When the Saints Go Marching In

"When the Saints Go Marching In" is an African-American spiritual of unknown authorship that became the anthem of New Orleans jazz. This page has the When the Saints Go Marching In chords and a backing track you can slow down, speed up and move to any key.

Who wrote "When the Saints Go Marching In"

Nobody knows. The song grew out of the gospel tradition of the American South around the turn of the twentieth century, and no composer or lyricist has ever been credited with it. It has words: a hymn about the day of judgement, sung in many versions with verses added and dropped from one congregation to the next. From the church it passed to the brass bands of New Orleans, where it became one of the pieces played on the way back from a funeral, when the band turns from a dirge to a celebration.

Because it is traditional, the song is in the public domain, and it has been printed, arranged and recorded under many slightly different titles, "When the Saints" among them.

Recordings that made it a standard

• Louis Armstrong and His Orchestra (Decca, 1938) — the record that took the hymn out of the church and the street parade and made it a jazz standard; Armstrong sings it as a sermon before the band takes over.
• Bill Haley and His Comets, "The Saints Rock 'n Roll" (1956) — the tune turned into rock and roll, which carried it to an audience that had never heard a brass band.

Since then it has been played by every traditional jazz band, sung at football grounds and taught to beginners on almost every instrument, because the melody needs only a handful of notes.