I'll Fly Away

With this upload, I begin a series that features organ works by African-American composers played on a historical American instrument, the 1893 J.W. Steere organ in the First Baptist Church of Owatonna, Minnesota, sampled by Evensong, and most generously gifted to me as well (thank you). Alas, the Baptist church is no longer under Baptist purview--see comment section.

Written in the style of gospel keyboard, such as on the piano or Hammond organ, today’s piece, “I’ll Fly Away,” improvised by Henry Sexton during a Sunday morning service while he served as organist at Concord Baptist Church in Brooklyn, NY, has been transcribed and edited for us by Raymond Henry. Raymond implores us to not try and impose a Bach sensibility on ‘the Holy Blues.’ He goes on to say that “the keyboard style is detached, and indeed many of the chord voicings make an organ legato impossible. This is not by accident, it gives a percussive effect, with constant repeated accents and driving rhythm. The rests also give impetus to the rhythmic drive, when time values are strictly observed.”

In editorial notes, R. Henry explains that the piece begins mf and grows progressively louder to the indicated ff climax 9 measures from the end. Then the stops get retired gradually, but quickly, to finish pp with a very quiet enclosed flue, like a wisp of smoke, wafting heavenward. My performance here also includes additional “ornamentation,” as suggested by Dr. Pamela Decker herself in one of my lessons 23 years ago. That is to say, we zhuzhed it up just a bit more, and she approved my piano gospel riff at the end.

I grew up singing/playing this song on the piano and organ (for a picture of the type of organ I had to play back then, see the comment section) in my hometown Baptist church in AR, and this arrangement is one of my mother’s favorite pieces she’s ever heard me play.