Hymn #454: Lord, I Want to Be a Christian | First Congregational Church

This African American spiritual is an example of a mask-and-symbol song, which can be understood on two levels. The mask is that it is a simple song of longing for the Christian faith. The underlying symbol of “in my heart” is a commentary on insincere people who treat others with brutality.

R. Nathaniel Dett (1882-1943) transcribed this hymn for his Religious Folk-Songs of the Negro in 1927. It was sung by the Hampton Institute student chorus, which Dett organized in 1930. The chorus toured extensively in the United States and Europe.

This anonymous tune is named I WANT TO BE A CHRISTIAN after the first line of the text. It was written in the pentatonic mode, meaning that it can be played using only the black keys of the piano if started on G-flat. This pentatonic mode was frequently used in African American melodies.

The tunes of the spiritual tradition were “forged of sorrow in the heat of religious fervor” according to one expert in the field, James Weldon Johnson. By use of repetition and sustained high notes, the tunes reinforced the emotions of the words for the singers.