How to explain 4 shapes for 7 notes

[Tim Cook]

Greetings singers,

As some of you know, my wife and I now live in Tokyo, Japan, although we’re back in Birmingham, Alabama, at the moment. A British music professor at International Christian University in Tokyo has asked me to do a workshop on Sacred Harp on May 20, and I agreed to do it. Even though many of you would do a far better job, I’m the one that’s there so I agreed, but I had a big question about how to do this, especially to those of you who may have started Sacred Harp in places where it wasn’t already there.

Here in Alabama, I’m lucky to be surrounded by 4-shape and 7-shape singing, and I’m so-so OK with either one, but as for teaching this to others, all my experience has been with 7-shapes. For me, it’s a lot easier to teach since there’s a different name, and shape, for each note. When people ask me why doe and fa have the same name, as well as re and sol, and mi and la, I’m at a loss. Without any way to account for that, it makes about as much sense as spelling the English language with 16 letters because 26 is too many. In Japan, as well as other places in the world, the whole country learns doremi pretty well in elementary school, not the shapes, just the notes, so teaching them 7 shapes is just a matter of associating shapes with something they already know. I’m just wondering if there is a logical reason I can present to people, Japanese or otherwise, for using four notes instead. I know that with four, the intervals between the notes are the same, but I don’t know why that matters. And I know it was a transition from the hexachord to the octave, by doubling up on notes in different keys to arrive at the seventh note, but I don’t know why the people that did that didn’t just invent the seventh note instead.

This question never mattered to me before that much because living in Georgia and Alabama, I could learn all this by the sheer force of the singers around me, but in Japan I and a British English teacher, Peter Evan, are pretty much the only people with this experience. Together we started a monthly Sacred Harp singing in Tokyo, and we manage to get enough people there to have a pretty good singing, but I think the notes are a stumbling block that I don’t know how to overcome, which is ironic as they were invented to help people sing. If anyone can explain this, or lead me to resources that can, I would be most grateful.

 

It’s an honor to be associated with y’all.

 

Thanks much,

Tim Cook

This email has been sent from a virus-free computer protected by Avast. www.avast.com

[Karen Willard]

Tim--

The explanation that makes the most sense to me is that using only Fa Sol La and Mi, one is always aware of the interval to the next note. This satisfies many singers who only need to know that much. But adding Do Re and Ti/Si to have 7 unique names not only tells one the interval to the next note, one also always knows where in the scale one is. This is important to some singers so they prefer 7-shape systems. But because it is not so immediately obvious that the intervals get repeated, it might take a 7-shape singer longer to nail the intervals? Maybe not... I wouldn't know because I started out on 4-shapes and struggle with the 7, especially in minor music because the changed location of the MI drives my sightsinging interval knowledge kaflooey.

Karen Willard
Computer Archivist for Willard Family Association
One-Name Study: Willard (Williard, Willyard)

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[cath tyler]

Haloo!

I've been able to explain that the internal relationships are described by the four shape system, in that the distance from fa to fa, sol to sol, and la to la, are all the same interval, and the mi marks the change in pattern. So, you not only have a place in the scale, but you have the  bolstering of your understanding of distances enhanced by those relationships. I guess in a major scale, the internal distances would be a fourth (based on the tonic to its next repeated syllable), and in a minor scale, the distance is a fifth (based again on the tonic to its next repeated syllable).

- cath tyler

[Midge Harder]

I second the kaflooey comment. The Sound of Music was my introduction to solfeggio and I'm amazed that you can layer Occidental over an Oriental (Pentatonic?) structure. One fasola tune sounds Asian, like War Department in the Tenor. I'm not knowledgeable about theory enough to say why I think so.

Midge Harder

Santee, CA

---

From: fasola-di...@googlegroups.com <fasola-di...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Karen Willard <kayren....@gmail.com>
Sent: Tuesday, February 23, 2016 7:34 PM
To: coo...@gmail.com
Cc: Fasola discussions
Subject: Re: [fasola-discussions] How to explain 4 shapes for 7 notes

 

[Will Fitzgerald]

Here’s what I do — most people seem to be familiar with the do-re-mi solfege, so I have them sing do-re-mi (pause) fa-sol-la (pause) mi-do (with a short mi)

I do this a couple of times, and then change the first do-re-mi to fa-so-la and sing that a couple of times. I may mention how “natural” it seems to divide things this way while doing the do-re-mi version.

