|
Sacred Harp
Sacred Harp singing is a tradition of sacred choral music which developed in New England and perpetuated in the American South. The name is derived from ''The Sacred Harp'', a historically important shape notes, shape-note tunebook printed in 1844; multiple subsequent revisions of the tunebook have remained in use since. Sacred Harp singing has roots in the singing schools that developed over the period 1770 to 1820 in and around New England, related development under the influence of "revival" services around the 1840s. This music was included in, and became profoundly associated with, books using the shape note style of notation popular in America in the 18th and early 19th centuries. Sacred Harp music is sung ''a cappella'' (voice only, without instruments) and originated as Protestant music. The contemporary Sacred Harp tradition includes singers and events in the American South (the historic locus of Sacred Harp singing) but also across the United States as well as several ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alabama Sacred Harp Singers
The Alabama Sacred Harp Singers were any of the informal groups participating in four recorded Sacred Harp singing sessions in Alabama in the 20th century, who were thereafter credited by that name as artists or performers in the published versions of those recordings. The informal nature of Sacred Harp singing makes it difficult to identify performers in the usual sense. The music is rarely performed by a well-rehearsed Musical ensemble, ensemble in concert or recording studio settings, but rather is sung by attendees at gatherings and conventions, usually open to the public. ''Alabama Sacred Harp Singers'' has referred to several such ad hoc groups of singers in Alabama. Recordings On April 16, 1928, a group led by J.C. Brown and S. Whit Denson recorded several songs for Columbia Records, amongst which were "Present Joys" and "Rocky Road", later included on the ''Anthology of American Folk Music''. In August 1942, Alan Lomax recorded the Alabama Sacred Harp Singing Convention i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Polyphony
Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice ( monophony) or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords ( homophony). Within the context of the Western musical tradition, the term ''polyphony'' is usually used to refer to music of the late Middle Ages and Renaissance. Baroque forms such as fugue, which might be called polyphonic, are usually described instead as contrapuntal. Also, as opposed to the ''species'' terminology of counterpoint, polyphony was generally either "pitch-against-pitch" / "point-against-point" or "sustained-pitch" in one part with melismas of varying lengths in another. In all cases the conception was probably what Margaret Bent (1999) calls "dyadic counterpoint", with each part being written generally against one other part, with all parts modified if needed in the end. This point-against-point conception is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fuguing Tune
The fuguing tune (often spelled fuging tune) is a variety of Anglo-American vernacular choral music. Fuguing tunes form a significant number of the songs found in the American Sacred Harp singing tradition. They first flourished in the mid-18th century and continue to be composed today. Description Fuguing tunes are sacred music, specifically, Protestant hymns. They are written for a four-part chorus singing ''a cappella''. George Pullen Jackson has described the fuguing tune as follows: A well-known fuguing tune that is typical of the form is "Northfield", written in 1800 by Jeremiah Ingalls. The text is by Isaac Watts: Variety in fuguing tunes George Pullen Jackson's description above gives a common form for a fuguing tune, but there are variations. Jackson describes the entrance order of the four parts as "bottom to top" (Bass-Tenor-Alto-Treble), but this is not the only possible order. Indeed, in the fuguing tunes printed in '' The Sacred Harp, 1991 edition'', it ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hymn
A hymn is a type of song, and partially synonymous with devotional song, specifically written for the purpose of adoration or prayer, and typically addressed to a deity or deities, or to a prominent figure or personification. The word ''hymn'' derives from Greek language, Greek (''hymnos''), which means "a song of praise". A writer of hymns is known as a hymnist. The singing or composition of hymns is called hymnody. Collections of hymns are known as hymnals or hymn books. Hymns may or may not include instrumental accompaniment. Polyhymnia is the Greco/Roman goddess of hymns. Although most familiar to speakers of English in the context of Christianity, hymns are also a fixture of other major religious groups, world religions, especially on the Indian subcontinent (''stotras''). Hymns also survive from antiquity, especially from Egyptian and Greek cultures. Some of the oldest surviving examples of notated music are hymns with Greek texts. Origins Ancient Eastern hymns include th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Church Service
A church service (or a worship service) is a formalized period of Christian communal Christian worship, worship, often held in a Church (building), church building. Most Christian denominations hold church services on the Lord's Day (offering Sunday morning and Sunday evening services); a number of traditions have mid-week services, while some traditions worship on a Saturday. In some Christian denominations, church services are held daily, with these including those in which the seven canonical hours are prayed, as well as the offering of the Mass (liturgy), Mass, among other forms of worship. In addition to this, many Christians Church attendance, attend services on holy days such as Christmas, Ash Wednesday, Good Friday, Feast of the Ascension, Ascension Thursday, among others depending on the Christian denomination. The church service is the gathering together of Christians to be taught the "Word of God" (the Christian Bible) and encouraged in their Faith in Christianity, fai ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Singing School
