Sometimes a song perfectly captures an experience before it happens. When Bruce Springsteen kicked off a national 9/11 telethon in 2001 with “My City of Ruins” 10 days after the World Trade Center was ...

Rap occasionally seems to get a bad wrap. The genre’s critics may be quick to point out the R-rated content that defines hip-hop and makes it the important powerhouse in music that it is, but there’s ...

I was recently trying to describe LUH‘s excellent debut album, Spiritual Songs for Lovers to Sing, to a coworker, and he asked what kind of music the band plays. Even after several listens, I was a ...

As a child growing up in the Bahamas, Rudolph Cleare often sang songs that came out of the slave era. Some were sorrowful, some had inspiring messages, and others had lyrics that described the ...

Starting with its roots in traditional African American spirituals, Wade in the Water has long been a powerful anthem of freedom and hope. Ella Jenkins, known for her contributions to children’s folk ...

The religious hymn "This Little Light of Mine" has often been referred to as having originated in the era of American slavery. For instance, on Sept. 26, 1998, the Orlando Sentinel published that the ...

In honor of what would have been the timeless Marvin Gaye’s 74th birthday on April 2, the following list consists of his five most iconic songs that spread across generations and still influence ...