I think this is more “visceral,” meaning people can feel how the major scale divides and that just maybe using fa-so-la twice isn’t a faulty idea.

—

Will

[Morgan Bunch]

Hi Tim,

I think there are two questions embedded in your note. The first is historical: why did the four shape system develop in the beginning? The second is: how do we make sense of it now, especially for people who are familiar with seven? Answering the first question will ease concerns that this system is random and irrational. (I'll leave the answer to the historians among us.) The answer to the second question is "first, do whatever works for you to begin with (other responses to your note offer good ideas, but a single approach probably won't work for everyone); second, enjoy the music and don't worry too much about whether it makes sense; and third, keep singing and eventually it will either make sense or you'll enjoy the music enough that it probably won't matter."

Morgan

--

[John Bealle]

When I've taught fasola, I have sometimes posed the question "Why four shapes and seven notes?" and answered decisively, "Because there aren't seven notes."  Then I say that the fasola scale is built from two separate components.  I sing the first tritone FA-SOL-LA, then pause, then sing the second FA-SOL-LA tritone on top of that. Then I say you need a leading tone, which is given a different name.

Then I demonstrate how the intervals between the shapes in each tritone are identical, FA-FA SOL-SOL LA-LA, and I say that singers instinctively understand this and use it in reading. The seven shape scale provides no indication of these internal relationships, which is why the four-shape scale is much better.

Probably I have strayed a bit from what can be justified historically.  I remember discussing the here a while back but can't remember the resolution. I would very much appreciate a refresher if anyone can resurrect the theory and history of this.

In the appendix to James's History of the Sacred Harp, he is clear that the four-shape system is based on the Greek tetrachord. Guido introduced the hexachord, but James says it was "not quickly adopted" and goes on to position four-shapes as the preferred system among musical holdouts in various places.

In any case I bristle at hearing "Why four shapes and seven notes?" and my instinct is to disabuse questioners of the logical fallacy behind it. I treat it as a chauvinistic question and use it to leverage an appreciation that fasola as a distinct tradition.

 - John Bealle

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[Bob Richmond]

Why four notes and not seven? I think the answer is obvious, though this is my own idea.

We seem to assume that 19th century tunebooks just fell out of the sky, but actually they had to be laboriously typeset. Most classical music before modern electronic methods was engraved, but the old tune books I look at all look to be typeset - if you look closely at the printed lines of the staff, you'll see little breaks in them where types didn't quite come together. (I just looked at the New Harp of Columbia, Social Harp, the original Missouri Harmony, Southern Harmony, the old Walker Christian Harmony, and a 1947 convention music pamphlet, Heaven's Gift.)

A separate matrix had to be founded for every shape, note value, and place on the staff. Obviously labor is nearly doubled with a 7 note notation. (That's why leger lines are avoided, also.) Lippincott in Philadelphia set up the 4-note Hesperian Harp in 1846, so printing the original Harp of Columbia in 1848 must have required additional matrices for do, re, and si/ti.

All handset - no Linotype before about 1880.

Bob Richmond

New Harp of Columbia treble

Maryville TN

[Matt Bell]

It is interesting that in Aikin's seven shapes, there is still some correspondence between "FA-FA SOL-SOL LA-LA."  Do and fa are both triangles, re and sol are a semi-circle and circle, and mi and la are both rectangles.  

Matt Bell

[plu...@gmail.com]

The explanations given by Cath Tyler and John Bealle are persuasive to me. As an utter musical moron, I was amazed to discover that after a few weeks of singing Sacred Harp, I could sing a fourth interval by merely jumping from one fa to the next. And the fifth interval by going to the next highest sol. And so on. (And the mi, as David Ivy explains, is the 'hinge' between the major and minor scales.)

The system is not random, nor dependent on the exigencies of printing technology. It is purposeful and ingenious in its simplicity. 

Seven notes systems do not offer this same advantage, as far as I'm concerned. There are too many shapes to keep track of, nor do the intervals plant themselves in my head. 

Paul Wilson

Sent from my iPad

[goffsca...@juno.com]

On Sat, 27 Feb 2016 06:39:24 +0700 plu...@gmail.com writes:

 

> Seven notes systems do not offer this same advantage, as far as I'm concerned. There are too many shapes to keep track of, nor > do the intervals plant themselves in my head. 

