I recently re-read Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain and came across this passage written from the perspective of the fiddler, Stobrod.
“One thing he discovered with a great deal of astonishment was that music held for him more than just pleasure. There was meat to it. The grouping of sounds, their forms in the air as they rang out and faded, said something comforting to him about the rule of Creation. What the music said was that there is a right way for things to be ordered so that life might not always be just tangle and drift, but have a shape, an aim. It was a powerful argument that life did not just happen.”
When I read this, I immediately thought it could have been written about the tradition and sound of Sacred Harp singing.
A Sacred Harp refers to our vocal cords: an instrument each of us is endowed with. And the style of Shape Note singing is an expression of our life force. It’s not a performance. It’s not entertainment. Not about technique or quality of voice. It is not conducted. The singers are not a choir. There is no leader.
It’s an experience shared in community – a group of people expressing their faith in song with a full voice. If you can hear your neighbor to your right or left you are not singing loud enough.
Folks take turns in the hollow of the square. Nine-year-olds as well as ninety-nine-year-olds all have a chance to pick a song and be in the center of the music, the center of the sonic whirlwind, the rage of shifting chords. Open 5ths where you hear the harmonics both the major and minor.
Shape Note singing began in New England in the 1700s to teach, primarily, church congregations how to sing. The first publication of Sacred Harp music was in 1801. The style and teaching found a home in the South. It’s been said that in the years leading up to the Civil War the two books most commonly found in Southern homes were a Bible and a Sacred Harp Hymnbook.
Notes of the scale were given shapes, and those shapes were given syllables. However, of the seven notes in a scale only four shapes were assigned. Notes were understood in relationship to one another: the intervals between the notes, rather than the absolute value of any one note.
For me, seeing the octave I knew as CDEFGABC or DoReMeFaSoLaTiDo designated fa so la fa so la ti fa created a full stop on my brain’s ability to understand the system. I spent many sleepless nights trying to get past this concept and failed miserably.
But loving the sound, I carried on relying on my ear rather than my intellect.
The Women’s Singing Circle loves this singing too. Some of the first pieces we learned came from the soundtrack of Cold Mountain: Idumea, Wayfaring Stranger, I’m Going Home. We found the fierce lyrics paired with strident rhythms and angular harmony cathartic.
Tonight, we’re offering our take on Shape Note. A confession is in order: it is not a true-to-form rendering.
- One, we are only a 3-part group. We are singing the tenor melody and the bass and treble harmonies – completely disregarding the alto part.
- Two, we are not grouped in the traditional square, rather a lopsided holy triangle.
- Three, we are not going to sing the shapes at the beginning of each song.
- Four, we have already chosen the key that works best for us rather than having designated pitchers choosing a key of convenience just before the singing begins.
- Five, we will have some accompaniment on a couple of the songs.
- And Six, it is kinda a performance. You have our permission to clap.
So, what then are we doing that is within the tradition?
We are giving it everything we’ve got. The values that inform our circle are similar to Shape Note. All are welcome, as long as you are a woman. We sing because we like to sing, and we offer our songs to God.
Like the Charles Fraizer character, we believe that life did not just happen. We believe music is a divine gift lifting our hearts, minds, and souls to the creator God. And we believe that God loves our sacred hearts, our beating pulses, and the voices we raise in song.