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Deep Down In My Heart
Traditional spiritual;
ARTIST: W. M. (Billy) Givens; Folk-Songs of America: The Robert Winslow Gordon Collection, 1922-1932
Listen: http://www.loc.gov/folklife/Gordon/sound/Deepdowninmy.mp3
SHEET MUSIC:
YOUTUBE:
CATEGORY: Traditional and Shape-Note Gospel;
DATE: Probably 1800s; 1926
RECORDING INFO: Deep Down In My Heart
W. M. (Billy) Givens; Folk-Songs of America: The Robert Winslow Gordon Collection, 1922-1932.
OTHER NAMES: "Lord, you know I love everybody"
RELATED TO:
SOURCES: Folk-Songs of America: The Robert Winslow Gordon Collection, 1922-1932.
NOTES: "Deep Down In My Heart" is an African-American spiritual recorded from W. M. (Billy) Givens. It appears on-line in the collection Folk-Songs of America: The Robert Winslow Gordon Collection, 1922-1932. The song has been adapted as a contemporary praise song:
DEEP DOWN IN MY HEART- from Biblestudy.Churches.net
I love the Lord Messiah
Deep down in my heart.
I love the Lord Messiah
Deep down in my heart.
CHORUS:
I say deep deep, I say down down,
I say deep down in my heart. [repeat]
(women)
Deep down, deep down in my heart.
Deep down, deep down in my heart.
I love my christian family,
Deep down in my heart. [repeat]
I love to sing His praises,
Deep down in my heart. (repeat)
NOTES FROM GORDON COLLECTION: Darien, Georgia, the childhood home of Mrs. Gordon, was Gordon's "field station" for over two years, 1926-28. Located on the coast of Georgia, this town was ideally situated for the study of Afro-American folksong. The Carolina and Georgia sea coast blacks spoke a dialect (Gullah) thought to represent the earliest mixing of English with African languages. Gordon hoped to find folksong evidence of similar mixture. This led him to spirituals, of which he collected a substantial number. "Deep Down In My Heart" was performed by one of his best Darien informants, W. M. (Billy) Givens. Gordon later recorded a variant of this song from the white singer Betty Bush Winger (Record 8A), who is discussed below.
DEEP DOWN IN MY HEART- W. M. (Billy) Givens- Darien, Georgia; March 19, 1926
Gordon cyl. A279, Item GA69;
LISTEN: http://www.loc.gov/folklife/Gordon/sound/Deepdowninmy.mp3
Lord, you know I love everybody,
Deep down in my heart.
Lord, you know I love everybody,
Deep down in my heart.
Lord, you know I love everybody,
Deep down in my heart.
Amen, Amen, Amen.
Lord, you know I love my preacher, etc.
Lord, you know I love my deacon, etc.
Lord, you know I love my brother, etc.
Lord, you know I love my Savior, etc.
Lord, you know I love everybody, etc.
Spoken: W. M. Givens, Darien [?], Georgia, March the nineteenth, Nineteen twenty-six.
In his article on "Negro Spirituals from Georgia," Gordon describes the context in which these songs were performed. He urges the reader to "Go, on a Tuesday evening, to the smallest wooden church in a country district, and slip quietly into the last of the rough-hewn wooden benches" (p. 20). He describes the preparations of the sexton, the gathering of the congregation and the preacher's first hymn, lined out "just as he heard the white preacher do it seventy years ago … It is not a spiritual, but an old hymn of the camp-meeting type." A deacon is called upon for the first or "mourner's" prayer, and Gordon describes the congregations response, which leads up to the first spiritual:
The older women are swaying back and forth, and one of them is tapping nervously with her foot. When finally in the course of his prayer he mentions something that calls to mind the words of an old spiritual, this same woman who is tapping begins, probably quite unconsciously, to croon it almost under her breath. The spark catches, others near her join in, and the crooning becomes an audible under-tone -- "Jesus, Jesus, is my ond-ly friend, Jesus, Jesus, is my ond-ly friend, Jesus, Jesus is my ond-ly friend; King Jesus is my ond-ly friend." Louder and louder it grows as more and more join in till it seems actually to compete with the prayer. The deacon pauses a second, ceases abruptly his chanting, and drops into prose for a concluding line or so. And as he ceases the spiritual bursts forth free of all restraint: (here Gordon gives two stanzas of "Jesus is My Only Friend," p. 21).
Bessie Shaw and her husband Henry were the persons in the service Gordon described, and it was Bessie Shaw whose singing he transcribed in his article. Gordon's comment at the end of this recording indicates his awareness of the way in which the song was performed in context at church meeting. As mentioned in the note to "Brother Jonah," Henry Shaw was an important informant not only for Gordon but also for Lydia Parrish. As in Asheville, the outside collector relied upon local contacts, in this case the Shaws, for guidance and collectanea. Gordon recorded two other performances of this song (A308, GA97; A408, GA178) and an additional manuscript text (GA388) -- all from Georgia, and Ballanta- (Taylor) also published a version from St. Helena Island (pp. 6-7).
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