A Cultural Critique Of The Song "Shut De Door" (Keep Out De Debil)

Edited by Azizi Powell

Let me start by saying that I think that "Shut De Door" (also given as "Shut De Do") is a song that has a very catchy tune and easy to learn lyrics that can be inspirational from a religious standpoint. But this post isn't about the musicality of that song.

From jump street I want to correct some erroneous beliefs about this song:
1. "Shut De Door" isn't a Caribbean folk song.

and

2. "Shut De Door" isn't a "Negro" Spiritual.

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"Shut De Door" wasn't composed by a person from the Caribbean. It was composed in 1982 by a White American singer/songwriter Randy Stonehill who is from California and has no Caribbean descent, at least none that is indicated in his biography. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randy_Stonehill

From
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/2011/11/11/my-top-10-randy-stonehill-songs/
"My Top 10 Randy Stonehill songs"

November 11, 2011 By Fred Clark

7. “Shut De Do”
The lyrics here are pure CCM, but the catchy calypso lilt and the good humor and musical playfulness life the song to another level. That playfulness also suggests that this “devil” Stonehill is singing of is more like the Old Scratch of folklore than the archenemy of Peretti-esque spiritual warfare. It reminds me of my favorite story about the Devil, one told by Tony Campolo: An old preacher wakes in the night and hears a noise. He turns on the light as sees Satan, the devil himself, standing at the foot of his bed. “Oh,” says the preacher, “it’s just you.” And he turns off the light and goes back to sleep."
-snip-
“CCM” = probably Contemporary Christian Music

"Old Scratch" is a nickname for the devil. Click http://www.answers.com/topic/old-scratch
American Heritage Dictionary for information about this nickname.

The erroneous belief that "Shut De Door" is an old song -that is older than 1982 when it was composed by White American Randy Stonehill- probably mostly comes from these two verses of that song:

When I was a baby child
(Shut de do, keep out the debil)
Good and bad was just a game
(Shut de do, keep the debil in de ni-eet)
Many years and many trials
(Shut de do, keep out the debil)
They proved to me they not the same
(Shut de do, keep the debil in de ni-eet)

....

My mama used to sing this song
(Shut de do, keep out the debil)
Oh poppa used to sing it too
(Shut de do, keep the debil in de ni-eet)
Jesus called and took them home
(Shut de do, keep out the debil)
And so I sing the song for you
(Shut de do, keep the debil in de ni-eet)

http://www.metrolyrics.com/shut-de-do-lyrics-randy-stonehill.html

But my main problem with the "Shut De Door" song, besides the false attributions of the song to Caribbean folk music or African American Spirituals, is exactly the "good humor and musical playfulness" of Randy Stonehill's renditions of his composition. It appears to me -from watching two YouTube videos of Randy Stonehill singing that song (particularly the video given below from the 1990s) that Stonehill is making fun of Black Caribbean culture. In his prefacing remarks in that videotaped concert it appears to me that Stonehill makes fun of Black Caribbean pronunciation, and-by extension Caribbean folk beliefs. Here's that video followed by my transcription of Randy Stonehill's introductory comments to his rendition of his song:

shut de do stonehill



newlifelooks. Uploaded on May 21, 2009

1990 look for diane wigstone!
-snip-
Diane Wigstone is an American actress and director known for Christian themed productions.

Transcription with my comments in brackets [beginning at .34]

“Because the thing is we sound too polite...What better opportunity than now to go native with Uncle Ran? [When he says that the camera pans to one of the apparently very few People of Color in the audience. Then Stonehill sings some nonsensical words in Caribbean tune and says] It’s not “Shut The Door”, darn it, let’s regress. Just un-learn many many things...It’s “Shut de door”. "Shut de door". “Shut de door”. Keep out de debbil". [Audience members are shown laughing -at this accent or the words of the song?] Randy continues by saying laughingly “How’s the soup?”

