English subtitles for clip: File:In Performance at the White House- The History of Gospel.webm

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The President: (sings) Well.

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(laughter and applause)

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I hope everybody is in the

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spirit tonight.

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(applause)

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Bringing some
church to the White House.

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(applause)

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Good evening, everybody.

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Audience: Good evening.

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The President: Tonight, we
continue one of my favorite

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traditions here at the White
House by celebrating the

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music that has helped to
shape our nation.

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And over the years, we've
had the quintessential

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sounds of America fill this
room, from jazz to Motown,

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to blues, to country.

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So it is fitting that,
tonight,

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we honor the music that
influenced all those genres

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-- gospel.

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I want to start by thanking
tonight's amazing

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performers: Shirley Caesar,
Darlene Love,

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Rhiannon Giddens, Rance
Allen, Emmylou Harris,

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Rodney Crowell, Tamela Mann,
Lyle Lovett,

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and the Morgan State
University Choir.

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(applause)

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And I also want
to thank tonight's MC,

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Robin Roberts, who we love.

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(applause)

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Now, I've got to say, you're
having a pretty good night

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when T-Bone Burnett and the
Queen of Soul herself,

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Aretha Franklin, show up at
your house to jam.

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(applause)

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We've got
royalty here tonight.

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It's a state visit tonight.

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(laughter)

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We don't know everything
about the origins of gospel,

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but we do know that this
music is rooted in the

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spirituals sung by the
slaves, which

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W.E.B. Du Bois called "the most
beautiful expression of

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human experience born this
side of the seas."

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Even though they were often
forbidden to read or write

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or even speak freely, slaves
were permitted to sing.

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Songs were where their
dreams took flight,

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where they expressed faith
and love,

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as well as pain and fear and
unimaginable loss.

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Songs were also how they
conveyed information -- the

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locations of safe houses for
runaway slaves,

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or directions for a path
towards freedom,

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buried in the coded language
of divine lyrics.

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They sang songs of
liberation,

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if not for their bodies in
this world,

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then for their souls in the
next.

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And over time, those
spirituals blended with

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hymns and sacred songs to
become the music of the

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black church.

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In the decades after the
Civil War,

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as free men and women
streamed north in record

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numbers searching for a new
life,

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they brought those tunes
with them.

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But the gospel music we know
today really started in the

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1930s, when jazz musician,
Thomas A.

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Dorsey, combined the sounds
of the church he grew up in

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with the jazz and blues that
he loved.

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By the 1960s, gospel music
had become central to the

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Civil Rights Movement -- not
just through the political

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activism of legends like
Mahalia Jackson and the

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Staple Singers, but through
the songs themselves,

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from hymns like "Take My
Hand, Precious Lord,

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" a favorite of Dr. King's,
to the anthem of the

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movement, "We Shall
Overcome."

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Gospel music has evolved
over time,

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but its heart stays true.

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It still has an unmatched
power to strike the deepest

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chord in all of us, touching
people of all faiths and of

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no faith.

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As Mahalia Jackson herself
once said,

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"Blues are the songs of
despair,

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but gospel songs are the
songs of hope."

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Hope that we might rise
above our failures

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and disappointments.

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Hope that we might receive
His redemption.

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Hope that, in lifting our
voices together, we, too,

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might one day reach the
Promised Land.

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So tonight, we will hear
from musicians who helped to

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shape this singular American
art form,

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and musicians who are taking
gospel to great new heights.

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And to get us started, I'd
like to introduce an

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extraordinary singer, a
woman who reaches millions

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with her music, and preaches
to her flock from her North

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Carolina pulpit every
Sunday.

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Please give it up for
Reverend, Doctor,

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Pastor Shirley Caesar.

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(applause)