Shape note singing at Tippe

The Living Waters Contemplative Life Center hosts monthly Sacred Harp singing at Tippecanoe Presbyterian Church, 125 W. Saveland Ave., the fourth Sunday of each month. New members are welcome.

“The sacred harp is your voice,” said Karen Hagen, Tippecanoe pastor and a spiritual director with a private healing practice. Sacred Harp singing is a form of shape note singing, which uses four different shaped notes (triangle, rectangle, oval, diamond) for musical notation.

“Shape note singing developed because back in the early times in the country, there was no ability to have musical accompaniment and not everybody read music,” Hagen said.

Participants sit in a square facing each other and sing a cappella. To join in, singers don’t need to know how to read music or have experience singing. Pitch is relative and harmonies sound “crisp and full.” Hagen said she was surprised at their first meeting a few months ago how good their four-part harmony sounded. “None of us had known before we’d sing this that well.” 

Sacred Harp music has roots in the English countryside but is an American tradition with ties to Appalachian churches. The local group started to gel in early 2009, some months after artist and writer Peggy Hong joined Hagen’s Threshold Singers, who sing music to comfort those suffering grief, loss, or illness, including those in hospice care. The Sacred Harp group is still expanding but has a core group of 10-20 local regulars, with some coming from as far as Beloit and Madison to sing.

Hagen said the songs are implicitly Christian but mainly God-centered. “This is an interdenominational group of singers pulled from all major denominations,” Hagen said. She said new members are welcome regardless of affiliation or income. LWCLC is a mission ministry of Tippecanoe Church. The Sacred Harp singers are under the umbrella of the international nonprofit Sacred Harp Musical Heritage Association.

More: fasola.org, lwclc.org, tippechurch.org.

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