[He and the audience laugh and then Randy says] “With this new exotic vision let us go forth, even now, and begins to sing the song...
-snip-
It should also be noted that in the beginning of Randy Stonehill's singing this song, silhouette images of people dancing [Black people?] in a Hip-Hop fashion. The people are wearing necklaces. At least one man is wearing a large chain link necklace, a style that was popular among African American Hip-Hop music lovers.

In case the reference to "going native", and the question "Where's the soup?" went over some people's head, I've no doubt that those are nods to the stereotypical images of Black Africans cooking people in a huge iron pot. I've also no doubt that Stonehill's exhortation to his White audience to "regress and unlearn many things" was at the very least a back handed compliment to the supposedly simple, uncomplicated religious beliefs of folks "close to nature".

Here's a serious question for you - Doesn't Randy Stonehill's introductory remarks if not his actual rendition of his "Shut De Door" song have elements of black faced minstrelsy? Black people's superstitions are so funny. Ha. Ha. Ha. Never mind that some of those folk beliefs originated with Elizabethan European superstitions. Light the candle. Everything's alright (or "Everyting" as I found this word given on one lyric website for this song).

because "Shut De Door" has such a catchy tune and such easy to learn words written in call & response format, I'm not surprised that that song appears to be a standard for so many American school choirs. I'm glad that those choirs seem to take a much more formal approach to the song, as is the case with these singers:

Shut De Do



D Van
-snip-
The choir member introducing the song invites the audience to "Join us In the Caribbean with the song “Shut de do”.

Like most YouTube viewer comment threads for this song, a number of the commenters critiqued the choir's rendition of this song, indicating that their choir sang it better. But there's one comment from that viewer comment thread which I won't quote because of its profanity which points out the choir's choice of "fake" Caribbean attire- the floral shirts that Americans seem to think Caribbean people and Hawaiian people wear.

I will quote two other comments from that viewer comment thread that reinforce my concerns that 1. people may confuse this song with a "Negro" Spiritual (because of its call & response textual structure) and people may think that all people from the Caribbean use Patois or Creole pronunciations or always use those pronunciations.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_eUKhTC_C8
jesssicaax, 2007
..."The only problem was that we went faster since our principal was gonan cut it form the program whatever. You guys suck Its suppose to sound jhamaican not white -_- Middle schools did better then you guys."

**
Jarrod Freeman, 2009
"this a negro spiritual. the intonation is too correct and perfect for this type of song but whatver the conductor wanted goes"
-snip-
Did you catch the inaccurate beliefs that there are no White Jamaicans, that all White people sound alike, and that all Jamaicans sound alike? smh [Shake my head (in exasperation and disdain)].

Also, besides spelling the long retired referent "Negro" with a small n [which is a big no no], did you catch the implication that White people's pronunciation is "correct and perfect", and other pronunciations are... what? ...Certainly they're not as correct or perfect.

It's interesting to me that all the YouTube videos that I've found to date of this song feature White singers and White choirs. I wonder why that is, and I wonder what Caribbean people think of this song.

I strongly believe that people who teach this song need to make sure that their students and their audiences know that this song was composed with a Calypso tune "in the manner of a Caribbean religious song" but it's not a "real" Caribbean song - if by "real" you mean a song whose composition is unknown but which originated in one of the Caribbean cultures or a song with a known composer of Caribbean descent. Mind you, because there are White people, Chinese people, East Indian people etc. from the Caribbean, composers of Caribbean songs need not be of some African descent.

Oh and I wish that choirs singing this song would refrain from wearing fake Caribbean shirts. But compared with other things related to this song, that's just a small matter.

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RELATED LINK
Click http://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2014/01/the-devil-jumbies-and-shut-de-doorkeep.html for a companion post on the superstitions that are referred to in the "Shut De Door" song.

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Thanks to those who are quoted in this post.

Thanks also to the publishers of these videos on YouTube.

Thanks for visiting pancocojams.

Visitor comments are welcome.