 

The shapes themselves also lead to confusion.  I've got a copy here of the 1947 Broadman Hymnal in the seven shape edition (the first time I ever saw shape notes was back in 1983, when I came across a shape note edition of the Broadman in the building where my church met; we used that hymnal, but in the round note edition), and at least two shapes are confusing - there's a triangle with a rounded base in addition to one with a square bse, and there's a hemisphere that if you're not careful you can mistake for an oval.  For me, it's a lot simpler to keep track of just four shapes, which don't resemble each other.    :)

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[Bob Richmond]

The "Swan shapes", unique to the New Harp of Columbia, are considerably more distinct. The neighboring Christian Harmony singers have a new (2010) Aikin shapes book, but also keep the 1873 Walker book in print.

You can see the Swan shapes at oldharp.org

Bob Richmond

New Harp of Columbia treble

Maryville TN

--

[Steve Nickolas]

I don't think I'll ever get used to a 4 or 7 shape system, I learned on
round notes - but to me it doesn't really matter, it's the melodies that
make the difference. I still remember seeing an old hymnal, think it was
a Cokesbury Hymnal, with the shapes and nobody knew what they were for.

But that reminds me.

A couple weeks ago I went through Southern Harmony and got a wild hair to
do a more typical SATB style arrangement of STAR IN THE EAST. When I
punched it into my computer, the hair on my neck started standing up. I
decided to try playing it through on my computer with voice presets and my
JAW HIT THE FLOOR. This was clearly a tune that HAD to be sung a capella
in parts for full impact.

-uso.

[Zack Allen]

You know, it’s all in what you are used to. You make a big investment in one  thing and you’re inclined to politely throw rocks at other ways of doing the same thing. Go to the internist and he’ll find a medical way of dealing with you. Go to a surgeon and he’ll get out his scalpel. If you just spent good money for one kind of hammer, you probably won’t go out and buy another kind of hammer to drive the occasional nail.

 

In our part of the world, the Walker shapes and the Swan shapes seem most natural and, as much fun as it is to sing Sacred Harp, it takes a few mental gymnastics for us stop looking for missing notes. I find myself trying to translate on the fly, finding  the tonic, calling it by the name I know and going from there.  But then it might be, as much as I love this body of music, that I lack the passion and discipline of others who seem to be able glide smoothly from  seven shapes to four, and back again.

 

I have long suspected that William Walker’s 1867 move from four-shape notation (Southern Harmony) to seven shapes (The Christian Harmony) was, to some degree, a commercial decision. Flagging sales of his first book and the rising popularity of Aikin’s seven shapes would certainly be an incentive despite what he had to say about giving seven children but four names.  That being said, Walker did raise a rousing defense of the seven-note system in his 1873 second edition of the Christian Harmony and in advertising for his new book folks were told that the might learn to read music in as little time as 15 minutes. But then 19^th century advertising was notoriously hyperbolic.

 

Walker had this to say in 1873 (the italics are Walkers),

 

“To those who are in favor of four-note singing, and think it is the best way, we would remark that we were for many years opposed to any other – delivered many lectures, on the subject, and were not convinced of our error till we taught our first normal school. There we saw clearly that, as we had seven distinct sounds in the scale, we need and must have to be consistent, seven names    . . . and our opinion from experience is, that a school will learn nearly twice as many more tunes in the same time . . . “

 

Who am I to argue with someone in whose seven-shape system I am already heavily invested?

 

Zack Allen

Folk Heritage Books

www.christianharmony1873.org

 

Sent from Mail for Windows 10

 

From: goffsca...@juno.com
Sent: Saturday, February 27, 2016 7:50 AM
To: fasola-di...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [fasola-discussions] How to explain 4 shapes for 7 notes

 

On Sat, 27 Feb 2016 06:39:24 +0700 plu...@gmail.com writes:

--

[j frankel]

I only copied 6 symbols off my library computer's top row!  Stuff like that bugs me.  So I guess you'd have to go @ # $ % ^ & *.   OK.  I can see why they webt with real, ah, shapes, but I wish the various 7-shapers had picked better ones.

(And it turns out to be really, really hard to get a computer keyboard displayed so I can read it on this tablet.  I'm kind of afraid to haul out my real typewriter (yes, I still have one) & look at it already.)

