Luke 6:20b–23

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SONG: “Blessed Are the Poor in Spirit” | Traditional, performed by Mitchell’s Christian Singers, on Mitchell’s Christian Singers, vol. 2 (1936–1938)

The Great Depression had a devastating effect on America’s recording industry, but a gradual recovery started in 1934, and that’s when the gospel quartet climbed to ascendancy within the broader genre of African American religious music. One of the most celebrated groups of this period was Mitchell’s Christian Singers from Kinston, North Carolina, originally called the New Four but then renamed for manager Willie Mitchell.

Each of the members had a different day job—tobacco warehouse laborer, truck driver, stonemason, coal salesman—but they formed a habit of singing together in the evenings and were discovered by a local talent scout. They went on to record more than eighty sides from 1934 to 1940, and in 1938 they even appeared onstage at Carnegie Hall alongside other greats, including Sister Rosetta Tharpe and Count Basie, for a landmark program titled “From Spirituals to Swing.” (One review of the concert noted how Mitchell’s Christian Singers sang “with touching solemnity . . . intensity and abandon . . .”) But despite their extensive output and relative popularity, none of the members opted for full-time professional musicianship. They traveled out of state to make records from time to time but generally stayed close to home, performing at churches and community functions.

The recording above, from an August 11, 1937, studio session, features Louis “Panella” Davis, Julius Davis, William Brown, and Sam Bryant. It was reissued in 1996 by Document as part of a four-volume CD set of the group’s complete works.

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To view all the Revised Common Lectionary scripture readings for the Sixth Sunday after Epiphany, cycle C, click here.