Maintained by Charles Wells
The last (at least for now) Annual All-Day Singing in Oberlin, Ohio, took place in September, 2007. But we have a replacement!
The Northwest Pennsylvania Shape Note Singers are excited to
announce the first Northwest
Pennsylvania All-Day Sacred Harp Singing, which will occur on Saturday,
September 6 from 9:30 AM to 3:30 PM at the Crossroads Community Baptist Church,
5827 Old French Road in Erie, PA. Singing will be from the 1991 revision of the
Sacred Harp. Registration will commence at 9:00 AM. There will be a singing
school, taught by Aldo Ceresa of Brooklyn, NY, from 9:30 AM to 11:00 AM.
Pot-luck dinner on the grounds will be at 12:30 PM.
The Erie Heritage Festival is also scheduled for that day,
and we have been asked to demonstrate Sacred Harp singing at the festival in
Liberty Park from 5:00 PM to 6:00 PM. Bus transportation from the church to the
park and back will be provided for singers who wish to participate in this
demonstration.
There will be a social starting at 8:00 PM at a singers
house. Details will be announced at the singing.
A limited amount of housing for singers from out of town can
be provided by local singers; please contact me if you're interested (see
below).
For those inclined to stay at a hotel, the Super 8 Hotel
located at Exit 27 on I-90 in Pennsylvania has given us a rate of $80.99, as
per Judy, continental breakfast included. Be sure to ask for the "Sacred
Harp" rate; make reservations before August 5. Phone: 814-864-9200. This
hotel is just about a mile away from the church.
We intend for this singing to become an annual event!
For further information, please contact Gerry Hoffman at:
cabanaman77 [at] gmail.com
814-734-5950
Our songbook Oberlin Harmony: Songs We Like To Sing, is
available. It will be for sale for $7.00 each at some singings. To
order it by mail in the USA, send a check made out to Charles Wells to 105
South Cedar Street, Oberlin, Ohio 44074. The cost postpaid in
the
Oberlin Harmony was edited by Chloe Maher and Charles Wells, with the help of many singers from the Oberlin area. It contains over 70 old and new songs, chosen primarily because we like to sing them. Many are by authors connected with Oberlin, and most of them have been newly typeset. These are the songs, listed by author:
Barnett, G. P.: Arkansas
Bayer, John, Jr.: Hans; Marcia; Okefenokee
Bliss, P. P.: It is Well with my Soul
Bosold, Ann: Bosold; Pontchartrain
Bradshaw: Mississippi
Brown, Bartholomew: Williamstown
Bruce, Neely: Millbrook
Chandler, Henry F.: Lisbon; Palms of Victory
Croft, William: St. Anne
Davis, Lena Mae: Sweet Peace
Davis, R.M.: Sweet Peace
Davisson, Ananias: Amandra
Dean: Consolation
Denson, S. Whitt: I Won't Turn Back
Gibbons, Dan: Sixty-Five South
Hauff, Judy: Marcia; Okefenokee
Heider, Anne: Evanston
Henkin, Doron: Works of Wonder
Heritage, E.: Marshfield
Hertzler, David: Mount Hope
Houston, Seth: Emerald Stream
Humphreys: Exultation
Hutchinson, Roland: Relly's Third
Jenks, Stephen: Painesville; Solon; South Thompson
Johnson, Ted: Boulder
Kastelle, Allen Gabriel: Aberdeen; Encouragement; Forsaken; Mount Zion (Third)
Kelly, Ron: Life's Purpose
Kinkade, Pat: Deluge
Kunkel, Hal: The Stone Forever Stands; Ten Thousand Charms
Morris, Blake: Bankes
Palazzolo, Michael: East College
Pappas, Nikos: Buzzard’s Glory; Sinking Spring
Penick, S. R.: Narrow Space
Roberts, Caradog: In Memoriam
Schedler, Eric: Wells
Stokes, Edward: The Good Old Way
Sutherland, Pete: Crossing
Swan, M. L.: Paradise
Tucker, Tom: Windgate
Walker, W.R.: Laurel Hill
Wells, Charles: Cedar Street; Harkness
Wojcik, Matthew: Sovereign Love
Wright, David: Durango; Every Grace; Old Barrows; Wells (Second); York
York, Chandler H.: The Earth; Garvin; Maher; Marietta; Muhaiyadeen; Nhat Hahn; Pondicherry; Round Pond; Roxborough; Sophia; Wednesdays
York, Jeremy: Gilbert; Turman
These are songs in four-shape notation that you may download and copy to use in singings.
They are all Acrobat .pdf files. To see or print a .pdf file you need Adobe Acrobat Reader, a free program that you can download from this location. Many documents are distributed in .pdf format and if you download Acrobat Reader and install it on your computer (which you need to do just once) I predict you will use it many times in the future!
Many of the songs were written by David Wright, a graduate of Oberlin College.
Many thanks to Karen Willard for help in typesetting.
Other locations where songs can be downloaded: Other songs, old and new, are available for downloading at these locations:
by Charles Wells. Download
by David Wright. Download
by David Wright. Download
by Charles Wells. Download
This is a song from the J. L. White edition of The Sacred Harp (thanks to my son Matt Wells for giving it to me) which appears in Eclectic Harmony. I have retypeset it because the copy in E.H. is hard to read. Download
You can find out how to buy Eclectic Harmony in Chapter 1 of the at Resource Guide.
by Caradog Roberts. This is a Welsh song with very nice words (in English!) that is often called at our weekly evening singings in Oberlin. It is posted here by permission of the Welsh National Gymanfa Ganu Association from Welsh and English Hymns and Anthems (reformatted), page 28. Download
by David Wright. Download
This is a song from The New Harp of Columbia (a seven-shape
book used in eastern
by David Wright. Download
I will be glad to post in this location other songs that you would like to see more widely distributed. Email Charles (at) abstractmath.org for more information. Of course if it is a modern song I will need permission from the copyright owner.
Some good introductions are:
The main sources of information on the Net about Sacred Harp and other shape note singing are
These two sites have many different resources that are not listed on this Northeastern Ohio site.
Charles Wells' Personal Home Page
Charles (at) abstractmath.org