A while back I lamented to Sacred Harp singers Leigh Cooper and Mark Godfrey (wife and husband; some of us come in couples) over no longer being able to sing face to face, in one another’s company (instead, having to sing along alone at home via Zoom). Leigh took my lament to Paul Kostka, who acts as arranger for our twice-monthly singings in Palo Alto, and they picked a day (9/10) and time (11 am). That turned out to be the exact time I was scheduled to get flu and covid vaccinations, and Mark’s schedule that day precluded his taking part at all. (Juggling schedules is hellish).
But the plan eventually came together, with many singers invited to take part, but only four actually able to turn up on 9/10 : Leigh, Paul, Lorraine Sohlberg Kostka (yes, another couple), and me. Four is the magic number — SH is 4-part a cappella music — and together the four of us could cover the treble, alto, tenor, and bass lines. I’m a male treble; in the world of ordinary vocal music, I’m a natural baritone (roughly corresponding to SH tenor), but astonishingly I can do this other stuff too and love the lines I get. And when I have a voice (various degrees of laryngitis have dogged me in recent weeks), I am wildly, fiercely shake-the-windows loud.
But what is so touching is that the whole event was a gift to me. Causing me to spill over with joy at being back in the community — SH is communitarian, elaborately egalitarian, and comfortable with difference (I am often adorned in way-gay apparel) — with these wonderful people.
Doing it by the book. At small singings (like this minimal one), the control of the singing passes though each of the singers, one by one around the room. When you’re up as leader, you choose the song (give its name and page number in The Sacred Harp book), specify which verses you want and what repeats you want (note: once a song has been picked, it can’t be picked again by any later leader). Someone who’s good at this “pitches the song”, picks a key to sing in (the keys in the book are chosen to make printers’ lives easier, but we negotiate on the actual keys). The leader then beats the rhythm with one hand (there’s a technique for this) and sings — first “singing the shapes” — solfeggio — using the scale note-names FA SO LA and MI, each with a shape for the notes (everybody’s practicing the melody and rhythm) — and then singing the song with the text added to the tune.
And then the next person becomes the leader, and we begin again.
[It’s an old tradition: this brand of shapenote singing gets its own book in the early 19th century, with roots going back to pre-Revolutionary America. It’s a living tradition, with new editions of the book coming out at irregular intervals. The current edition (the third one in my singing career) came out in 2025; it has songs in it by many people I know, including a new one by Mark Godfrey.]
Meanwhile, back at Avant on 9/10, the four of us sang for about an hour. With only four people, your turn to lead comes around unsettlingly often: you realize that everyone else is staring at you expectantly, because it’s your turn again and you haven’t chosen anything. Scurry scurry scurry. And then we ended with the standard Palo Alto closing song: Christian’s Farewell (SH 347), an old tune, but with a 1989 text. (Brethren, farewell, / I do you tell. / I’m sorry to leave, / I love you so well.)
Beyond the great bulk of songs welcoming death as a release from the pains of life in favor of a joyous afterlife in Jesus Christ — mocked by a friend as Whoopee! I’m dying! music — there are other themes, and a great variety in musical form (lots of really splendid fugal music). Readers who know something about my beliefs and moral concerns will find my passionate involvement with this stark Protestant fundamentalist theology hard to understand; it really is an alien world for me. But the power of the music moves me, and the deeply earnest stance of the believers commands respect (though not assent).
Bonus story. People often wonder how someone gets into SH singing. There are many stories; very commonly, it was a long-standing family practice. In any case, singers often share these stories, as the Palo Alto singers once did on an anniversary of the group’s founding.
It came to me. And I began my story with simple fact: One summer I had this boyfriend … So it was, and Dean thought I would like the singing that his housemate was setting up in Columbus OH. Dean was right; it was like discovering ice cream. And it came with a whole community, something that was wonderful all on its own.
In my world, old boyfriends go on to become affectionate friends for life, as Dean did for me. Well, one of them stuck, and Jacques and I pledged to be together in sickness and in health, until death parted us, which it did, and before actual (same-sex) marriage was available. (Dean and Tim, on the other hand, did the whole marriage thing beautifully, and I’m sorry I couldn’t be there for them)
The important part of the story is that Dean gave me Sacred Harp singing.
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