Spirit of The Century
“For more than seventy-five years since my Gospel-singing, schoolteacher mother introduced me to the Five Blind Boys from Alabama, we have been graced with their magnificent music, their thundering, harmonic power that moves soul and spirit. They’ve stood the test of time and they’re still striking hot iron with every note. Get on board with Spirit of the Century—people get ready, this is the train that’s comin’!”
Taj Mahal
In 1939, a group of boys between ten and sixteen years old slipped out of the Alabama Institute for the Negro Deaf and Blind in Talladega and sang on street corners for donations. They called themselves the Happy Land Jubilee Singers. Over the next eight decades they would become the Blind Boys of Alabama — six Grammy awards, collaborations with Peter Gabriel, Lou Reed, Ben Harper, and Mavis Staples, and a place in the Gospel Music Hall of Fame.
Spirit of the Century is their memoir, told in their own voices with Preston Lauterbach. It covers the full arc: the Jim Crow South where they learned to navigate a world designed to exclude them, the gospel highway where they competed fiercely with rival quartets for crowds and survival, the lean decades when gospel fell out of fashion, and the unlikely late-career renaissance that brought them to Carnegie Hall and the New Orleans Jazz Fest. It is a book about music, but also about endurance — what it costs and what it yields.
Winner of the ARSC Certificate of Merit for Best Historical Research in Recorded Blues, R&B, Gospel, Hip Hop or Soul Music, 2025.
“This is a story you WANT to know. If you know anything about The Blind Boys of Alabama—spirit, heart, and determination go into this fabulous blend of voices and music. And you will understand the struggle, not just theirs but all of ours.”
Whoopi Goldberg
“This is an extraordinary story of an extraordinary group—a wonderful account of how these young men conquered their difficulties to become one of the most legendary and inspirational groups of our time.”
Peter Gabriel
“Gospel fans will have a hard time putting down this crowd-pleaser.”
Publisher's Weekly
“The Blind Boys of Alabama have enjoyed an astonishing career marked by an unwavering work ethic, inspired collaboration, and mesmerizing live performances… A riveting and exciting read.”
Booklist
“A riveting celebration of the Blind Boys of Alabama’s glorious and often unpredictable musical journey.”
Arts Fuse
“Every page of Spirit of the Century teems with stories of the group’s challenges and triumphs.”
No Depression
"Spirit of the Century is as entertaining and filled with joie de vivre as the Blind Boys themselves."
Living Blues
“[The book] offers a rousing view of the old gospel highway…and provides a rare chance to pause and take stock for a group that has been moving forward for almost 90 years.”
Washington Post
Media
Current lead singer Ricky McKinnie and author Preston Lauterbach, who co-wrote Spirit of the Century: Our Own Story with the Blind Boys of Alabama, tell the incredible, unlikely, inside history of this ensemble that is still going strong more than 85 years after first sneaking out of their group home to sing.