Songs of Humanity

'Old man river --I must keep fighting--'

Ol' Man River (music by Jerome Kern, lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II) is a song in the 1925 musical Show Boat, that tells a melancholy story of African American hardship and struggles of the time, related to the endless flow of the Mississippi River, from the view of a dock worker on a showboat. The song was first performed in the original stage production of Show Boat on December 27, 1927 by Jules Bledsoe.

However, the most famous rendition of it, one that is still noted today, was sung by Paul Robeson in James Whale's 1936 film version of Show Boat (Robeson had first performed the song in the 1928 London production of the show and in the 1932 Broadway revival, and had even recorded it with Paul Whiteman's orchestra back in 1928).

The song also has versions in Hindi, Bengali and Assamese sung by Bhupen Hazarika, who met Robeson while studying at Columbia University. The Assamese song is called Bistirno Parore, the Bengali version is Bistirno Dupare. The Hindi composition is known as "Ganga Behti Ho Kyon." Instead of the Mississippi, the song is dedicated to the Brahmaputra river in the Assamese version and the Ganges river in the Bengali and Hindi versions.

Ol' Man River (Showboat, 1936)-Paul Robeson

Bistirna Parare - Bhupen Hazarika