A Beginner’s Guide to Shape-Note Singing

1 A beginner s Guide to Shape-Note SingingHints, stories, advice, and minutiaeby Lisa GraysonFifth edition 2012 ContentsIntroduction; first impressions2 Basics of Shape-Note singing3 Four frequently asked questions4 The story of Shape-Note music5 What s with those shapes?6 Anatomy of a Sacred Harp tune7Do you have a vocal identity crisis?8 Intervals; sight-reading for beginners 9 Suggestions for song leading11 Leading your first some final leading suggestions13 Tips on beating time14 Why fa-sol-la?15 The true Sacred Harp16 Find a Singing near you 17 Further reading and listening18A beginner s Guide to Shape-Note SingingFifth edition, 2012 Letter-sized handout 2012 Lisa Grayson, except Suggestions for song leading (byBecky Browne), Why fa-sol-la? (by Sam Hinton), and The trueSacred Harp (by Clarke Lee). Contents may be reprinted, photocopied, or transmitted electroni-cally, in whole or in part, as long as the text is unedited and credit isgiven to the author.

2 First edition 1994, second edition 1997, third edition 2001,fourth edition 2009 Lisa of the material published in this book originally appeared in The Chicago Sacred Harp Newsletteras part of the author s series oftutorials for beginners. Reprinted by permission. Old Hundred reprinted with permission from The Sacred Harp, 1991 Sacred Harp Publishing to Becky Browne, Aldo Ceresa, Annie Grieshop, Judy Hauff,Melanie Hauff, Sam Hinton, Marcia Johnson, Ted Johnson, Jesse , Kathleen Kuiper, Clarke Lee, Steven Levine, Ted Mercer,Janet Miller, and the new singers who inspired this more information about this Guide , please contact the author,Lisa Grayson: you respond to the pulsing beat, the rich harmonies, thepowerful poetry, or the deep spiritual current of a SacredHarp Singing , you are joining generations of Americanswho found sustenance and joy in this musical booklet was compiled with an eye toward introducingyou to the basics of the music, so that you can fully enjoyand participate in many brand-new singers, your author fell in love withSacred Harp music from the very first song I heard at theUniversity of Chicago in February 1990, even though mynose was buried in the tunebook, and my mind in confu-sion, all afternoon.

3 I plowed on for months, often clueless,for I was moved by the sound in a way I am still unable toarticulate fully. Most of the entries in this booklet are theresult of my continuing Sacred Harp self-education, andshould be treated as such: a collection of tips and anec-dotes by an amateur with no formal musical training. Please write to me with any comments, and Sacred Harpquestions that remain unanswered, so that I can addressthem in future editions. Meanwhile, realize that you haveentered on a marvelous musical journey that will bringyou into the company of some of the finest people any-where Sacred Harp singers. Introduction2 IntroductionAbraham Lincoln, Shape-Note singer?Carl Sandburg wrote in The American Songbag: A famousoblong songbook of the pioneer days in the middle west wasthe Missouri Young Abraham Lincoln and hissweetheart Ann Rutledge sang from this book in theRutledge tavern in New Salem, Illinois, according to old set-tlers there.

4 Miss Rutledge s sister recalled,* They used tosing together. There was one song I didn t like to hear, andhe would sing it to tease me. He would tip back his chairand roar it out at the top of his voice, over and over again,just for fun. The song is as follows: When in death I shall calmlyrecline/ O, bear my heart to my mistress dear; / Tell her itlived on smiles and wine/ Of brightest hue while it lingeredhere; /Bid her not shed one tear of sorrow/ To sully a heartso brilliant and bright, /But healing drops of the red grapeborrow/To bathe the relic from morn to night. * Gallagher, Best Lincoln Stories, Tersely Told, s the audience?We don t perform; we sing as an end in itself. Anyone iswelcome to just sit and listen, but will be encouraged toborrow a tunebook and sing along. We have no auditions,no rehearsals if a song doesn t sound quite right, weshrug it off and move onto the next one.

5 All are welcometo join in. Why don t you applaud?Traditional singers regard applause during the Singing as ifit were applause during a worship service. We usuallyreserve applause for children and brand-new leaders. Evensingers who do not consider the Sacred Harp experience tobe a worship service acknowledge that we aren t perform-ing, so there s nothing, and no one, to commend. We won tshush you if you applaud, but please realize it s not part ofour tradition!What s with the gloom and doom?We can t deny it: Many songs in The Sacred Harptell of the coffin, earth, and winding sheet, as the otherwisesprightly tune Morning Sun (page 436) puts it. A majori-ty of the texts are hymn or camp meeting songs, religiousin nature; after all, Shape-Note music took root as a way toteach unlettered Americans how to worship through song. Some people are initially put off by many of the texts, par-ticularly those who prefer a spiritual practice that s allsweetness and froth.

