shape-note-lineage · jackson1933-white-spirituals

thirty-eight different books of song appeared in the four-shape notation between the years 1798 and 1855. ... One of them, the 1844 Sacred Harp, is enjoying a wide use today. It was the introduction of seven-shape notation practices in the 1840's that put an end in a short time to the making of new collections in the four-shape manner ... With the close of the Civil War a new era dawned in the singing practices of the rural South, an era that might be termed that of the gospel-hymn-tinged religious music in shape notation. ... It is the old sacred music of the country-South, which has grown and metamorphosed. And one of the early factors in the metamorphosis was the Sunday-school-gospel-hymn epidemic. Later factors were the secular popular songs, the glee club manner, and jazz. But the most important factor from the start in the development of this song as an independent type was doubtless the soon-to-become-practically-universal seven-shape notation