The Black National Anthem Roland Carter Analysis

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Roland Carter, one of the world’s greatest composer and CEO of MAR-VEL, made a great impact on African American music. Mr. Carter is known as a distinguished composer, conductor, pianist and most of all an educator. Carter is the Ruth S. Holmberg Professor of American Music in the Department of Music at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. In recognition of his stature, he has served on National Endowments for the Arts’ Heritage, Access and Choral Panels and received an honorary Doctor of Music degree from Shaw University. For his outstanding contributions to American Music, Carter was given honorary membership in the nation’s largest music fraternity, Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia and elected to the charter class of Signature Sinfonians.…show more content…
Carter’s arrangements and settings have and continue to be performed by orchestras and choirs throughout the world. Unquestionably gifted composer-arranger, it is Carter’s arrangement of “Lift Every Voice and Sing” that is most often used to present the anthem in formal settings. “Lift Every Voice and Sing”; often called "The Negro National Hymn," "The Negro National Anthem," "The Black National Anthem," or "The African-American National Anthem", was written by a poet called James Weldon Johnson (1871-1938) and then set to music by his brother John Rosamond Johnson (1873-1954) in 1900. Singing this song quickly became a way for African Americans to demonstrate their patriotism and hope for the future. In calling for earth and heaven to "ring with the harmonies of Liberty," they could speak out subtly against racism and especially the huge number of lynching’s accompanying the rise of the Ku Klux Klan at the turn of the century. In 1919, the NAACP adopted the song as "The Negro National Anthem." By the 1920s, copies of "Lift Every Voice and Sing" could be found in black churches across the country, often pasted into the

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