Rebekah Presson Mosby

From Amazon.com:
A very smartly assembled two-disc compilation of African American poetry, Our Souls Have Grown Deep Like the Rivers digs deep to unearth a wealth of unheard and rare material spanning almost the entire 20th century. The collection features some of the greatest names in black literature, and--as Al Young points out in the liner notes--it can be a revelation to hear, for instance, Harlem Renaissance leader Langston Hughes pronounce the word "Harlem" with utter pride and joy. Other notables include Ishmael Reed, Nikki Giovanni, Gwendolyn Brooks, Gil Scott-Heron, Maya Angelou, Rita Dove, W.E.B. DuBois, the Last Poets, Public Enemy, Wanda Coleman... You get the picture--it's sort of a greatest-hits of black spoken word. But it's too scattershot a set to be called definitive--anyone can bemoan the absence of this or that poet--but it is also a tremendously interesting document of hope and loss and rage and joy and perseverance--and, above all, remarkable poetry, works that each gain from the original authors' reading of their poem. Amiri Baraka's sonorous recitation of "Bang, Bang Outishly," a beat-era work dedicated to Thelonious Monk, is worth the price of admission by itself. --Mike McGonigal