In these days of easy access to music of all types, it’s hard to imagine a time when if you wanted music, you had to make it yourself. In colonial times, choirs, singing bees and gathering to hear the few instruments that you and your neighbors possessed were the only sources of music.
Like most things in colonial life, especially in the 1700s, the church was home to most public music. The Sabbath was celebrated by long sermons and prayers interspersed with the singing of a Psalm which was apparently a lengthy procedure.
At a Sunday service, the Psalm, “turned into meter”, was lined off or “deaconed” by an appointed person. In the case that person was unavailable, there were always two or more who could take over. The style of singing in vogue at the time, slow tunes, took up quite a bit of time. The book from which most music was chosen was the “Bay Psalm Book” and in general, only a few church tunes were well known.
Our colonial ancestors were nothing if not contentious, and it wasn’t long before a disagreement arose over whether it was more appropriate to have “singing by rote” or “singing by rule”. One of those in opposition to “singing by rule” wrote, “If they sing by rule they will also pray by rule and preach by rule, and then comes popery”.
The “singing by rule” faction won out and with it came books of music, variations in the method of singing and The New England Singing School. Many of those who attended the school were gathered into choirs and “part singing” was introduced.
Once church congregations stopped arguing over the singing, they turned their attention to the musical instruments allowed in the church. First, came the pitch pipe (to help with the singing), followed quickly by the bass viol, the violin and eventually other instruments.
It was the bass viol that caused the most contention, though I’ve found no explanation of why. After much debate and discussion, a compromise was made in some churches as to how often the bass viol could be played. After that, things settled down and the pitch pipe, bass viol and violin were most commonly used, until the introduction of the melodeon and then in the mid-1800s the church organ.
The popularity of organs rose and could be found not only in most churches, but also in the homes of the well to do. In fact, the organ in our museum (pictured here) was donated to the East Rochester Congregational Church from a private home. Though it looks like a small pipe organ, it is a rare “vocalion” organ of which we are very proud. It was once in the home of the Hathaways of Wareham and was given by a Mrs. Stone in 1932.
By Connie Eshbach