Gospel Music - 福音音乐

Have you seen the 2016-released popular animation movie Sing before? If so, you must be familiar with this clip. Meena, a teenage elephant with an exquisite voice. She's singing Hallelujah. It's beautiful, isn't it? But do you know what genre is this song? And what does “Hallelujah” means?

你有看2016年火热的动画电影《欢乐好声音》吗？如果你看过的话，相信你对这个片段一定很熟悉。象女孩米娜有者无与伦比的歌喉，她正唱的是《哈利路亚》。非常动听不是吗？但你知道这首歌是什么流派的吗？而“哈利路亚”又是什么意思呢？

Actually, this song is a cover of the song Hallelujah released by Canadian singer Leonard Cohen in 2002, which evokes both early rock and roll and gospel music.¹⁾ He received Lifetime Achievement Award at 2010 Grammys. You can click on the component below to audition the song for thirty seconds.

事实上，这首歌翻唱自加拿大歌手莱昂纳德·科恩2002年发布的歌曲《哈利路亚》，这首歌让人们想起早期的摇滚乐与福音音乐。他在2010年时获得了格莱美终生成就奖。你可以点击下方的元件试听三十秒。

Gospel music, also known as “black gospel music” or “African American gospel music”, is a genre of American Protestant music that emerged in the 1920s. The term “Gospel Music” was created by Thomas A. Dorsey in Chicago in 1921, it made him called “the father of gospel music”.

福音音乐又称“黑人福音音乐”或“非裔美国福音音乐”，是出现于20世纪20年代的一种美国新教音乐。该专有名词是1921年托马斯·多尔西在芝加哥发明的，这使他被冠以“福音音乐之父”之称。

This music is an upbeat style of religious singing with lots of harmonies. Traditional hymns, brought from England to the US in hymn books, were sung every Sunday by white Americans. Slaves heard these hymns and worked out a “call-and-response” format of them. They evolved into what came to be known as the “spiritual.” Call and response was the model of the “work song,” sung by slaves in cotton plantations and on chain gangs. One singer would sing a line and it would be repeated, often in harmony, by the group.

这种音乐是一种欢快的宗教歌唱风格，有很多和声。传统的赞美诗，以赞美诗书的形式（被移民们）从英国带至美国，美国白人每个星期天都会吟唱它们。奴隶们听到这些赞美诗，并研究出一种“呼唤回应”的形式。它们演变成了后来被称为“灵歌”的东西。呼唤和回应是“工作歌”的模式，由棉花种植园和链式帮派的奴隶演唱。一个歌手唱一句，然后由大家重复唱，往往是和声唱。

By the 1950s, African-American Christian songs were known as the gospel, and took on danceable rhythms and the instrumental traits of blues and jazz. While religious in nature, the lyrics of many gospel songs spoke of liberation and better times to come, themes with political resonance in the days of unequal rights for Africa-Americans in the 1960s. Many great soul singers, such as Aretha Franklin²⁾ and pop singers like Whitney Houston³⁾, had their roots firmly in the gospel tradition.

到了1950年代，非裔美国人的基督教歌曲被称为福音歌曲，并带有舞蹈节奏和蓝调和爵士乐的乐器特征。虽然在本质上是宗教性的，但许多福音歌曲的歌词谈到了解放和未来的美好时光，在60年代非洲裔美国人权利不平等的日子里，这些主题具有政治共鸣。许多伟大的灵魂歌手，如艾瑞莎·富兰克林⁴⁾和惠特尼·休斯敦⁵⁾等流行歌手，都深深扎根于福音传统。