Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet

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“Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet”
Song by Gavin Bryars
Genre	Minimalistic Neoclassical
Length	25',40',60',74'
Writer	Gavin Bryars

Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet is a piece of music composed by Gavin Bryars in 1971. It is based around a recorded loop of an un-named tramp singing a brief stanza; eventually rich harmonies are played by a live ensemble of strings and brass, always increasing in density. The recording was originally made for use in a documentary by Alan Power which chronicled street life in London. Later when listening to the recordings, Bryars noticed that the clip was in tune with his piano, and that it looped well into 13 bars.

For the first recording as an LP, Bryars was limited to a duration of 25 minutes for the piece; upon the invention of cassette tape technology, Bryars made a 60 minute version of the piece, and for CD, a 74 minute version.

The studio in which Bryars made the piece was next to a busy art studio. When constructing the piece, Bryars unintentionally left the loop playing and his door open during a lunch break; when he returned, the usually lively studio was quiet, and some people were crying - Bryars attributed this to the somber mood created by the tramp's singing. The tramp, whose voice was featured in the recording, died before Bryars had finished constructing the piece.^[1]

A new recording of this work was made in the 1990s with Tom Waits singing along with the original recording of the tramp during the final section.

The piece has been performed with accompanying dance. [1] Its first performance was at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in December 1972, and it was first recorded for Brian Eno's Obscure label in 1975.

In 1993 William Forsythe used the piece as the score for his short work Quintett for the Frankfurt Ballet.

Christian Rock group Jars of Clay also recorded a version on their 2003 album, Who We Are Instead.

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