On Feb 27, 2016 4:28 PM, "j frankel" <ghos...@gmail.com> wrote:

That the 4-shape system lets you easily feel that there are 4ths between the same-name notes in the major scale (fa-fa, sol-sol, la-la [I always wanna go la la la la la when I read "la-la" written out in English]) & 5ths between same-name notes in the minor scale is just an added bonus; what is more important is getting the intervals between *consecutive* notes wired into your brain, as well as other intervallic jumps besides fa-fa etc.  And you can do that with a 7-shape system too, of course.

The problem 7-shape systems present to me is that the ones I've come into contact with (the one used in North Carolina & that other one, I believe its another one, used in Alabama/Georgia) is that some of the shapes are too similar, & in some cases the same as, shapes the Aiken (4-shape) system uses.  And in some cases the shapes are just too weird (as a previous poster has mentioned) to figure out *what* they are.  And bleary typesetting in some reproductions I've seen that occasionally gives you "what is it?!" shapes doesn't help either.

I would frankly do better with symbols from the top row of my typewriter, but am not sure that had been invented yet? when the shapes were (invented).  However, typewriter invented or not, printers certainly had access to @ # $ % ^ &.  I would use * instead of ^, myself.  And wouldn't start with "!" just because I wouldn't.  Better yet, I would use numbers (as I've read something called the Nashville system does do; just sing out 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 instead of fa-sol-la-fa-so-la-ti-do.  Or do-re-me-fa-sol-la-ti-do, if you insist.).  However, my brain/mind wants to do other things with numbers once it hears them, other things than assign "fa" etc to them, so that wouldn't be a good system for *me*.

[j frankel]

That the 4-shape system lets you easily feel that there are 4ths between the same-name notes in the major scale (fa-fa, sol-sol, la-la [I always wanna go la la la la la when I read "la-la" written out in English]) & 5ths between same-name notes in the minor scale is just an added bonus; what is more important is getting the intervals between *consecutive* notes wired into your brain, as well as other intervallic jumps besides fa-fa etc.  And you can do that with a 7-shape system too, of course.

The problem 7-shape systems present to me is that the ones I've come into contact with (the one used in North Carolina & that other one, I believe its another one, used in Alabama/Georgia) is that some of the shapes are too similar, & in some cases the same as, shapes the Aiken (4-shape) system uses.  And in some cases the shapes are just too weird (as a previous poster has mentioned) to figure out *what* they are.  And bleary typesetting in some reproductions I've seen that occasionally gives you "what is it?!" shapes doesn't help either.

I would frankly do better with symbols from the top row of my typewriter, but am not sure that had been invented yet? when the shapes were (invented).  However, typewriter invented or not, printers certainly had access to @ # $ % ^ &.  I would use * instead of ^, myself.  And wouldn't start with "!" just because I wouldn't.  Better yet, I would use numbers (as I've read something called the Nashville system does do; just sing out 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 instead of fa-sol-la-fa-so-la-ti-do.  Or do-re-me-fa-sol-la-ti-do, if you insist.).  However, my brain/mind wants to do other things with numbers once it hears them, other things than assign "fa" etc to them, so that wouldn't be a good system for *me*.

On Sat, Feb 27, 2016 at 10:24 AM, 'Zack Allen' via Fasola Discussions <fasola-di...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

[Tim Cook]

Many thanks to everyone who has put in so much serious thought to this question. I like to think of myself as ecumenical regarding four vs seven shapes, but I feel the only one I can easily explain without getting bogged down in technical terms that I myself don’t quite understand is the seven, even though when I’m at an actual singing, both make perfect sense in my bones. I wish everyone in Japan had access to singings where they could learn it like I did, but they pretty much just have me.

 

So I’m trying to understand the significance of fasola representing whole steps. I’ve been singing fa-sol-la…half-step…fa-sol-la (putting aside mi for the moment) over and over to myself to try to understand that. I don’t explain much anyway so as to make more time to sing, and I thought maybe having everyone do this exercise a few times could substitute for an actual explanation, but I was still wondering. I’m thinking those of you who started Sacred Harp in Europe must have encountered this issue as I understand Europeans have a stronger sense of doremi solfege than most Americans do. That’s certainly true for Japanese. I would like to add a fasola sensibility on top of their doremi sensibility without taking anything away from the latter if that’s possible. That’s what I mean by “ecumenical”.

