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African-American Jubilee Quartet Music

Spirituals
- Early Recordings
- Wings Over Jordan
Jubilee Quartets
- Jubilee Quartets 1
- Jubilee Quartets 2
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- Jubilee Quartet Music
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Artist Song Links
Alphabetical Four Get On Board Little Children
Birmingham Jubilee Singers He Took My Sins Away
Blue Jay Singers I Must Tell Jesus
Blue Jay Singers I Am Bound for Canaan Land
Capitol City Five Go Down Moses
The_Dixie_Hummingbirds Standing by the Bedside
The_Dixie_Hummingbirds I've Got So Much to Talk About
The_Dixie_Hummingbirds Swing Down, Sweet Chariot
Fairfield Four Dig a Little Deeper
Fairfield Four My God Me This Morning
Fairfield Four Don't You Let Nobody Turn You Round
Fairfield Four Noah
Fairfield Four Lord Have Mercy
Fisk Jubilee Singers When I Was Sinkin' Down
Four Interns Count Your Blessings
Golden Gate Quartet Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho
Golden Gate Quartet You'd Better Run
Golden Gate Quartet Yes, Indeed
Golden Gate Quartet Hush
Golden Gate Quartet Swing Down, Sweet Chariot
Golden Gate Quartet Ave Maria
Heavenly Gospel Singers Have a Little Talk with Jesus
Heavenly Gospel Singers Let Jesus Fix It
Heavenly Gospel Singers Walk in the Light
Jubilaires Noah
Jubilaires God Almighty's Gonna Cut You Down
Jubilee Four Go Where I Send Thee
Jubilee Four Noah Had A Hammer
Norfolk Jubilee Quartette Daniel in the Lions' Den
Selah Jubilee Singers I Want Jesus to Walk Around my Bedside
Selah Jubilee Singers King Jesus Is A Rock In A Weary Land
Selah Jubilee Singers (Two Songs)
Selah Jubilee Singers I'm So Glad
Silver Leaf Quartet Will The Circle Be Unbroken
Silver Leaf Quartet I've Got a Home in that Rock
Southern Sons Praise the lord, and pass the ammunition
Sterling Jubilee Singers I Want to See Jusus
Spirit of Memphis Quartet amazon.com He Never Left Me Alone
Spirit of Memphis Quartet amazon.com If It Ain't One Thing it's Another
Spirit of Memphis Quartet amazon.com Thank You Jesus
Swan Silvertones Only Believe
Swan Silvertones Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior
Swan Silvertones All Aboard
The Trumpeteers Milky White Way & John Saw That Number

Jubilee quartets were popular African-American religious musical groups in the first half of the 20th century. The name derives from the Fisk Jubilee Quartet, a group of male singers organized by students at Fisk University in 1871 to sing Negro spirituals, which had typically been sung by mixed choirs before then. Students at other historically black schools, such as Hampton Institute, Tuskegee Institute and Wilberforce University, followed suit.

The early jubilee quartets featured close harmonies, formal arrangements and a "flatfooted" style of singing that emphasized restrained musical expression and technique derived from Western musical traditions. Early quartets reinforced their respectable image by adopting uniforms that a university glee club might wear and discouraging improvisation.

In time, however, the popularity of the jubilee style spread from the universities to black churches, where quartets, singing before audiences with a tradition of enthusiastic response, began to absorb much of the energy and freedom of Gospel music coming out of Holiness churches. Groups such as the Golden Gate Quartet--originally named the Golden Gate Jubilee Quartet—infused their performances of spirituals with the rhythmic beat of blues and jazz and gradually began including gospel standards written by Thomas A. Dorsey and others in their repertoire. The Gates and other jubilee quartets gained nationwide popularity through radio broadcasts, records and touring in the 1930s and 1940s.

Other groups, such as the Dixie Hummingbirds and the Original Five Blind Boys of Alabama (formally known as the Happyland Jubilee Singers) that had begun singing in the conventional jubilee style went further, creating the more improvisational and fervent style of quartet singing known as "hard Gospel." That new style largely eclipsed jubilee singing by the 1950s. (Wikipedia) amazon.com Dovesong

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