Sacred Harp singing is a tradition of sacred choral music which developed in New England and perpetuated in the American South. The name is derived from The Sacred Harp, a historically important shape-note tunebook printed in 1844; multiple subsequent revisions of the tunebook have remained in use since. Sacred Harp singing has roots in the singing schools that developed over the period 1770 to 1820 in and around New England, 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.David Warren Steel, "Shape-note hymnody", in Grove Music Online (Oxford University Press: article updated 16 October 2013) Subscription required
Sacred Harp music is sung a cappella (voice only, without instruments) and originated as Protestant music. The contemporary Sacred Harp tradition includes singers and events in the American South (the historic locus of Sacred Harp singing) but also across the United States as well as several other countries, particularly the UK and Germany.
The music and its notation
The name of the tradition comes from the title of the shape-note book from which the music is sung, The Sacred Harp. This book exists today in various editions, discussed below.
In shape-note music, notes are printed in special shapes that help the reader identify them on the musical scale. There are two prevalent systems, one using four shapes, and one using seven. In the four-shape system used in The Sacred Harp, each of the four shapes is connected to a particular syllable, fa, sol, la, or mi, and these syllables are employed in singing the notes,This is a simplified version of Guidonian solmization which was also used in Elizabethan England: see Solfège#Origin just as in the more familiar system that uses do, re, mi, etc. (see solfege). The four-shape system is able to cover the full musical scale because each syllable-shape combination other than mi is assigned to two distinct notes of the scale. For example, the C major scale would be notated and sung as follows:
The shape for fa is a triangle, sol an oval, la a rectangle, and mi a diamond.
In Sacred Harp singing, pitch is not absolute. The shapes and notes designate degrees of the scale, not particular pitches. Thus for a song in the key of C, fa designates C and F; for a song in G, fa designates G and C, and so on; hence it is called a moveable "do" system.
When Sacred Harp singers begin a song, they normally start by singing it with the appropriate syllable for each pitch, using the shapes to guide them. For those in the group not yet familiar with the song, the shapes help with the task of sight reading. The process of reading through the song with the shapes also helps fix the notes in memory. Once the shapes have been sung, the group then sings the verses of the song with their printed words.
Singing Sacred Harp music
Sacred Harp groups always sing a cappella, that is to say, without accompanying instruments.In particular, no harps are present. The term "Sacred Harp" is sometimes taken by singers to be a metaphor for the human voice .On a number of early historical recordings, a piano or parlor organ accompanied the singers. In the ensuing decades, the practice of using such instruments has evidently died out. The singers arrange themselves in a hollow square, with rows of chairs or pews on each side assigned to each of the four parts: treble, alto, tenor, and bass. The treble and tenor sections are usually mixed, with men and women singing the notes an octave apart.
There is no single leader or conductor; rather, the participants take turns in leading. The leader for a particular round selects a song from the book, and "calls" it by its page number. Leading is done in an open-palm style, standing in the middle of the square facing the tenors.
The pitch at which the music is sung is relative; there is no instrument to give the singers a starting point. At a given singing event, one or more people are designated "keyers"; they are responsible for choosing the key at which the song will be sung and intoning it to the group. The singers reply with the opening notes of their own parts, and then the song begins immediately. Leaders have the option of keying their own songs, if they are able and choose to do so.
Musical style
As the name implies, the tunes in the Sacred Harp and related tunebooks are predominantly sacred music and originated as music sung by Protestant Christians (though the singing context derives from singing schools rather than church services). Many of the songs in the book are hymns that use words, meters, and stanzaic forms familiar from elsewhere in Protestant hymnody. However, many other Sacred Harp songs are quite different from mainstream hymns in their musical style: some, known as fuguing tunes, contain sections that are polyphonic in texture, and the harmony tends to deemphasize the interval of the third in favor of fourths and fifths. In their melodies, the songs often use the pentatonic scale or similar "gapped" (fewer than seven-note) scales. The harmonic and contrapuntal style of Sacred Harp singing is often referred to as "dispersed harmony".See the discussion in Robert T. Kelley, Sacred Harp Harmony: A Part-Writing Primer for Shape-Note Hymnody (2009), page 4.
In their musical form, Sacred Harp songs fall into three basic types. Many are ordinary hymn tunes, mostly composed in four-bar phrases and sung in multiple verses. Fuguing tunes contain at least one prominent passage, usually after a homophonic opening couplet, in which each of the four choral parts enters in succession, in a way resembling a fugue. Anthems are songs with non-metrical text drawn (in whole or in part) directly from scripture; they are sung through just once rather than in multiple verses, and tend to be longer than hymn tunes and fuging tunes.The harmony and form of Sacred Harp music are discussed in and in more technical detail in .
