Early American composers "were the products of a homegrown system of music education that had its own teachers, its own apprenticeships, its own publications, and its own artistic standards. The foundation of this musical system was a body of indigenous music that had been rejected by the nineteenth-century sacred music establishment. For the Sacred Harp tradition, the stone the builders rejected had become the cornerstone." -- Neely Bruce, "The Sacred Harp as Experimental Composition," p. 18
Despite being rejected by musical elitists, these old tunes are still being sung several hundred years later.
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J.R. Graves was instrumental in putting together some hymnals. I would think the songs in them would be true to Scripture yet I have never seen a page of them or heard of anyone checking them out.Ever seen one?
Yes, I have seen one. The East Texas Research Center has a copy of "The Little Seraph" which was compiled and published by Graves late in his life. It, if I remember correctly, was considered as something of a Sunday School hymnal. I am not familiar enough with it to make a educated comment on how good a book it might be. But we sing two songs that came from it, and that is mainly what I was looking for -- how they were in the original -- when I looked at it. One is "Shall We Know Each Other There" by Robert Lowry. The other is "Where the Saints are Passing Over" by M. A. Kidder.
I think he compiled at least one other song book.
The other one was The Southern Psalmist I think. I would like to see that one and the one you mentioned.
You might try looking at Stephen F. Austin's East Texas Research Center site. They have several historical documents scanned and viewable online. I really doubt 'The Little Seraph' is, but it wouldn't hurt to check.
I did not find Seraph online nor the Southern Psalmist at all.Wouldn't it be great to have the Psalmist reprinted? We could have a hymnal that I would think would be more in line with Scripture than many available today.I think that is something we really need today with all the circus atmosphere/rock concert music being used in so many churches.
Btw, Graves compiled and published the New Baptist Psalmist For Churches And Sunday Schools in 1873. Found this on a page called Reformed Reader.
I did a little more looking around to see what I could find. Hymnary.org is an online hymn index containing texts from over 5,000 hymnals. I found that the Southern Psalmist info has been entered. This will give the first lines of the hymns and will help give an idea of what it contained. There Pendleton is listed as a editor with Graves. According to David Music, Southern Psalmist was a words-only hymn book: "...another attempt to provide Sunday School songs for Southern Baptists was J. R. Graves's The Little Seraph...Graves had issued a words-only hymnal, The Southern Psalmist...in 1858...(and from) Memphis, Tennessee...issued another words-only book, The New Baptist Psalmist (1873)..." ["I will sing the wondrous story": a history of Baptist hymnody in North America] Concerning the music found in The Little Seraph, this book says it contained 194 in seven-shape notation from four traditions of church song: English and American psalm and hymn tunes of the 17th and 18th centuries, tunes from the Mason-Hastings-Bradbury school of American composers, gospel songs, and American folk hymns.
Interesting subject.
That should say The Little Seraph contained "194 TUNES in seven-shape notation".
I may have found a copy of the Southern Psalmist , a revised version from a later date. Does not have Graves listed as author.
I will be curious to hear what you find. I am not aware of another Southern Psalmist, though I wouldn't be altogether surprised for a different book to have the same title. Back in those days there were a lot of regional publications with these standard types of titles. So sometimes folks in different areas might wind up using the same title. I have seen several tunebooks like this. For example, there are at least four books titled The Sacred Harp, and I think three of them were by Baptist compilers in the South.
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