Abolitionist My Country Tis Of Thee

Free download.  You get piano/solo score, vocal score, lyrics sheet, and mp3 recording. Peter Amidon’s arrangement of the “Abolitionist My Country Tis of Thee”.  The original “My Country Tis of Thee” words were penned by Samuel Francis Smith in 1831.  In 1843 A. G. Duncan wrote an abolitionist version of the text.  Dr. Rev. Lise Sparrow and Peter Amidon revised and updated A. G. Duncan’s lyrics in 2020 for a Guilford (VT) Community Church UCC virtual (pre-recorded) service in the era of the COVID-19 pandemic.  Patty Meyer plays piano and joins Peter Amidon on vocals in the recording.  Here is the Youtube video of their performance that was used in the church service.

Abolitionist My Country Tis of Thee
A. G. Duncan, 1843, Lise Sparrow & Peter Amidon, 2020

My country, ’tis of thee,
Stronghold of slavery, of thee I sing;
Land where my fathers died,
Where human’s rights deride,
From every mountainside thy deeds shall ring.

My native country, thee,
Where all men were born free, if white their skin;
I love thy hills and dales,
Thy mounts and pleasant vales;
But hate thy negro sales, as foulest sin.

Now comes the Douglas voice,
Abolitionists rejoice, hearts filled with hope.
Emancipation came
Many worked hard for gain
Jim Crow knocked it all down again with a hundred-year yoke.

Rosa Parks took her space,
Children marched in our place, Black voices  heard.
King’s words inspired us all,
Equality was the call,
Now Confederate generals fall, the nation’s stirred.

Kaepernick took the knee:
systemic slavery surely will Fall.
Protests still show us how
Our work’s just starting now;
Let us all take a vow to heed the call.

Oh, come, the joyful day,
When tyranny’s proud sway, stern as the grave,
Shall to the ground be hurl’d,
And freedom’s flag, unfurl’d,
And then throughout the world, o’er all us wave.