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AFRICAN AMERICAN HYMNODY l 987 been many and varied. While women’s place at the decision-making level for standard denominational hymn repertoires is a post–World War II reality, finding women’s names printed above the lyrics—and occasionally the tunes—of Protestant hymn favorites is a common occurrence. Many of those hymns were originally intended for arenas other than the sanctuary. There a handful gained such popularity that they found their way by public demand into the hymn vocabulary of American churchgoers. SOURCES: Ian Bradley, Abide With Me: The World of Victorian Hymns (1997). Fanny J. Crosby, Memories of Eighty Years (1905). E. C. Gaskell, The Life of Charlotte Brontë (1901). Michael Hicks, Mormonism and Music: A History (1989). June Hadden Hobbs, I Sing for I Cannot Be Silent: The Feminization of American Hymnody (1997). John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1892). Mrs. E. R. Pitman, Lady Hymn Writers (1892). Ira Sankey, My Life and the Story of the Gospel Hymns (1907). J. R. Watson, The English Hymn (1999). Paul Westermeyer , Te Deum: The Church and Music (1998). AFRICAN AMERICAN HYMNODY Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan HYMNODY IS THE experience of hymn singing and writing in and for a particular time, place, or church. A hymn is a song of adoration or praise of God, a poetic, religious proclamation appropriate for corporate expression . Hymns are sung statements of doctrinal beliefs in theological language, that is, beliefs and understandings about God’s presence and work in the world. The stanzas may have an accompanying refrain/chorus that is repeated after each verse. Traditionally, hymns are those songs that express the truth claims that capture the Christian religious experience of the faithful throughout the ages. African American hymnody emerges from the African cultural, religious, and musical practices of African slaves mixed with European religious doctrines and musical styles within the United States. African traits, characteristics, myths, and hermeneutical strategies central to the development of African American music create continuity between African American hymnody and oral African cultural memories. Central to African American Christian hymnody are their experiential issues that emerge from their pain predicament —years of enslavement and ongoing oppression . Richard Allen (1760–1831), a minister and founder of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, published the first hymnal designed for African Americans, A Collection of Hymns and Spiritual Songs from Various Authors (two editions) in Philadelphia in 1801. African American church hymnody categorizes music sung in a congregational style in a black church setting. This hymnody emerges from the soul as participatory, spirit-filled, holistic, celebratory, life-giving utterances and experiences, reflecting the doctrinal, theological, ethical, and sociocultural history and consciousness of diverse black churches. The songs include spirituals (folk, jubilee, arranged, protest songs); gospel music (folk, gospel-hymn, quartets, choral, contemporary); anthems (antiphonal, choral music with organ accompaniment ); revival songs (music with an evangelistic fervor ); hymns (standards by, e.g., Isaac Watts, Charles Wesley, Fanny Crosby, Charles A. Tindley); and praise songs (toe-tapping music of deep adoration). Central to this African American music tradition is the ring shout. The ring shout is a cultural, expressive ritual combining the secular and sacred. The ring shout embedded the slave’s musical habits into African American musical genres, where dance and holy music fuse. Such fluidity is key to all African American music. The ring shout involves feet shuffling, hand clapping, repetitive drumming , and counterclockwise movement in opposition to the sun’s movement, which symbolized the bards’ long, exhausting days of hard work during enslavement. The ritual embodied teaching through storytelling, trickster techniques, and other symbolic gestures and values of ancestor worship and multivalent gods; all facilitated the adaptation of the Christian doctrine of a Trinitarian God. In addition to the ring shout, African Americans retained and embraced many African traditions and practices foundational to African American hymnody. These traditions and practices include cries, calls, and hollers; call and response; heterophony, multiple rhythms, and polyrhythms; blue notes, pendular thirds, bent notes, hums, elisions; glides, grunts, vocables; and other rhythmic-oral declamations, punctuations, and interjections . Syncopation, parallel chords and intervals, melodic and rhythmic repetitions, body movement, and distinctive timbre connected the slave bards to their African traditions and have enriched African American hymnody. African American ethnomusicologist Portia K. Maultsby tracks a three-pronged musical lineage: African American sacred traditions, African American secular traditions (nonjazz), and African American secular traditions (jazz); these traditions have multiple tentacles reflecting a continuous linkage, influence, and fluidity between the so-called sacred and secular. The...

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