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Shape Notes, Billings, and American Modernisms

by Will Robin
24 July 2013

Note: Will Robin’s piece for NewMusicBox begins with Charles Seeger’s discovery of American shape-note notation and goes on to trace “a sturdy lineage of American musicians who sought out a maverick impulse in native hymnody.” Don’t miss the YouTube posting of Pare Lorentz’s film The River (1938), with music by Virgil Thomson.