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Dese Are My Fader's Children/Soon Ah Will Be Done
Traditional Old-Time Gospel Spiritual;
ARTIST: From "American Negro" suite 1916
CATEGORY: Traditional and Public Domain Gospel
DATE: 1800s; 1916
RECORDING INFO: Dese Are My Fader's Children
OTHER NAMES: "Soon I Will Be Done (With The Trouble Of The World)"
SOURCES: Mudcat
NOTES: "Dese Are My Fader's Children" is a spiritual related to "Soon I Will Be Done (With The Trouble Of The World)" The traditional song was set to music in 1916 "American Negro" suite by Tkorwald Otterstrom. The lyrics were published in Program notes: Chicago Symphony Orchestra - 1927.
Soon I Will Be Done (With The Trouble Of The World)" is found in John Work's 1907 book.
SOON-A-WILL BE DONE WITH THE TROUBLES OF THE WORLD
CHORUS: Soon-a-will be done-a-with the troubles of the world,
Troubles of the world,
Troubles of the world,
Soon-a-will be done-a-with the troubles of the world,
Going home to live with God
1. These are my Father's children,
These are my Father's children,
These are my Father's children,
All in-a-one band.
CHORUS
2. No more weeping and a-wailing,
No more weeping and a-wailing,
No more weeping and a-wailing,
All in-a-one band.
CHORUS
From Mudcat: This spiritual seem to have been recorded much later than the slavery days. According to the Cleveland Public Library's Index to Negro Spirituals [of thirty popular collections published up to 1937] (1991), the only book containing "Soon I will be done" is R.N. Dett, Religious Folk-Songs of the Negro, As Sung at Hampton Institute (1927, p. 234). This is a revised and enlarged edition as a separate book of the appendix to M.F. Armstrong, et al.'s Hampton and Its Students (1874). I have the reprint of the 1920 "new edition," where this song is not contained. The Index doesn't mention other title variants, so very likely no other versions are recorded in those "thirty collections." There is, however, an earlier version (in Jack Snyder, American Negro Spirituals, 1926) in Erskine Peters, Lyrics of the Afro-American Spiritual (Garland, 1993). I don't have Work's Folk Songs of the American Negro. Horace Clarence Boyer, in his notes to the Mahalia Jackson CD (Gospels, Spirituals, & Hymns, Columbia/Legacy C2K 47083), says "TROUBLED OF THE WORLD: The popularity of this well-known spiritual was, due to, until 1959, to the concert choral arrangement by William Levi Dawson." Dawson's (b. 1899) arrangement was probably in 1930s, that is later than Dett. It is possible that this song had other titles or "floating verses" common to other spirituals.
Program notes 1927: The "American Negro" suite by Tkorwald Otterstrom is scored for the following orchestra: Three flutes (the third flute interchangeable with a piccolo), three oboes (the third oboe interchangeable with an English horn), three clarinets, bass clarinet, two bassoons, double bassoon, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, two harps, kettledrums, side drum, cymbals, sandpaper shuffle, castagnettes, xylophone, bells, gong and strings.
It should be added that the suite was composed in March, 1916, and orchestrated-in July of the same year. The following are the movements of the suite and the verses to which the original melodies were set:
Dese Are My Fader's Children- Andante solemelle, P. minor, 4-4 time.
Dese all my fader's children,
All in one band.
An' I soon shall be done
Wid de troubles of de worl'
Goin' home to live wid God. Oh!
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