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Hardcover. Zustand: Near Fine. Zustand des Schutzumschlags: Fair dj. Illustrated by Millar of the Roland Company (illustrator). First Edition. [just the faintest bit of shelfwear to book; the jacket has extensive chipping/paper loss along the top of the front panel, large triangular pieces missing at three corners of the rear panel, multiple pieces missing from spine, front flap completely detached]. (pen & ink drawings) A collection of sixteen Negro spirituals, with lyrics, music and background information on each. As the author explains in her Preface, this volume "presents no elaborate and length discussion of the why, wherefore and significance" of the songs, but "is simply a recording of some songs I grew up with." Her growing-up, she goes on to explain, was done "in a little country town in the Southern part of 'Free Kansas,' Coffeyville -- which is also shared with the colorful state of Oklahoma [and which] was settled some seventy years ago [i.e. circa 1857], mostly by migrants from Tennessee, Kentucky, Texas, Georgia, Arkansas and Alabama, many of them being former slaves." Per Wikipedia, Eva Jessye was a Harlem Renaissance figure, "the first black woman to receive international distinction as a professional choral conductor," who created her own choral group in the 1920s and performed widely on the stage and the radio, in addition to making numerous recordings. After a brush with Hollywood as choral director on King Vidor's 1929 all-Black musical drama HALLELUJAH, she returned to New York, where she "worked with creative multi-racial teams in groundbreaking productions that experimented with form, music and stories." Notable collaborations included the appearnce of her choir in Virgil Thomson's and Gertrude Stein's 1933 opera, "Four Saints in Three Acts," and her service as music director for the original 1935 production of George Gershwin's "Porgy and Bess"; much later, she and her choir participated in the 1963 March on Washington. She remained active as a teacher into her eighties, teaching at Pittsburg (Kansas) State University and the University of Michigan, and establishing the Eva Jessye African-American Music Collection at the latter institution.