 

Some of you will remember Bufrey Dean, a Primitive Baptist preacher at Sylacauga, Alabama. I once told him I was ecumenical and he said he didn’t know what that word meant. I told him it means you sing my songs and I’ll sing your songs. One of the few times I thought I was pretty darn clever.

 

Tim Cook

[j frankel]

Since you say the Japanese are taught to understand the reason for solfege (to get the intervals between scale-notes firmly into your head), instead of just learning to sing the syllables like a (very poor excuse for a) song (the way a lot of us Americans did), it should work for them with the fasola syllables the same way doremi does.  Of course, as in America, you may encounter a few who escaped any kind of training to date & you will need to explain what solfege is to start with.

I am definitely one American who was drilled in singing the doremi scale as a child without being given any clue why.  And that song from "The Sound of Music", other than being a great song, doesn't really tutor anybody in solfege either.  Whereas at singing schools, whenever people are given drills on the shapes where the drill suddenly turns into a familiar song (& not necessarily a shape-note song, either) you can see a few lights turn on in people's faces.  Great lights to see.

By the way; I don't know if it applies to Japan, but I have been researching (on the internet; lyrics, not tune on this one) one of my favorite songs, Garden Hymn, & found out along the way to my astonishment that it is a favorite among Christian groups in parts of Asia, because it was a favorite of missionaries who brought it there (so probably were other hymns brought favorites of the *missionaries*, but this one struck some chord that delighted Asian singers, though it certainly doesn't have an Asian scale-sensibility to me.  So you should try it out just to see if people recognize it.  It is generally given a name that translates into "song of the garden", though I haven't followed through on translations of any of the Asian-language lyrics.).

I also found out is it a big favorite in the Unification Church of Sun Myung Moon (originally a Korean phenomenon).  Used in their mass-wedding ceremonies.  Brrr.  But it is not the song's fault!

[Claire Outten]

Here goes - I grew up in a church (in the South) where we sang from hymnals featuring the Stamps-Baxter 7-shape system, and I had no problems learning the William Walker/Christian Harmony, the Marcus Lafayette Swan or the Aiken systems.  These scales work fine - reports of their difficulties are exaggerations.  It is not so hard to learn 4-shape and 7-shape note gamuts.  

Thanks, 

Claire A. Outten 

Cincinnati Singer

On Sunday, February 28, 2016 9:48 AM, j frankel <ghos...@gmail.com> wrote:

Since you say the Japanese are taught to understand the reason for solfege (to get the intervals between scale-notes firmly into your head), instead of just learning to sing the syllables like a (very poor excuse for a) song (the way a lot of us Americans did), it should work for them with the fasola syllables the same way doremi does.  Of course, as in America, you may encounter a few who escaped any kind of training to date & you will need to explain what solfege is to start with.

I am definitely one American who was drilled in singing the doremi scale as a child without being given any clue why.  And that song from "The Sound of Music", other than being a great song, doesn't really tutor anybody in solfege either.  Whereas at singing schools, whenever people are given drills on the shapes where the drill suddenly turns into a familiar song (& not necessarily a shape-note song, either) you can see a few lights turn on in people's faces.  Great lights to see.

By the way; I don't know if it applies to Japan, but I have been researching (on the internet; lyrics, not tune on this one) one of my favorite songs, Garden Hymn, & found out along the way to my astonishment that it is a favorite among Christian groups in parts of Asia, because it was a favorite of missionaries who brought it there (so probably were other hymns brought favorites of the *missionaries*, but this one struck some chord that delighted Asian singers, though it certainly doesn't have an Asian scale-sensibility to me.  So you should try it out just to see if people recognize it.  It is generally given a name that translates into "song of the garden", though I haven't followed through on translations of any of the Asian-language lyrics.).

I also found out is it a big favorite in the Unification Church of Sun Myung Moon (originally a Korean phenomenon).  Used in their mass-wedding ceremonies.  Brrr.  But it is not the song's fault!

On Sun, Feb 28, 2016 at 12:59 AM, Tim Cook <coo...@gmail.com> wrote:

Many thanks to everyone who has put in so much serious thought to this question. I like to think of myself as ecumenical regarding four vs seven shapes, but I feel the only one I can easily explain without getting bogged down in technical terms that I myself don’t quite understand is the seven, even though when I’m at an actual singing, both make perfect sense in my bones. I wish everyone in Japan had access to singings where they could learn it like I did, but they pretty much just have me.