Sacred Harp singing deviates in several respects from typical choral music. It is not generally rehearsed or performed for an audience: singers participate for the sake of the experience in itself, as well as for the sake of the friendships and social ties of the community (many also engage with singing as a spiritual or religious experience). Songs are generally sung in strict time, without pauses at the ends of phrases. A prominent feature of the vocal style is accent: instead of phrases being sung legato (as is typical in much choral singing), downbeats are sung louder than offbeats, enhancing a shared feeling of pulse and providing rhythmic interest to the singing experience. Especially at large singings, the volume of the sound is generally loud (with singers using "full voice").
Although Sacred Harp singing is heavily reliant on the printed book, the style of singing and social customs are also transmitted orally. In some cases, singers deviate from the music in specific ways that cannot necessarily be assumed from the book itself (for example, raising the 6th scale degree in many minor songs, or observing unwritten repeats).
Teaching music in the Sacred Harp style
Sacred Harp music continues to be taught in "singing schools" by members of the singing community.
The Sacred Harp, as is typical of shape-note tunebooks, contains a section on rudiments, describing the basics of music and Sacred Harp singing.
Books in contemporary use
The most common tunebook in the Sacred Harp tradition is The Sacred Harp: 2025 Edition, published by the Sacred Harp Publishing Company; David Ivey was the editorial chair for this revision. This book is used as the principal or only book at the majority of major singing events (known as "conventions" and "all-day singings"). This book is often known as the "Denson Book" (from the principal editor of previous editions in its revision lineage). Work on this revision began in 2018; the first public singing from this revision took place with the 2025 session of the United Sacred Harp Musical Association on September 13–14; it has a green cover. The 2025 Edition replaces the 1991 Edition of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company, but the 1991 Edition is still used by some singing conventions. Previous editions date back to 1911.
Also commonly used is The Sacred Harp, Revised Cooper Edition (2012), colloquially known as the "Cooper Book" or the "blue book". It has significant overlap in contents with the Denson Book but a different revision history dating back to a 1902 revision. The Cooper Book contains a much higher proportion of songs influenced by gospel music than the Denson Book. In some regions, the Cooper Book is the primary edition of the Sacred Harp used; elsewhere, some singers appreciate it as a secondary book that provides variety.
Many Sacred Harp singers also sing from other tunebooks. Several of these have histories and communities of their own, and many continue to be edited and revised to fit the needs of contemporary participants. Many who sing from these tunebooks, however, are also familiar with the more prominent Sacred Harp editions. These other books include:
Less common editions of the Sacred Harp, such as the J. L. White book (1911, last reprinted in 2007) Other historical four-shape tunebooks, such as the Missouri Harmony (last revised in 2005) or Judge Jackson's Colored Sacred Harp (1934, last reprinted in 1993) Seven-shape tunebooks such as The Christian Harmony (last revised in 2010) and Harmonia Sacra (last revised in 2008) Contemporary tunebooks such as the Shenandoah Harmony (2013).
Venues for singing
Sacred Harp singing normally occurs not in church services, but in special gatherings or "singings" arranged for the purpose. Singings can be local, regional, statewide, or national. Small singings are often held in homes, with perhaps only a dozen singers. Large singings have been known to have more than a thousand participants. The more ambitious singings include an ample potluck dinner in the middle of the day, traditionally called "dinner on the grounds".
Some of the largest and oldest annual singings are called "conventions". The oldest Sacred Harp convention was the Southern Musical Convention, organized in Upson County, Georgia in 1845. The two oldest surviving Sacred Harp singing conventions are the Chattahoochee Musical Convention (organized in Coweta County, Georgia in 1852), and the East Texas Sacred Harp Convention (organized as the East Texas Musical Convention in 1855).
Singings are not restricted to members of an organization, but are communicated verbally at other singings, through social media and email lists, in unofficial public listings,Jeremiah Ledbetter. Annual Singings. Accessed March 28, 2025 and in Sacred Harp Singings: Minutes and Directory, published annually by the Sacred Harp Musical Heritage Association. "Minutes" of conventions and all-day singings are also kept as a record; recent minutes are published in this annual volume as well as online.Sacred Harp Musical Heritage Association. Minutes. Sacred Harp Singing. Accessed March 28, 2025.
History of Sacred Harp singing