[Dixielandjazz] AMAZING GRACE

[Harry Callaghan]

I just received this from a musician friend up in NY and thought it might be
of interest to some subscribers here

The text appears to infer "Amazing Grace" played upon the
piano........frankly, I didn't think it was allowed to be played on anything
but bagpipes.


Hello Don. Do you remember the e-mails and videos that were swirling around
a while back about the "complete" version of "Taps" that everyone got so
teary-eyed over to finally hear the "full arrangement" of that turned out to
be a performance of "Il Silencio" and other than a few notes had nothing in
common with our military bugle call "Taps?" Here we go again. I quote from
Wickipedia:

"*Amazing Grace*" is a Christian hymn <http://wiki/Hymn> written by English
poet and clergyman John Newton <http://wiki/John_Newton> (1725–1807),
published in 1779. With a message that forgiveness and redemption is
possible regardless of the sins people commit and that the soul can be
delivered from despair through the mercy of God, "Amazing Grace" is one of
the most recognizable songs in the English-speaking world.
Newton wrote the words from personal experience. He grew up without any
particular religious conviction but his life's path was formed by a variety
of twists and coincidences that were often put into motion by his
recalcitrant insubordination. He was pressed <http://wiki/Impressment> into
the Royal Navy <http://wiki/Royal_Navy> and became a sailor, eventually
participating in the slave trade. One night a terrible storm battered his
vessel so severely that he became frightened enough to call out to God for
mercy, a moment that marked the beginning of his spiritual conversion. His
career in slave trading lasted a few years more until he quit going to sea
altogether and began studying theology.
Ordained in the Church of England <http://wiki/Church_of_England> in 1764,
Newton became curate <http://wiki/Curate> of Olney,
Buckinghamshire<http://wiki/Olney,_Buckinghamshire>,
where he began to write hymns with poet William
Cowper<http://wiki/William_Cowper>.
"Amazing Grace" was written to illustrate a sermon on New Year's Day of
1773. It is unknown if there was any music accompanying the verses, and it
may have been chanted by the congregation without music. It debuted in print
in 1779 in Newton and Cowper's *Olney Hymns <http://wiki/Olney_Hymns>*, but
settled into relative obscurity in England. In the United States however,
"Amazing Grace" was used extensively during the Second Great
Awakening<http://wiki/Second_Great_Awakening>in the early 19th
century. It has been associated with more than 20
melodies, but in 1835 it was joined to a tune named "New Britain" to which
it is most frequently sung today.
Author Gilbert Chase writes that "Amazing Grace" is "without a doubt the
most famous of all the folk
hymns",[1]<https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=1&view=page&name=gp&ver=sh3fib53pgpk#129a985d7020c1c3_cite_note-0>and
Jonathan Aitken, a Newton biographer, estimates that it is performed
about 10 million times
annually.[2]<https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=1&view=page&name=gp&ver=sh3fib53pgpk#129a985d7020c1c3_cite_note-aitken224-1>It
has had particular influence in folk
music <http://wiki/Folk_music>, and become an emblematic African American
spiritual <http://wiki/Spiritual_(music)>. Its universal message has been a
significant factor in its crossover into secular music. "Amazing Grace" saw
a resurgence in popularity in the U.S. during the 1960s and has been
recorded thousands of times during and since the 20th century, sometimes
appearing on popular music charts.

Musical scales, and there are many, can begin on any note - black or white
on a piano. This preacher has a moving presentation, but lets not start
deciding that he knows anything about music history, music theory or the
origin of any form of Negro music just because he is a Negro and recorded a
video in a setting surrounded by several hundred followers.

I've know people that think black music started after the Civil War when
freed slaves found instruments discarded by soldiers. Help! The early New
Orleans black bands and orchestras were well versed in the classics, READ
music and played for all sorts of functions and supplied whatever
material that was required by each job.

Let's be fair here. Reducing early Negro music, especially spirituals, to
those melodies which can be played on "black keys" is... I won't say it in
print. Yeah, day show had a lot a pianahs out in dem cotton fields to
write dem spirituals on dem black keys, aw right!

People: if you're going to decide what's Y.K.O.M - Your Kind Of Music -
please enjoy it, but realize that it's created by artists of every stripe
that technically know a lot more about it than you do and don't try to bring
their work to your level with these simplistic e-mails. You only confuse
yourselves, not the artists.
 ------------------------------



-- 
Alcohol is necessary for a man so that now and then he can have a good
opinion
of himself, undisturbed by the facts

            - Finley Peter Dunne (1867-1936)