 

So I’m trying to understand the significance of fasola representing whole steps. I’ve been singing fa-sol-la…half-step…fa-sol-la (putting aside mi for the moment) over and over to myself to try to understand that. I don’t explain much anyway so as to make more time to sing, and I thought maybe having everyone do this exercise a few times could substitute for an actual explanation, but I was still wondering. I’m thinking those of you who started Sacred Harp in Europe must have encountered this issue as I understand Europeans have a stronger sense of doremi solfege than most Americans do. That’s certainly true for Japanese. I would like to add a fasola sensibility on top of their doremi sensibility without taking anything away from the latter if that’s possible. That’s what I mean by “ecumenical”.

 

Some of you will remember Bufrey Dean, a Primitive Baptist preacher at Sylacauga, Alabama. I once told him I was ecumenical and he said he didn’t know what that word meant. I told him it means you sing my songs and I’ll sing your songs. One of the few times I thought I was pretty darn clever.

 

Tim Cook

 

From: fasola-di...@googlegroups.com [mailto:fasola-di...@googlegroups.com]
Sent: Saturday, February 27, 2016 9:25 AM
To: goffsca...@juno.com; fasola-di...@googlegroups.com
Subject: RE: [fasola-discussions] How to explain 4 shapes for 7 notes

 

You know, it’s all in what you are used to. You make a big investment in one  thing and you’re inclined to politely throw rocks at other ways of doing the same thing. Go to the internist and he’ll find a medical way of dealing with you. Go to a surgeon and he’ll get out his scalpel. If you just spent good money for one kind of hammer, you probably won’t go out and buy another kind of hammer to drive the occasional nail.

 

In our part of the world, the Walker shapes and the Swan shapes seem most natural and, as much fun as it is to sing Sacred Harp, it takes a few mental gymnastics for us stop looking for missing notes. I find myself trying to translate on the fly, finding  the tonic, calling it by the name I know and going from there.  But then it might be, as much as I love this body of music, that I lack the passion and discipline of others who seem to be able glide smoothly from  seven shapes to four, and back again.

 

I have long suspected that William Walker’s 1867 move from four-shape notation (Southern Harmony) to seven shapes (The Christian Harmony) was, to some degree, a commercial decision. Flagging sales of his first book and the rising popularity of Aikin’s seven shapes would certainly be an incentive despite what he had to say about giving seven children but four names.  That being said, Walker did raise a rousing defense of the seven-note system in his 1873 second edition of the Christian Harmony and in advertising for his new book folks were told that the might learn to read music in as little time as 15 minutes. But then 19^th century advertising was notoriously hyperbolic.

 

Walker had this to say in 1873 (the italics are Walkers),

 

“To those who are in favor of four-note singing, and think it is the best way, we would remark that we were for many years opposed to any other – delivered many lectures, on the subject, and were not convinced of our error till we taught our first normal school. There we saw clearly that, as we had seven distinct sounds in the scale, we need and must have to be consistent, seven names    . . . and our opinion from experience is, that a school will learn nearly twice as many more tunes in the same time . . . “

 

Who am I to argue with someone in whose seven-shape system I am already heavily invested?

 

Zack Allen

Folk Heritage Books

http://www.christianharmony1873.org/

[j frankel]

Someone just pointed out I put "ti" into the fasola scale.  My deepest apologies.  Brain gear & other problems.

[Tarik Wareh]

1. I have never seen lines of music notated on a staff with the numerals (and apparently the "Nashville system" most commonly refers to a way of writing out chords for a song - http://www.kyleoneal.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/Intro-to-the-Nashville-Number-System.pdf). I'm sure it's been done sometime by someone, and it might be pretty functional for singing and very functional for chord analysis, etc. I wonder if the reason we use solfege instead has to do with the need to silence the analytical/numerical part of the brain in order to get in the groove and productively use our instincts. After all, the amazing thing about fasola, really, is how much it can do for a lot of singers who aren't thinking very explicitly about scale degrees. (It's also pretty helpful for thinking about scale degrees, but if that were our narrow focus, it couldn't rival doremi.)

In any case, looking at a line of music in shape notes and singing by number is a venerable singing-school tradition!

2. The problem with fasola for folks from the European continent, in my experience, isn't their "stronger sense of doremi solfege" exactly. Rather, it's that (A) they use fixed-do not movable-do, and (B) they use the solfege syllables as the names of the pitches (the way we use A, B, C, etc.). "Fa" is French or Italian for "F," not for "the fourth degree of the major scale."

