Sing St. John welcomes you to our senior Singalong, Episode 5 My name is Winnie and I'm here today with Lucia and Bodicea We're going to lift all our spirits today by singing in harmony together.

Today we will learn the harmonies for Down in the River to Pray "Down in the River to Pray" is an American song known by varied names, and has been described as a Christian folk hymn, an African-American spiritual, an Appalachian song, and a Southern gospel song.

No one knows its exact origin.

The earliest known version of the song is "The Good Old Way," which was published in Slave Songs of the United States in 1867 The version that we will sing today is an Appalachian version and it can be heard in the movie “O Brother Where Art Thou.

As always, before we sing, we must prepare our voices and our hearts and our minds.

So let's start with our posture.

Our backs are tall and are ready for action.

If you are sitting, sit as tall as you can and place both feet flat on the floor, make sure your shoulders are relaxed and sitting right on top of your spine.

To do that, let's raise our shoulders high, high, high, high and relax.

There you go.

And now let's have a nice neck stretch.

So if you're sitting down, you can take hold of the seat of the chair with your right hand.

Make sure your shoulders, stay level and down and take in a deep breath.

And as we exhale, gently lean our heads in the opposite direction.

Take a breath here in and out.

And as we inhale again, let's move to the other side.

And so you'll hold this seat with your left hand.

Inhale.

And as you exhale, lean your head to the left and give that nice stretch.

Remember to keep your shoulders level.

Don't tilt them.

Just keep them nice and level.

And now you breathe in and exhale there and then gently raise your head back to the center part.

Very gently.

Very good.

Now let's get ready to breathe.

Take a deep breath with me.

(inhales) And exhale.

(exhale) Very good.

And now we'll take another deep breath, and when we exhale, we'll make this sound.

Shh, shh, shh.

OK. Just like this.

OK, now let's do it together.

Deep breath in.

(inhales) Exhale.

So we're going to gently warm up the middle voice first.

Can you make this sound "oo".

Similar to now.

But just When we make this sound, the front of our mouth isn't open very much, but our throat is So using the "oo" sound, we are going to sing a short scale and it's going to sound like this.

(Piano introduction) ready ready (piano) Up Keep it nice and smooth Almost like an owl.

One more.

Awesome!

That was very good.

And now we'll do that with the word "LO".

(Piano) Gently going down.

Relax your throat.

But stay alert.

One more.

Awesome.

Now, are you ready to learn down in the river to pray?

Yes.

Yes.

All right.

Let's sing it through together all the way.

Bodicea will sing the melody.

You can sing the melody with her or any part that feels comfortable to you.

This is the great thing about singing at home.

You can sing it your way.

(Piano) Low (Piano) Middle (Piano) Melody (Piano introduction) Chorus Verse two Chorus Verse three Chorus Verse four Chorus Verse five Chorus Repeat this Chorus Great job!

(Laughter) Now we're going to learn the harmony for the low voices with verse one.

First, I sing a phrase and then you sing a phrase.

I sing, you repeat.

Piano introduction) Good.

Now lets sing through that verse together.

Good job.

Now it's time to learn the chorus harmony for the low voices (Piano introduction) Awesome Let's sing the chorus together.

(Piano introduction) Great job.

Now, let's sing the whole low harmony part for both the first verse and the chorus.

Bodicea will join us on the melody and Lucia will sing the middle harmony.

Are you ready?

Let's go.

(Piano) Low (Piano) Middle (Piano) Melody (Piano introduction) Verse one (Piano introduction) Chorus Very good.

Yay!

Now there is one thing about the chorus, though we will repeat the chorus when we get to the Oh sinners part.

On that repeat We changed the words just a little bit and it goes like this Come on, try it with me.

So the whole last chorus will sound like this.

Wasn't that fun?

Now it's time to learn the middle harmony, of verse one with Lucia So Lucia and I will sing a phrase and then you repeat, We sing.

Then you repeat.

(Piano introduction) Great.

Now let's sing that verse through together.

Yes!

Now we just have to learn the middle harmony for the chorus.

Are you ready?

(Piano introduction) Almost there.

Now let's sing the chorus through together.

Great job.

Thank you, Lucia.

Now we're going to sing all of the middle harmony together.

(Piano) That's the low harmony.

(Piano) Middle harmony.

(Piano) Melody (Piano introduction) Verse one Chorus Very good.

Oh, before we give the middle voices a rest, we need to learn one more thing.

We will repeat the last chorus.

When we get there that's the one that begins Oh sinners.

On that repeat we also change the words a little and it goes like this.

Do you want to try that with us?

Good.

So the last chorus will sound like this for the middle harmony.

Very good.

Now it's time to sing it all the way through with all the parts.

We're going to sing all the verses this time the entire song.

Each chorus invites someone else to come down to the river to pray.

It's sisters than brothers and then fathers and then mothers and finally, sinners.

As always, your lyrics will be printed on the screen, and I will let you know when it's time to repeat that last chorus with the special "Don't you want to come down" part?

OK?

(Piano) Low (Piano) Middle (Piano) Melody (Piano introduction) Chorus Verse two Chorus Verse three Chorus Verse four Chorus Verse five Chorus Repeat this Chorus We did it, you did it.

Awesome Yes, you did it.

(laughter) Thank you for joining our Senior Singalong episode five.

one day we'll have the opportunity to sing together at church or a function at concert or in the line at the market.

But until then, keep singing.

(piano introduction) Good night to you all and sweet be thy sleep May angels around you their silent watch keep Good night, good night, good night, good night Good night to you all and sweet be thy sleep May angels around you their silent watch keep Good night, good night, good night, good night Good night to you all and sweet be thy sleep May angels around you their silent watch keep Good night, good night, good night, good night Good night to you all and sweet be thy sleep May angels around you their silent watch keep Good night, good night, good night, good night Good night to you all and sweet be thy sleep May angels around you their silent watch keep Good night, good night, good night, good night May angels around you their silent watch keep Good night, good night, good night, good night Good night everyone!