6 Please know that some of the mostenthusiastic Sacred Harp singers including a large per-centage of people at any Singing in the North do notsubscribe to the same religious beliefs as the poets whowrote the texts, yet still appreciate their often austere andhaunting few words about first impressionsThe music we sing is from The Sacred Harp, a hymnal orig-inally published 150 years ago in a tradition older still. Itis passionate, spirited music that harks back to the dayswhen church music was intended to be sung by the con-gregation rather than the choir. Any type, quality, andrange of voice should find a comfortable and importantplace within its harmonies. The sacred harp is thehuman voice!Where should I sit?Sacred Harp music is divided into four parts: treble, alto,tenor (or lead), and bass. Depending on inclinations oftemperament, timbre, or necessity, women and men dou-ble on both the treble and tenor parts, with women usuallysinging an octave above the men.

7 Men with tenor voices in standard choral music willprobably be most comfortable Singing tenor or treble; bari-tones may like tenor or bass; basses well, no problem. Women with high voices may like the tenor or treble parts(in high register); altos might try that part, althoughwomen with a strong low register could also sing tenor ortreble in the men s in doubt sing tenor. That s where the melody feel free to move around to different parts to see whatfeels comfortable to you. The hollow square and song leadingSacred Harp music is traditionally sung in a hollowsquare with each voice part taking one of the four sidesand facing the center. The song leader stands in the center,beating out the rhythm and delighting in the surge of voic-es and blending of sound from all four sides. (Newcomersare often encouraged to stand in the middle to experi-ence the full power and exaltation of the music.)

8 Songleaders face the tenor section to help carry the melody ofthe song. Sacred Harp leading is egalitarian. Everyone has a chanceto lead the song of his or her choice. Newcomers are wel-come, and encouraged, to lead. Don t worry just face thetenor section and follow the hand motions of the front rowof tenors and you will be notesThe music in The Sacred Harpis written in standard nota-tion, except that the notes appear in four different shapes(see illustration); therefore the music is also called shapenote. Itinerant early American tunesmiths and singingmasters used this four-note system to teach sight readingto people without musical training. Most of us first learneda seven-note solfege system: do-re-mi-fa-sol-la-ti-do. TheSacred Harp uses the old four-note English system: fa-sol-la-fa-sol-la-mi-fa. With our Shape-Note system, there s no need to worryabout different keys.

9 The shapes ingeniously indicatewhere the different pitches are. The interval between, say,any faand the laabove it is always the same. Before Singing the words to a Sacred Harp tune, we singthe notes by Singing the syllables of the shapes to try tolearn our parts before tackling the words. People who hearSacred Harp music for the first time are often baffled whenthe entire room breaks out into what sounds like gibber-ish. New singers may be daunted by the shapes, especiallyon fast songs. Just remember, the person who now confi-dently sings mile-a-minute fa-sol-las had to learn themslowly, too. So jump in and sing la if you aren t sure;you ll be right 25% of the time! And the shapes thatseemed so strange at first will soon help you to sight sections above adapted from Steven Levine s A Sacred HarpGuide for Newcomers, in Prairie Harmony (Minnesota Sacred Harpnewsletter), Basics of Shape-Note singing3 Basics of Shape-Note singingFa, sol, la, mi the four basic notes in our Shape-Note major scale, written to show how the shapes appear in whole, half,quarter, and eighth between shapes are the same in any key!

10 Here, fa-las in Amajor (treble clef, left) and G minor (bass clef, right). Note triangle faand square sol la fasol la mi fa Why is everyone Singing at the top of their lungs?Sure enough, the symbols used to indicate loudness orsoftness in regular music are conspicuously absent in ourshape-note book. And the more experienced singers dosing at a consistent fortissimo that can be alarming to peo-ple hearing the music for the first time. Singers mayexchange knowing looks as a newcomer accidentallycaught between two legendarily loud voices beats a quickretreat to a quieter spot. Basically, in Sacred Harp Singing ,loud is good, and louder is better. And so you might hearsingers say good alto! after being blasted out of theirchairs by the low-timbred music is for singers, not for listeners. And for ama-teur, untrained voices at that. We set our chairs in a hollowsquare; there s no audience at our singings.