Christian Sacred Music in the Americas explores the richness of Christian musical traditions and reflects the distinctive critical perspectives of the Society for Christian Scholarship in Music. This volume, edited by Andrew Shenton and Joanna Smolko, is a follow-up to SCSM's Exploring Christian Song and offers a cross-section of the most current and outstanding scholarship from an international array of writers. The essays survey a broad geographical area and demonstrate the enormous diversity of music-making and scholarship within that area. Contributors utilize interdisciplinary methodologies including media studies, cultural studies, theological studies, and different analytical and ethnographical approaches to music. While there are some studies that focus on a single country, musical figure, or region, this is the first collection to represent the vast range of sacred music in the Americas and the different approaches to studying them in context.
Andrew Shenton is professor of music at Boston University. His research areas include music and transcendence, humor and religion, performance practice, and theology and the arts. Joanna Smolko is an instructor at the University of Georgia. Her research areas include American popular music from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, American sacred music, American folk music, and film music.
Introduction: Exploring Christian Sacred Music in the Americas Andrew Shenton and Joanna Smolko I. Liturgical Music 1. Liberation Theology: Affirmation and Homage in Three Brazilian Popular Masses Cathy Ann Elias 2. The Guatemalan Choirbooks: Facilitating Preservation, Performance, and Study of the Colonial Repertoire Martha Thomae II. Hymnology 3. Sweet Harmonies of Praise: Reviving Shape Note Singing in Rural Arkansas Andrew Granade 4. Hymns of Joyful Praise: Sacred Harp Singing in Athens, Georgia Joanna Smolko 5. The Hymn Tunes of Thomas Hastings David W. Music III. Contemporary Worship 6. 'Evangelico e Brasileiro': Brazil's Alternative Christian Music Scene Marcell Silva Steuernagel 7. Ethics, Justice, and Politics in Contemporary Worship Music Jeff R. Warren IV. Paraliturgical Music 8. 'Resignation' and Virgil Thomson's Hymns from the Old South Zen Kuriyama 9. "Rock of Ages: Images of Jesus in Popular Music." Delvyn Case V. Diasporic Music 10. The Folk Scholarship Roots and Geopolitical Boundaries of Sacred Harp's Global 21st Century Jesse Karlsberg 11. Anglican Diaspora: Episcopal Church Music in the Twenty First Century Matthew Hoch VI. Indigenous and African American Music 12. 'Woman, Arise and Speak': Envisioning the Study of Indigenous Christian Song in Brazil Andrew Janzen and Meiry Yakawa 13. From the Sun to the Son: How Christian Missionaries used Music to Evangelize the Choctaw People Emma Wimberg 14. Lift Every Voice and Sing: Embodying Black Theology in Song Stephen Michael Newby and Chelle Stearns Epilogue: Singing Worlds in the Americas Michael O'Connor
Admirable in its geographic reach and in its range of historical and ethnographic approaches, this volume offers a stimulating and welcome set of case studies that shed new light on areas of Christian sacred music that have not yet received the attention they deserve. -- Stephen A. Crist, professor of music history, Emory University Christian Sacred Music in the Americas is a brilliantly interdisciplinary collection. The chapters coalesce to form a kaleidoscopic view-one that illuminates not only aspects of worship and spirituality but also of resistance, resilience, and reconciliation. -- Eftychia Papanikolaou, Associate professor of musicology, Bowling Green State University Refreshingly, this insightful volume expands the geographical frame from the typical focus on North America to "the Americas," weaving Central and South American perspectives into its rich tapestry of voices. It is an excellent addition to any sacred music or American music course. -- Monique Ingalls, associate professor of music; affiliated faculty, religion, Baylor University
