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Southwest Texas Sacred Harp Singing Convention
The Southwest Texas Sacred Harp Singing Convention is an annual gathering of shape note singers. Songs are sung a cappella from the '' Sacred Harp'' tune book. The convention was organized on April 28, 1900, at the Round Top School House, in Caldwell County, Texas, as the South Union Singing Convention. It is the second oldest continuous Sacred Harp convention in Texas. Several older conventions are no longer extant. During its history, the Southwest Texas Musical Convention has been held in at least a dozen Texas counties. Originally an annual two or three day convention, the delegates later changed to meet on each fifth weekend of the year. The Convention presently meets on Saturday and Sunday of fifth-Sunday weekends in the spring and fall. The spring session is held at Bethel Primitive Baptist Church, at McMahan, Texas. The fall session is held in Austin, Texas Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the county seat, seat and largest city of Tr ...
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Shape Note
Shape notes are a musical notation designed to facilitate congregational and social singing. The notation, introduced in late 18th century England, became a popular teaching device in American singing schools. Shapes were added to the noteheads in written music to help singers find pitches within major and minor scales without the use of more complex information found in key signatures on the staff. Shape notes of various kinds have been used for over two centuries in a variety of music traditions, mostly sacred music but also secular, originating in New England, practiced primarily in the Southern United States for many years, and now experiencing a renaissance in other locations as well. Nomenclature Shape notes have also been called character notes and patent notes, respectfully, and buckwheat notes and dunce notes, pejoratively. Overview The idea behind shape notes is that the parts of a vocal work can be learned more quickly and easily if the music is printed i ...
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A Cappella
''A cappella'' (, also , ; ) music is a performance by a singer or a singing group without instrumental accompaniment, or a piece intended to be performed in this way. The term ''a cappella'' was originally intended to differentiate between Renaissance polyphony and Baroque concertato musical styles. In the 19th century, a renewed interest in Renaissance polyphony, coupled with an ignorance of the fact that vocal parts were often doubled by instrumentalists, led to the term coming to mean unaccompanied vocal music. The term is also used, rarely, as a synonym for ''alla breve''. Early history A cappella could be as old as humanity itself. Research suggests that singing and vocables may have been what early humans used to communicate before the invention of language. The earliest piece of sheet music is thought to have originated from times as early as 2000 B.C. while the earliest that has survived in its entirety is from the first century A.D.: a piece from Greece called the ...
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Sacred Harp
Sacred Harp singing is a tradition of sacred choral music that originated in New England and was later perpetuated and carried on in the American South. The name is derived from ''The Sacred Harp'', a ubiquitous and historically important tunebook printed in shape notes. The work was first published in 1844 and has reappeared in multiple editions ever since. Sacred Harp music represents one branch of an older tradition of American music that developed over the period 1770 to 1820 from roots in New England, with a significant, 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 performed ''a cappella'' (voice only, without instruments) and originated as Protestant music. The music and its notation The name of the tradition comes from the title of the shape-not ...
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Caldwell County, Texas
Caldwell County is a county located in the U.S. state of Texas. As of the 2020 census, its population was 45,883. Its county seat is Lockhart. The county was founded in 1848 and named after Mathew Caldwell, a ranger captain who fought in the Battle of Plum Creek against the Comanches and against Santa Anna's armies during the Texas Revolution. Caldwell was also a signer of the Texas Declaration of Independence. Caldwell County is part of the metropolitan area. History Around 8000 BC, Paleo-Indians hunter-gatherers inhabited the area, and later Tonkawa, Karankawa and Comanche peoples became the first identified inhabitants. Caldwell County, of Green DeWitt's petition for a land grant to establish a colony in Texas, was approved by the Mexican government in 1825. In 1839, Edmund Bellinger became the first settler of Prairie Lea, the county's oldest town. Sam Houston named the town for his future wife Margaret Lea Houston. The legislature formed Caldwell County from ...
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Texas
Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by both List of U.S. states and territories by area, area (after Alaska) and List of U.S. states and territories by population, population (after California). Texas shares borders with the states of Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the west, and the Mexico, Mexican States of Mexico, states of Chihuahua (state), Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas to the south and southwest; and has a coastline with the Gulf of Mexico to the southeast. Houston is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in Texas and the List of United States cities by population, fourth-largest in the U.S., while San Antonio is the second most pop ...
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McMahan, Texas
McMahan is an unincorporated community in Caldwell County, in the U.S. state of Texas. According to the Handbook of Texas, the community had a population of 125 in 2000. It is located within the Greater Austin metropolitan area. History McMahan was originally called Wild Cat (also spelled Wildcat) and Whizzerville. Ambrose Tinney was given a land grant to establish the community in June 1832 and new settlers began arriving in the early 1840s. The Comanche Native American tribe attempted to kill Tinney but was unsuccessful. When it was known as Wildcat, it had an early store and a saloon. When it was called Whizzerville, there was a saloon on the opposite side of Tinney Creek. A post office was established in the community in 1898, but postal authorities thought the name Whizzerville was too long. They also accepted the name Raymondville. Residents chose the name McMahan to honor Edward J. McMahan, who built a store in the community in 1890. The settlement had two general stores ...
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Austin, Texas
Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the county seat, seat and largest city of Travis County, Texas, Travis County, with portions extending into Hays County, Texas, Hays and Williamson County, Texas, Williamson counties. Incorporated on December 27, 1839, it is the List of United States cities by population, 11th-most-populous city in the United States, the List of cities in Texas by population, fourth-most-populous city in Texas, the List of capitals in the United States, second-most-populous state capital city, and the most populous state capital that is not also the most populous city in its state. It has been one of the fastest growing large cities in the United States since 2010. Downtown Austin and Downtown San Antonio are approximately apart, and both fall along the Interstate 35 corridor. Some observers believe that the two regions may some day form a new "metroplex" similar to Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, Dallas and Fort Worth. Austin i ...
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Tunebook
A song book is a book containing lyrics for songs. Song books may be simple composition books or spiral-bound notebooks. Music publishers also produced printed editions for group singing Sing-along, also called community singing or group singing, is an event of singing together at gatherings or parties, less formally than choir singing. One can use a songbook. Common genres are folk songs, patriotic songs, kids' songs, spirituals .... Such volumes were used in the United States by piano manufacturers as a marketing tool. Song books containing religious music are often called hymnals; books containing the music for hymns with minimal, or no words, are sometimes called tune books. See also * Great American Songbook References External links {{music-publication-stub ...
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Wilson Marion Cooper
Wilson Marion Cooper (December 17, 1850 – July 17, 1916) of Dothan, Alabama, was a notable musician and music teacher within the Sacred Harp tradition. Marion Cooper was born in Henry County, Alabama, the son of W. S. and Elizabeth Ann (Oates) Cooper. He was a cousin of Alabama governor William C. Oates. Overview W. M. Cooper prepared a revision of B. F. White's tune book ''The Sacred Harp'' in 1902. In the revision, some songs were transposed to a different key, and some of the old tune names changed to descriptive titles based on the words of the hymns. Some old songs were removed and new songs added in their places. Perhaps the most significant contribution of his book was adding alto parts to the songs, the majority of which were originally written with three vocal lines (treble, tenor, bass). Cooper wrote most of the alto lines himself, though his daughter Anna Blackshear and other individuals made important contributions. Believing this was significant and unique, Coo ...
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