Fisk Jubilee Singers singing spirituals since 1871

When the Fisk Jubilee Singers first formed a group singing a cappella spirituals, they weren’t just introducing audiences to songs that had been heard before only by slaves. They were crossing boundaries: political, racial, social and spiritual. It had a huge effect. The group will perform in Tacoma this weekend.

“When the Fisk Singers came to my hometown in Arkansas in 1954, my father was on the symphony board, so one of them stayed in our home,” says Dr. Diana Marre, a Tacoman and longtime fan of the Fisk Jubilee Singers. “My mother hit the ceiling – it was obviously a color thing. It was unprecedented to do that. But the impact of their singing on the white members of the symphony was tremendous. People had tears in their eyes. And they’ll have the same effect here.”

Formed in 1871, the Fisk Jubilee Singers have been credited with introducing the Negro spiritual to the world and making it mainstream. In their first half-century, they broke racial norms as they toured Europe and performed for kings and queens. In 2008, the group received the National Medal for Arts, the nation’s highest artistic honor. This year, they were nominated for a Grammy. They’ve collaborated with performers from Jonny Lang to Neil Young and were the subject of a 1999 award-winning PBS documentary.

But their real effect, as Murre says, is on the audiences who hear them. Despite an ever-changing makeup (the 16 singers always are students at Fisk University, Nashville, Tenn.), the Fisk Singers still sing the same powerful spirituals as they did in 1871, just different arrangements.

Their harmonies change lives.

“I was only 5 when they came,” says Murre, who teaches humanities at Tacoma Community College. She is writing a novel about the group, contrasting the experience with a blackface minstrel show her brother participated in. “It was one of those profound experiences you remember for the rest of your life. They’re so pure, their art just penetrates. It’s not really gospel, not a bombastic mass thing. It’s very quiet and makes the world of the spirit manifest. Nothing else did that for me.”

Marlette Buchanan, arts development manager for Pierce County and a vocal teacher at Pacific Lutheran University, agrees. Buchanan had the chance to sing with the Fisk Singers during her four years at Fisk University in the 1990s, and says it’s “one of the most gratifying experiences” she’s ever had. “They have so much historical knowledge, as well as richness of musical tradition,” she remembers. “The camaraderie, the music is just beautiful. It brings people to tears. Once you’re a Jubilee singer, it’s a lifelong honor.”

Buchanan will sing with the group on Sunday as a guest artist in one of the songs she used to sing with them.

Dr. Paul Kwami, the current musical director, had just begun there when Buchanan was in her final year. He says the group’s repertoire stays the same, but singing style changes.

“We’re still singing Negro spirituals,” he says, “and we do a historical presentation where we sing the original simple harmonies and talk about the original members of the group. But even though I select spirituals that people can easily identify, I try to include a variety of arrangements by composers over the years, and they’ve changed a lot. It creates interest.”

Nevertheless, as Murre puts it, there’s something very pure about the whole Fisk performance: “They’re singing a cappella, no microphones, singing these songs that slaves kept as private. It’s just the same as in the 1800s. How many art forms are that pure?”

Fisk Jubilee Singers

Where: Pantages Theater, 901 Broadway, Tacoma

When: 7:30 p.m. Sunday

Tickets: $32.50-$62.50

Information: 253-591-5894, www.tacomaphilharmonic.org