A singing school is a school in which students are taught to sightread vocal music. Singing schools are a long-standing cultural institution in the Southern United States. While some singing schools are offered for credit, most are informal programs. Historically, singing schools have been strongly affiliated with Protestant Christianity. Some are held under the auspices of particular Protestant denominations that maintain a tradition of a cappella singing, such as the Church of Christ and the Primitive Baptists. Others are associated with Sacred Harp, Southern Gospel, and similar singing traditions, whose music is religious in character but sung outside the context of church services. Often the music taught in singing schools uses shape note or "buckwheat" notation, in which the notes are assigned particular shapes to indicate their pitch. There are two main varieties: the four-note, or ''fasola'', system used in Sacred Harp music, and the seven-note system developed by Jess ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Protestant Christians
Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that emphasizes Justification (theology), justification of sinners Sola fide, through faith alone, the teaching that Salvation in Christianity, salvation comes by unmerited Grace in Christianity, divine grace, the priesthood of all believers, and the Bible as the sole infallible source of authority for Christian faith and practice. The five solae, five ''solae'' summarize the basic theological beliefs of mainstream Protestantism. Protestants follow the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began in the 16th century with the goal of reforming the Catholic Church from perceived Criticism of the Catholic Church, errors, abuses, and discrepancies. The Reformation began in the Holy Roman Empire in 1517, when Martin Luther published his ''Ninety-five Theses'' as a reaction against abuses in the sale of indulgences by the Catholic Church, which purported to offer the remission of the Purgatory, temporal ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sacred Music
Religious music (also sacred music) is a type of music that is performed or composed for religious use or through religious influence. It may overlap with ritual music, which is music, sacred or not, performed or composed for or as a ritual. Religious songs have been described as a source of strength, as well as a means of easing pain, improving one's mood, and assisting in the discovery of meaning in one's suffering. While style and genre vary broadly across traditions, religious groups still share a variety of musical practices and techniques. Religious music takes on many forms and varies throughout cultures. Religions such as Islam, Judaism, and Sinism demonstrate this, splitting off into different forms and styles of music that depend on varying religious practices. Sometimes, religious music uses similar instruments across cultures. The use of drums (and drumming), for example, is seen commonly in numerous religions such as Rastafari and Sinism, while wind instruments (the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pitch (music)
Pitch is a perception, perceptual property that allows sounds to be ordered on a frequency-related scale (music), scale, or more commonly, pitch is the quality that makes it possible to judge sounds as "higher" and "lower" in the sense associated with musical melody, melodies. Pitch is a major auditory system, auditory attribute of musical tones, along with duration (music), duration, loudness, and timbre. Pitch may be quantified as a frequency, but pitch is not a purely objective physical property; it is a subjective Psychoacoustics, psychoacoustical attribute of sound. Historically, the study of pitch and pitch perception has been a central problem in psychoacoustics, and has been instrumental in forming and testing theories of sound representation, processing, and perception in the auditory system. Perception Pitch and frequency Pitch is an auditory sensation in which a listener assigns musical tones to relative positions on a musical scale based primarily on their percep ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bass (vocal Range)
A bass is a type of classical male singing voice and has the lowest vocal range of all voice types. According to '' The New Grove Dictionary of Opera'', a bass is typically classified as having a vocal range extending from around the second E below middle C to the E above middle C (i.e., E2–E4). Its tessitura, or comfortable range, is normally defined by the outermost lines of the bass clef. Categories of bass voices vary according to national style and classification system. Italians favour subdividing basses into the ''basso cantante'' (singing bass), ''basso buffo'' (comical bass), or the dramatic ''basso profondo'' (deep bass). The American system identifies the bass-baritone, comic bass, lyric bass, and dramatic bass. The German '' Fach'' system offers further distinctions: Spielbass (Bassbuffo), Schwerer Spielbass (Schwerer Bassbuffo), Charakterbass (Bassbariton), and Seriöser Bass. These classifications tend to describe roles rather than singers: it is rare for a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tenor
A tenor is a type of male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the countertenor and baritone voice types. It is the highest male chest voice type. Composers typically write music for this voice in the range from the second B below middle C to the G above middle C (i.e. B2 to G4) in choral music, and from the second B flat below middle C to the C above middle C (B2 to C5) in operatic music, but the range can extend at either end. Subtypes of tenor include the ''leggero'' tenor, lyric tenor, spinto tenor, dramatic tenor, heldentenor, and tenor buffo or . History The name "tenor" derives from the Latin word '' tenere'', which means "to hold". As noted in the "Tenor" article at ''Grove Music Online'': In polyphony between about 1250 and 1500, the enor was thestructurally fundamental (or 'holding') voice, vocal or instrumental; by the 15th century it came to signify the male voice that sang such parts. All other voices were normally calculated in relation to the ten ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
