Old Man River | In memory of Paul Robeson | Me and my Ngoni (my Senegalese Harp) Thakurpukur, Kolkata, May 2025 Old Man River is a show tune from the 1927 musical Show Boat with music by Jerome Kern and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, who wrote the song in 1925. The song contrasts the struggles and hardships of African Americans with the endless, uncaring flow of the Mississippi River. Beginning about 1938 to the end of his career, Paul Robeson changed a few of the lyrics of "Ol' Man River" when