So when I brought my Italian friend to our local Sacred Harp singing, it wasn't that he was being asked to switch from seven syllables to four, but that we started singing Easter Anthem "F G A E G F E F G A G F" (as it were). And he found this very disorienting indeed.

Tarik

[Warren Steel]

>I have never seen lines of music notated on a staff with the numerals... I'm sure it's been done sometime by someone, and it might be pretty functional for singing and very functional for chord analysis, etc.

   Thomas Harrison of Cincinnati came up with a numerical system around 1839, which was adopted by
Silas Leonard, Augustus Fillmore and Lindsay Watson, and achieved some popularity in the Ohio valley. Several books were published in it, including many fine original compositions. Here's an example of a familiar tune you can compare with page 36 in the Sacred Harp:
   http://home.olemiss.edu/~mudws/notes/numerical.html
A stereotyped edition of The Christian Psalmist, with rudiments for the numerical system (beginning at page 450), is at https://books.google.com/books?id=4sgBVwaK8aAC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22The+Christian+Psalmist%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjaorfHzqDLAhWMOCYKHeoPDH0Q6AEINTAA#v=onepage&q=%22The%20Christian%20Psalmist%22&f=false

--
Warren Steel                              mu...@olemiss.edu
Professor of Music Emeritus      University of Mississippi
              http://home.olemiss.edu/~mudws/

[Barry Johnston]

Hello Tarik,

I believe the idea of indicating chords by numerals originated in 16th-17th Century Europe, called "Figured Bass". This is also the predecessor of modern guitar notation used commonly today, as is pointed out in the Wikipedia article. Used very commonly by composers such as Johann Sebastian Bach.

Barry Johnston

Gunnison, Colorado

[Tarik Wareh]

Figured bass numerals indicate the interval above the note in the bass line (not the scale degree). By dictating the "vertical" harmony that will accompany a melody they do, together with the rules of voice leading, imply something about the "horizontal" harmony-part lines that will result from a correct realization. However, this process doesn't resemble anything like "the alto part will sing mi/the nth note in the scale"--It's not expressed in those terms, and there are extra steps of musical reasoning between the notation and the final result.

The numerals in chord symbols such as G7 are relative to the root of the chord, not to the tonic/key note, and they don't give any information about the contour of a melody or harmony part.

Intuitively I do still believe someone must have tried using numerals on a staff the way we use shapes, to indicate how the notes in a line of music relate to the major or minor scale in the key of the piece. Shape note singing school pupils have been made to sing their parts as if they were written in this fashion. But I haven't seen an example.

Tarik

[Chris Noren]

History of numerical notation: http://musicnotation.org/tutorials/numerical-notation-systems/

One difficulty of going this route is denoting note duration. It is much easier to have a filled or hollow shape to denote a quarter or half note than with numbers on a staff.

Chris Noren

Bxfd MA 

[Robert Vaughn]

Tim,

I had thought to post to this subject earlier, but never got around to it -- and don't think I have a lot to offer on the original question of explaining four notes to those who know seven. 

There is no reason to approach this as "four is better than seven" (as some might choose to do) and there is nothing to gain by it. Both systems are good, have their advantages and disadvantages, and their different approaches. One thing that might be helpful is the understanding that there aren't just seven notes, so the seven shapes also get repetition as well as the four -- it's just that the seven are based on the octave and the four on a tetrachord. Interesting, to me at least, is that my Dad used to speak of "four-note" singing and "eight-note" singing. I just used to think of that as something kind of weird that I overlooked because it was my father. He obviously knew there were only seven shapes in one and four in the other, so why compare four and eight? Looking back now I think he was intuitively (or perhaps deliberately) making a distinction between the basic function of the systems rather than the shapes.

I went to many more seven-shape singing schools than four. In fact, to this day I've never been to a week long four-shape singing school. So, in a real sense, I am much better trained in seven shapes than in four. But in reading music and singing I much prefer the four and they just work better for me. I can pick up a seven-shape book and sing the songs in four syllables all day long [at East Texas speed, at least! ;-) ]. I sing fairly often with the Mississippi "do-re-mi switching" singers and try to imitate their practice and find I struggle with reversing it this way, from four to seven -- no matter how much I'm supposed to know about seven shapes. (Like some others mentioned previously, seven shapes really throw things out of whack when I'm singing minor tunes. Not sure if it's the "mi" or just "me".]

