Origin: To Canaan's Land I'm on My Way

Subject: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 15 Jan 99 - 10:37 AM

All I know about this song is the Smith family of Coventry, England, used to sing it (probably still do!). Can anyone tell me more about it?

Thanks, Steve

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Wolfgang
Date: 15 Jan 99 - 12:18 PM

Steve,
perhaps this helps, perhaps not: go here

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Barbara
Date: 15 Jan 99 - 12:23 PM

Wolfgang, that's not any Canaan's Land that I know. The one in the database is the one I know and I always thought it was Appalachian, maybe a Shapenote. Is it the same one, Steve?
Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Dale Rose
Date: 15 Jan 99 - 12:31 PM

There are two US Gospel songs with similar themes, Camping in Canaan's Land by Bartlett and Brumley with a chorus which begins Every day I'm camping in the land of Canaan, And with wondrous beauties grand, and Golden's Where the Soul of Man Never Dies, frequently called Canaan's Land because it starts out, To Canaan's Land, I'm on my way, where the soul of man never dies.

I haven't got time right now, but let me know if it is either of these. And, for that matter, there may be others poised at their keyboards ready to enter your song at this very moment, whether it be either of those, or yet another Canaan's Land. That is what is so nice about the Mudcat.

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Dale Rose
Date: 15 Jan 99 - 12:36 PM

See? What'd I tell ya? Two responses while I was typing out mine! I checked out the database, the one there is not credited, but it is Golden's. The one Wolfgang mentions is the third one!

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From:
Date: 15 Jan 99 - 09:07 PM

Steve, are you perhaps thinking of I'M ON MY WAY, which I have a fragment recording by Erik Darling? The first stanza goes

I'm on on my way to Canaan land (3x)/I'm on my way, Lord, I'm on my way

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 18 Jan 99 - 03:45 AM

Hi folks!

Sorry, I shouldn't have een so vague ... but maybe I wouldn't have got so many replies?

The one I meant is in the DT as 'Canaan's Land', but I've always known it as 'The soul of man'; I looked it up before I posted my question, and thought I should use the kname it's known by there. [Oh, look what I've gone and typed! My brain doesn't start work until around 9.30, and it's only half past eight here.] It's the one that starts 'To Canaan's Land I'm on my way, where the soul of man never dies'. That's Golden's ... who he?

Thanks in advance,
Steve

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Dale Rose
Date: 18 Jan 99 - 10:51 AM

Sorry, but all I know is his name, William M. Golden, and that he also wrote A Beautiful Life,the one that begins:

Each day I'll do a golden deed
By helping those who are in need
My life on earth is but a span
And so I'll do the best I can

I'll see what I can dig up.

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: MMario
Date: 19 Jan 99 - 10:27 AM

the song I learned as "Canaan's Land" goes something like:

So long , my friend, I'm bound for Canaan
I'm trav'ling through the wilderness
Your company has been delightful
You do not give my mind distress...

haven't sung it in years - can probably come up with the rest of the lyrics if someone wants them.

MMario

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From:
Date: 04 Jan 00 - 12:06 AM

I've been looking for this song since it was sung at the KC Ren-fest lo these many years past - could you mail me the lyrics? I think I still remember the tune.

I realise this whole thread is a blast from the past for you but it was the only thing that the search turned up. Pleeezzze . . . . Shard

[e-mail]

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 04 Jan 00 - 12:57 AM

"Where the Soul of Man Never Dies" is sung by a trio from Beech Creek, North Carolina, on Volume 2 of Folk-Legacy's The Traditional Music of Beech Mountain, NC set, now available as "custom cassettes" with booklets containing extensive headnotes and complete texts of all the songs.

"I'm on my way" (the "Lord, I'm on my way" mentioned above by anonymous as from an Erik Darling fragment) was recorded for Folk-Legacy by Joe Hickerson, former head of the Archive of Folk Culture at the Library of Congress. Cassette C-39: Joe Hickerson, with a Gathering of Friends.

Sandy

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 04 Jan 00 - 01:02 AM

Darling's is the standard major key version. Joe's is in minor. He writes that he got it from the movie "Elmer Gantry"...and I LOVE it!

Rick

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Stewie
Date: 04 Jan 00 - 02:24 AM

The Darling fragment may be part of what the Carter Family recorded as 'On My Way to Canaan's Land' in 1930. The chorus is the same as that indicated by anonymous above and the verses are along the lines 'If father (mother, sister) won't go, it won't hinder me' and 'We'll be baptised in Jesus' name'.

Stewie.

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Joe Offer
Date: 04 Jan 00 - 03:48 AM

Shardarch, I can't tell which of several songs you wanted. a search of our database for canaan* comes up with several that have the word "Canaan" or "Canaan's" - if you can't figure out how to search, click here to do it the lazy way. I'm glad you brought this thread up again - I missed it the first time around.
If our database or the links in the messages above don't have the song you want, post a message here. Somebody's bound to have the lyrics.
-Joe Offer (also sent e-mail to Shardarch)-

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From:
Date: 08 Jan 00 - 12:42 AM

See, this is what comes of trying not quoting the source. The lyrics I was remember are these:

Farewell my friends, I'm bound for Canaan,
I'm traveling though the wilderness,
Your company has been delighful,
You do not leave my mind distressed.
I go away this time to leave you
Perhaps never to meet again,
But if we never have that pleasure
I hope we meet in Canaan's land.

