Reviewed by Tony Cummings

It was another group from Norfolk (the American one, of course) who became synonymous with jubilee singing, The Golden Gate Quartet. But the Golden Gates owed a big stylistic debt to this foursome who in the '20s were one of the most recorded religious acts of the '20s. As the sleevenote says, "The Norfolk Jubilee were an important quartet whose sound mixed tight harmony with strains of the vaudeville stage and barbershop harmonizing to give a syncopated jazz-influenced sound to acappella religious singing. A listen to the smooth harmonies and the staid arrangements of the Fisk or the Tuskegee quartets of the decade before show how far they had come." How far indeed. On "Our Father" they transform the Lord's Prayer, looping the first line into an intricate refrain and building an arrangement featuring switched lead voices that builds with propulsive intensity. There are plenty of other great performances on the 23 tracks presented here, with several of the songs like "His Eye Is On The Sparrow" and "I Heard The Voice Of Jesus Say" still in circulation now. Well worth investigating.

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