LIFT EVERY VOICE AND SING

In his highly iconic reinterpretation of the beloved “Negro National Anthem,” Collier was inspired by the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. Below the words of the song on each double-paged spread, a loose visual storyline follows a young boy through his day. Readers see him rising; going to school; with his class, visiting the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Ala., where a 1963 bombing killed four young girls; laying a wreath at Dr. Martin Luther King’s statue, which faces the church; and singing the words of Johnson’s momentous song. Two intentional unifying visual elements predominate: water (the slave ships of the Middle Passage, the symbolic drinking fountain of the Civil Rights era, a reflecting pool) and the often upraised, lustrous faces of black school children, sometimes profiled in the clouds. A bright blue predominates in intensely hued skies and school uniforms, while Collier’s highly recognizable style incorporates watercolor and collage to meaningful effect. (illustrator’s note, words with music) (Picture book/nonfiction. 4-8)