Sand Mountain Sacred Harp Singers

For generations, families from the Sand Mountain area of northeastern Alabama have raised their voices in song, carrying on the tradition of glorious, unaccompanied four-part harmony singing from The Sacred Harp, a beloved southern shape note songbook first published in 1844 and still sung from today.

Listen

[audio:http://media.rvanews.com/FolkFestival/audio/HowLong.mp3|artists=Sand Mountain Sacred Harp Singers|titles=How Long]
  • Shape Note Singing
  • Sand Mountain, Alabama

From the Dean’s Desk »

Sacred Harp is an old method of music notation used for singing hymns, a method that was largely wiped out and replaced by European hymn styles in most of America in the nineteenth century. Just about everywhere except Sand Mountain. This music is not meant to be performed (peculiar, then, that they would perform at a festival) and is much more raucous than your gentle, beautiful, church hymn.

  • Watch a related video on YouTube (Note: those featured in the video are not Sand Mountain Sacred Harp Singers — this is just intended to give an idea of what they sound like.)

Professional bio

For generations, families from the Sand Mountain area of northeastern Alabama have raised their voices in song, carrying on the tradition of glorious, unaccompanied four-part harmony singing from The Sacred Harp, a beloved southern shape note songbook first published in 1844 and still sung from today.

  • error

    Report an error

Notice: Comments that are not conducive to an interesting and thoughtful conversation may be removed at the editor’s discretion.

  1. Nate Mathews on said:

    Thanks Dean for pointing this out! If you are in need of further explanation of Sacred Harp Music, my friend has this website…

    http://rvanews.com/features/sacred-harp-old-time-music-big-time-sound/22842

    And if you want to pass event info on for this Saturday via The Facebook,

    http://www.facebook.com/pages/Richmond-Sacred-Harp-Singers/136182573704#!/event.php?eid=145673678809019&ref=mf

  2. Was surfing around just now and came upon this page… and oh, how weird. I’m pretty sure the person leading in the photo above is me. You never know what you’ll find, and where it will turn up, on the Web…

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked with an asterisk (*).

Or report an error instead