songs of dubious mode

[Nikos Pappas]

Good morning all.

Reading Warren's post yesterday regarding his quotes of McCurry got me thinking about this group. Here's his quote:

 "McCurry goes on to suggest that "there are some tunes that no man can tell whether they are major or minor-keyed; e. g., refer to "Ministers' Farewell," "Rhode Island," "Antioch," "Desire for Piety," that the keys are in conflict all the way through."
    You may note that Ministers' Farewell and Desire for Piety are notated as major, Antioch and Rhode Island as minor, but all show an emphasis on chords in the "relative" key, that is, the sixth degree in major tunes and the third degree in minor tunes. McCurry's statements are not always clear, but often reveal an original and perceptive point of view."

I've long been fascinated by these kind of tunes and have written a few myself to broaden my understanding of shape-note music. I'm appending a couple I've written in the past months. "May's Lick" is a minor-sounding tune that is actually major, "Goodner Mountain" a minor tune that comes across as major.

Has anyone else experimented with this type of song? If so, do you hear the harmony when writing the tune, or does the harmony just come out in this kind of non-committal way that blurs the lines between major and minor.

Any comments and thoughts are of course appreciated.

Cordially,

Nikos

[R. C. Webber]

You  might want to look at Erschienen ist der herrliche Tag.  All of the arrangements I have played are in D but gapped on the mediant (F/F#) until late in the melody with the result that one can't be sure whether it is dorian or mixolydian until the late appearance of the F indicates dorian.  Of course, it isn't in the shaped note tradition (unless someone wants to transpose the melody to the tenor, harmonize, and shape it up) but may serve as a parallel example.

Randy

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[Robert Vaughn]

These types of songs are very interesting. I have never felt successful at any such attempts. They don't seem to move or flow right like some of the great ones in The Sacred Harp.

On this order, but not exactly the same, the melody of SHAWMUT seems to be kind of ambiguous and could be harmonized either as major or minor. On the other hand, the song as harmonized by Mason in the 1991 edition doesn't strike me as the ambiguous sort of tune. Once when visiting a Primitive Baptist church that sings from Lloyd's Primitive Hymns, they struck up a tune with Wesley's "O how happy are they, who their Saviour obey." It sounded major except at the end of the first half and end of the song. Of course, they were only singing the melody in unison, so it might sound more minor harmonized.

Will print off your songs and try to take a look at them [though we have the grand-babies for the weekend, and they take priority! :-)].

 

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.

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From: Nikos Pappas <nikos.a...@gmail.com>
To: 'Robert Vaughn' via Fasola Songwriters <fasola-so...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, May 11, 2017 9:14 AM
Subject: [fasola-songwriters: 2616] songs of dubious mode

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[Rachel Hall]

Very old thread, but... I remembered this discussion because I was just looking at SHAWMUT in Mason's Sacred Harp, and, indeed, it seems that *he* toyed with the idea that it could be imagined in the minor key. The second ending ends on III - that is, V/vi. https://archive.org/details/sacredharporbeau01maso/page/123

Rachel