John Wesley Work, Jr.
August 6, 1871 or 1873 – September 7, 1925
John Wesley Work Jr. was an educator, musicologist, and is recognized as the first African-American collector of folk music. Work formed choral groups while attending Fisk University during the late 1800s and went on to study at Harvard at teach. By the turn of the century, he was collecting and later publishing slave songs and spirituals. One of those was “Go Tell It On The Mountain” which has become a Gospel standard that some believe he may have co-written. He later formed his own publishing company, Work Brothers and Hart, and was the director of the Fisk Jubilee Singers. Work’s son John Wesley Work III was a respected song collector and composer as well. John Wesley Work Jr. passed away on September 7, 1925.