Anyway, I think an "ecumenical" approach to four and seven shapes is a good one.

 

His glories sing,

Robert Vaughn 

Mount Enterprise, TX

http://baptistsearch.blogspot.com 

Ask for the old paths, where is the good way

http://mtcarmelbaptist.blogspot.com 

For ask now of the days that are past...

http://oldredland.blogspot.com 

Give ear, all ye inhabitants of the land.

---

From: Tim Cook <coo...@gmail.com>
To: fasola-di...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Saturday, February 27, 2016 11:59 PM

Subject: RE: [fasola-discussions] How to explain 4 shapes for 7 notes

[STaylor]

Morgan Bunch was correct that you have two questions.  1) Why was this done historically?  2) What case is there for singing with only 4 shapes/syllables?

To explain this historically you have to start out with the fact that there were only six syllables in the Middle Ages: Ut, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La. 
So, how did a Medieval singer traverse the diatonic scale, going from c to c'?
The answer was that they had to transmute from one hexachord to another.  Basically, in Medieval theory, the first "Fa Sol La" is in one hexachord. The next "Fa Sol La" is in another hexachord.  And the final "Mi Fa" is in another. Also, each hexachord contained a half step between Mi and Fa - something we can see in our fasola system.

There is a good article on wikipedia that shows these hexachords graphically.  If you look there you can see a path from c to c' consisting of Fa Sol La -> Fa Sol La -> Mi Fa.  In Medieval terms this is transmuting from the Durum to Naturale back to the next higher Durum. (Purple to Red to Purple on the chart in wikipedia)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guidonian_hand

I hope this isn't too confusing. Medieval theory is a bit insane.

So why do we continue in this four note system when we have recourse to something "better?"  I had the 7 note solfege system bludgeoned into my head during five years of studying at Juilliard.  When I first encountered this four note system I was sceptical.  But I decided to give it a fair shake and live with it a while.  Over the years I have come to appreciate the simplicity of only dealing with four syllables and shapes.  And these four syllables do a great job of indicating the quality of steps while traversing the scale.  Underneath Fa is always a half step, all others are whole steps.  This is powerful stuff in educational terms. 

On Tuesday, February 23, 2016 at 9:50:18 PM UTC-5, Tim Cook wrote:

Greetings singers,

As some of you know, my wife and I now live in Tokyo, Japan, although we’re back in Birmingham, Alabama, at the moment. A British music professor at International Christian University in Tokyo has asked me to do a workshop on Sacred Harp on May 20, and I agreed to do it. Even though many of you would do a far better job, I’m the one that’s there so I agreed, but I had a big question about how to do this, especially to those of you who may have started Sacred Harp in places where it wasn’t already there.

Here in Alabama, I’m lucky to be surrounded by 4-shape and 7-shape singing, and I’m so-so OK with either one, but as for teaching this to others, all my experience has been with 7-shapes. For me, it’s a lot easier to teach since there’s a different name, and shape, for each note. When people ask me why doe and fa have the same name, as well as re and sol, and mi and la, I’m at a loss. Without any way to account for that, it makes about as much sense as spelling the English language with 16 letters because 26 is too many. In Japan, as well as other places in the world, the whole country learns doremi pretty well in elementary school, not the shapes, just the notes, so teaching them 7 shapes is just a matter of associating shapes with something they already know. I’m just wondering if there is a logical reason I can present to people, Japanese or otherwise, for using four notes instead. I know that with four, the intervals between the notes are the same, but I don’t know why that matters. And I know it was a transition from the hexachord to the octave, by doubling up on notes in different keys to arrive at the seventh note, but I don’t know why the people that did that didn’t just invent the seventh note instead.

This question never mattered to me before that much because living in Georgia and Alabama, I could learn all this by the sheer force of the singers around me, but in Japan I and a British English teacher, Peter Evan, are pretty much the only people with this experience. Together we started a monthly Sacred Harp singing in Tokyo, and we manage to get enough people there to have a pretty good singing, but I think the notes are a stumbling block that I don’t know how to overcome, which is ironic as they were invented to help people sing. If anyone can explain this, or lead me to resources that can, I would be most grateful.

 

It’s an honor to be associated with y’all.

 

Thanks much,

Tim Cook