That's the chorus. There was stuff in between (or at least I think there was) but I couldn't hear it properly.
Anyone?

Shard

[e-mail]

Subject: Bound for Canaan - Parting Friends (Sacred Harp)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 08 Jan 00 - 02:53 AM

The one Shard is talking about is the one I recall, but I can't think of where I've heard it. It's a great parting song. There's a somewhat similar song in the database called VANCE SONG but I don't think that it's related - it's just that meeting on Canaan's shore is a common theme (maybe I'm wrong, though). Mmario, can you come up with the rest of the song.
Anybody?
-Joe Offer-

Click for related thread

I found quite a bit more. Apparently, it's a song called Parting Friends (click) from the 1991 Sacred Harp. Anybody got the book? Can you post the tune and the full lyrics? Here are the lyrics that I found:

PARTING FRIENDS
(John G. McCurry, 1842)

Farewell, my friends, I'm bound for Canaan,
I'm trav'ling through the wilderness;
Your company has been delightful,
You, who doth leave my mind distressed.
I go away, behind to leave you,
Perhaps never to meet again,
But if we never have the pleasure,
I hope we'll meet on Canaan's land.

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: MMario
Date: 08 Jan 00 - 11:39 AM

I've never heard more then those lyrics sung, but I HAVE heard it arranged so that it was done almost as a round.

Subject: Parting Friends & Canaan's Land
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 09 Jan 00 - 03:21 AM

Caroline and I learned the "Farewell, my friends, I'm bound for Canaan" from friends at the Indian Neck gathering. I see you've located the version in the Sacred Harp Online (fasola) web site. I know of no other. In my 1960 copy of Original Sacred Harp (also in the 1966 edition) "Parting Friends" (p. 521) is an entirely different song. Two observations: Caroline prefers to sing the second line of the song as "You who leave my heart at rest." She doesn't like the "distressed" in the original. Also, to extend the song, she likes to borrow at least one of the verses from "Watfaring Stranger" which scans nicely to the tune:

I know dark clouds will gather 'round me;
I know my way is rough and steep.
But beauteous field lie just beyond me,
Where souls redeemed their vigil keep.

You're welcome to do what you will with these two non-traditional changes. The "Vance Song" mentioned in the thread seems unrelated except in that it is a "goodnight" that offers a similar farewell in those later verses.

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: MMario
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 07:41 AM

The toto of the words I know are essentially as quoted by Shadach above, or by Joe in "Parting Friends". The way I usually heard it done was repeating the whole thing twice, first time in unison and the second time with harmonies. have also heard it with mutiple repititions, almost buyt not quite done as a round.

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Joe Offer
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 03:37 PM

refresh - Still hoping somebody can do a MIUDI of the tune. If you can't do MIDITEXT, you can click on my name below and e-mail me a MIDI or ABC or Noteworthy transcription.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: MMario
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 04:05 PM

this is not quite the way I know it but very close.

http://www.nettuno.it/bologna/iperbole/daltroca/midi.html

parting friends aka Canaan's land

MMario

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: MMario
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 04:09 PM

-gee- I woulda done a "miudi" if I knew how-- *grin*

I will send a miditext once I get a chance. As I said, I need to go over what is out there... - and get out from behind this blasted content filter as there were several other sites that came up on the search that I couldn't get to ......

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Jack The Lad
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 04:13 PM

I just have to add this. Canaan's land is rapidly turning green, as we have just had a week of blessed rain. I know, I live here.

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From:
Date: 12 Jan 00 - 01:37 AM

Nothing new to add - I was just amazed (as I frequently am) at the quantity of learned, friendly people. Is it me or is the virtual world a better place than the real one sometimes?

Shard

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land; Parting Friends
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 09 Dec 07 - 04:04 PM

Lyr. Add: PARTING FRIENDS

1.
Farewell, my lovely friends, farewell,
We must be separated,
In different regions we must dwell,
Distantly situated.
O let this not our friendship chill,
Though mountains rise between us,
May truth and justice guide our will,
And God from evil screen us.

Southern Harmony No. 35b. Printed with score. Are there several versions of the lyrics, or is this a separate verse from the one posted by Joe?
Parting Friends

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Murray MacLeod
Date: 09 Dec 07 - 05:34 PM

there used to be a superb version of "Where the soul of man never dies" on YouTube, sung acapella by Tony Rice and Ricky Skaggs.

unfortunately, it seems to have been pulled, no doubt for "terms of use violations".

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Jack Campin
Date: 09 Dec 07 - 08:22 PM

On that Southern Harmony page, the MIDI and the score agree (something I'd never heard before), but the MP3 is the words of "Bound for Canaan" to a different tune entirely (the one I've heard people sing).

That page also gives you an error when you try to go back to the index - maybe it's a provisional version that has been abandoned?

Subject: RE: Canaan's Land: info wanted
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 09 Dec 07 - 09:09 PM

Click on Contents at the bottom of 35b and get a broken link message with link to Southern Harmony. Go to the page number list, and click on 35 (no 35b) and musical score to Parting Friends appears, but no verse underneath it, and no link to MP3, etc. Can't explain the MP3.
Or change from 35b to 35.