This song seems appropriate considering that not only is it Passover, we’re also afflicted by a ruler deaf to the pleas of the people. Louis Armstrong recorded it in 1958 with Sy Oliver’s orchestra.
Fats Waller recorded it 20 years earlier, accompanying himself on Hammond organ.
Its first mention in history was in 1862, when “contrabands” — slaves confiscated by federal troops — sang it at Fort Monroe, Va., and sheet music was published calling it “The Song of the Contrabands: O Let My People Go.” The chaplain of the camp said in the sheet music that it originated in Virginia in about 1853. As you can hear on this 1914 recording of the Tuskegee Institute Singers, the earliest I could find, it was originally done slow and solemn, basically a dirge.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1TS85YDIj9k
The tune was popularized by Paul Robeson, whose bass voice made it sound as if it were coming from the voice of Yahweh himself.
