(singing voices)
- The old timers would say something like,
I wouldn't walk around the block
to listen to sacred harp music, but I'd
drive 100 miles to sing it.
- ♪Fa,
would probably do it.
♪Fa, (others joining in) la, so, fa... ♪
- Its based on the Sacred Harp,
which is the name of the volume of music
that references to the human voice being
the sacred harp.
(singing in harmony)
We have a scale that people recognize
as do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do,
and for simplicity's sake, they chopped out
three of them, and they kept fa, so, la, and mi.
- The difference is just that the note heads,
instead of being circles for every single note,
there's four shapes.
There's a triangle, and a square,
and a circle and a diamond.
So each of those shapes corresponds to a certain
piece of the scale.
- It was definitely difficult at first
because I did know how to read music,
read "regular" music.
I think the trickiest is realizing
when you've got step motion, and when you've got
triads or archiepiscopal with spaces in between.
- Yeah.
- I wasn't exactly using the shapes
as they're intended because the whole point of the shapes
is when you know in your head what a
fa to a fa with an interval sounds like.
When you see that, you just do that.
(singing in unison)
It's taken me 14 years to get to the point
where I am using the shapes as they were
intended to be used, as opposed to just
singing what is printed on the page.
- As I understand it, this particular
four shapes system, evolved sometimes around
1800, and in this country.
- (in unison) ♪so, la
- Methodist missionaries from Massachusets I believe,
is the actual core of where it started.
(group singing)
It's nondenominational in character.
It's a tradition that started as a
new way to get people who had little opportunity
for formal education to come up to speed
and sing in a group, and have it sound
not half bad.
- Another one of those ones that I think
got added after the fact.
- We were singing the Psalms, but not
the way they are in the King James Bible,
which is what he started from.
And not the way they are in the original Bible text,
because they were in a different language,
but in the symmetrical English.
- (singing in a round) ♪ The earth and seas....
The people who come to sing are singing
for themselves within the group.
Its about the people that get together
to sing, and what happens within the
hallow square singing.
(singing in unison)
- [Woman] Boy the bases have power! (laughing)
- There's a feeling of camaraderie.
There's all different sorts of people that
do Sacred Harp, but
we all have that one thing in common,
that we really like this music,
and we like to sing it together.
- (singing in unison) ♪Oh my son
♪Oh my son
- I think we're hardwired for two things:
we're hardwired for rhythm, so that
timing thing, the sound of drums,
we like to tap our feet.
All kinds of rhythmic sounds.
And the second is: we're wired to recognize
relationships between sounds.
(all singing)
That gives us great pleasure.
There are few people in the world who can
sing two notes at one time.
Everybody else can only sing one note at one time.
So if you want harmony, you've gotta have
the other people to sing.
(singing in harmony)
There you are, working to all
get to a place where you're not
doing exactly the same thing, but
you're doing things that work with each other.
(all in harmony) ♪ Hallelujah, when we arrive at home
- For me its definitely about
doing something with other people.
Working with people to make something greater than us,
make something beautiful.
(all singing)
(books closing and chuckles)