Odetta - Shout For Joy (live)

Live at Fordham University, February 15, 2005, this is a traditional spiritual first recorded by Odetta on her 1960 album Christmas Spirituals, this recording is available on the 'Gonna Let It Shine' album. In Wade in The Water, by Arthur Jones, he says of this song: "Here a spiritual through the added power of the ring shout transformed the despair and powerlessness of the enslaved community into an invincible personage, watched over by angels and the "Mighty Counsellor, Prince of Peace". Africans in slavery remembered their own royal roots. Singing and absorbing into our senses a song like this, powerful in its melodic and rhythmic impact, we imagine ourselves dancing in a circle, in a steady, counterclockwise motion, feeling connected to a larger community of children, mothers, fathers.

Added 2 Sept 2026