Wings Over Jordan

WINGS OVER JORDAN was a choral ensemble dedicated to the performance of spirituals and similar literature by black composers. The group was assembled in early 1936 as a touring church choir under the leadership of Rev. Glenn (or Glynn) T. Settle (1894–1967), shortly after he became pastor of Gethsemane Baptist Church in Cleveland, Ohio. His wife and two of his children, Glenn (“Buddy”) and Gwendolyn, sang in the choir. Conductors of the church choir included Leelis Rosser Wilson (1900–1981) and James E. Tate. Wilson, who is not mentioned in most sources, seems to have left the choir before or around the time Settle was made pastor; he formed and directed his own ensemble, the Wilson Jubilee Singers, which performed for many years.

In the summer of 1937, Settle approached Worth Kramer, a white program director at WGAR, about singing on the radio. Kramer agreed but recommended they enlarge the group; he provided vocal coaching and took over as conductor. They first appeared on the station’s Negro Hour on 11 July 1937, then after only a few months were picked up by CBS and given a national audience under the name “Wings Over Jordan.” The meaning of the name was explained as follows:

When a Negro dies, it is said that he has crossed over the River Jordan. . . . It was his hope that he would hear the winged chorus of angels, singing the praises of the Most High, calling the earth-worn traveler to his place of rest. Hence, Wings Over Jordan, the choir of angels God’s children will hear as they cross from earth to heaven.[1]

Featured Songs:

Amen

Collections of Songs:

Wings Over Jordan: Favorite Spirituals of 1939: WorldCat

Discography:

Wings Over Jordan (Columbia Masterworks Set M-499, 78-rpm, 1941/2): Archive.org

CBS radio program no. 366 (18 June 1944): Archive.org

V-Disc No. 353A (“The Old Ark’s A’Moverin,’” 78-rpm) (1945)

V-Disc No. 397A (“I Couldn’t Hear Nobody Pray,” 78-rpm) (1945)

Armed Forces Radio Service (AFRS, 16-inch) Nos. 20, 36, 67; NCP 1349, 1363, 1448, 1478; R-40/AFRS-148; END 40

Queen Records 78-rpm singles 4140–4156 (June 1946); reissued in 1958 as King LP-560 An Outstanding Collection of Traditional Negro Spirituals

RCA Victor singles 20-3242, 20-3128, 22-0006 (78-rpm, 8 June 1948)

Sterling Recordings single WOJ 1-2 (“Rock A-My Soul” / “Sweet Little Jesus Boy,” 78-rpm, 1949)

King EP-232 (Vol. 1), EP-233 (Vol. 2), EP-234 (Vol. 3) (30 Apr. 1953), also issued as King LP 395-519 Amen (two different covers); reissued in 1978 on King/Gusto K-5021 Original Greatest Hits(?)

Dial Records LP-5163, World’s Greatest Negro Choir (ca. 1958)

ABC Records LP-338, The World’s Greatest Spiritual Singers (1960); some tracks reissued on Electrola E 41 295 My Soul Is a Witness (Germany), and in 1974 as ABC Songbird SBLP-246 Wings Over Jordan

Parlophone GEP 8686 (British, reissued from 1953?); GEP 8712 (reissued from 1946?)

President PRC-128 Amen (French, reissued from 1953?)

Gospel Friend PN-1505, Trying to Get Ready (2007) [CD compilation including rare reissues]

[For further discography details, see Discogs, Price (1995), and Hayes/Laughton (2014)]

Archival Collections:

Wings Over Jordan Collection, National Afro-American Museum and Cultural Center (Wilberforce, OH):
https://ohiomemory.org/digital/collection/aids/id/11170/

Wings Over Jordan, photos by Gordon Parks (1943), FSA/OWI Collection, Library of Congress (Washington, DC): LOC

Wings Over Jordan, UCLA Ethnomusicology Archive: Archive.org

Wings Over Jordan, private collection owned by Sam Barber.

Related Resources:

Ommo Aummen, “Thunder an’ Lightnin’ Britches”: The Astounding Truth about Wings Over Jordan (St. Petersburg, FL: Blue Peninsular Sanctuary, 1942): WorldCat

Wings Over Jordan: World’s Greatest Negro Choir (St. Louis: Sterling, 1949): PDF

Wings Over Jordan: World Renowned Negro Choir (Affton, MO: Wings Over Jordan, ca. 1954): PDF

Samuel Barber, The Choral Style of the Wings Over Jordan Choir, dissertation (University of Cincinnati, 1979): WorldCat

Madalin Olivia Trigg Price, Wings Over Jordan and American Radio, 1937–1947, dissertation (University of Southern Mississippi, 1995).

Sam Edwards, “Wings Over Jordan and Joe Louis: Reincarnated Powers of the Original Spirituals,” The Negro Spiritual, no. 2 (Dec. 2001), pp. 15–23.

Robert Marovich, “Wings Over Jordan,” Encyclopedia of American Gospel Music, ed. W.K. McNeil (NY: Routledge, 2005), pp. 429–430.

Karin Patterson, Interview of Evelyn Freeman Roberts, UCLA Ethnomusicology Archive (Los Angeles: 6 Apr. 2007): UCLA | Archive.org

Bob Marovich, Interview of Kenneth Slaughter, Gospel Memories, WLUW (Chicago: 7 Jan. 2012).

Cedric Hayes & Robert Laughton, “Wings Over Jordan,” Gospel Discography 1943–2000, 3rd ed., vol. 2 (Canada: Eyeball, 2014), p. 1154.

Mary Dobbin Williams, “‘I’ll be somewhere listening for my name’: Wings Over Jordan choir, the spirituals, and the African American experience during the second World War,” thesis (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 2019): UNC

Babette Reid Harrell, Preserving the Negro Spiritual: A Case Study of Wings Over Jordan Celebration Chorus, dissertation (Boston University, 2019): PDF

Timothy Collins & Sam Barber, Go Down Moses: The Wings Over Jordan Choir (Then & Now, 2021): Amazon