Skip to Main Content
 

Global Search Box

 
 
 

ETD Abstract Container

Abstract Header

Change in Early Cincinnati's Musical Identity: Shape-Note Tunebooks from Timothy Flint's Columbian Harmonist (1816) to Timothy and Lowell Mason's Sacred Harp (1834)

Mennel, Christina Chenevert
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1364291804

Abstract Details

1997, Master of Arts, Ohio State University, Music.
Shape-note tunebooks in early Cincinnati provide a particularly rich picture of the growth and change in early nineteenth-century American musical culture. As Cincinnati changed from frontier town to cultivated city, and simultaneously became a center for the publishing of music, its music industry experienced the clash of musical tastes. The repertoire of folk tunes and compositions by American composers had until the 1810s and 1820s provided much of the music for shape-note tunebooks for use in the popular institution of the singing school. A movement against this repertoire and the notation associated with it began out of missionary and educational concern; this movement encouraged the use of a more cultivated repertoire adapted from works of European composers such as Handel and Haydn, in an effort to improve the moral and literary taste of the West. In 1816 Timothy Flint was among the first to try to introduce standard notation and cultivated repertoire to Cincinnati as part of his missionary calling to the West. His efforts all but failed. In 1834 Timothy and Lowell Mason attempted an indentical feat, again with minimal success. This thesis examines why the Masons thought their venture would be successful, including an examination of how Cincinnati had changed musically and culturally over those eighteen years. Also included here is an examination of several tunebooks that were published in Cincinnati through 1834, in an effort to determine any changes in the shape-note tunebook market itself. Lastly, there is a detailed biography of Timothy Mason and his role as an influential musical figure in Cincinnati It seems that Cincinnati had indeed grown substantially in its support of cultivated music between the years 1816 and 1834. Shape-note tunebooks had nevertheless remained popular as a result of their marketability and connection to a distinct and well-preserved sense of Western identity.
Charles Atkinson, Dr. (Advisor)
117 p.
Music

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Mennel, C. C. (1997). Change in Early Cincinnati's Musical Identity: Shape-Note Tunebooks from Timothy Flint's Columbian Harmonist (1816) to Timothy and Lowell Mason's Sacred Harp (1834) [Master's thesis, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1364291804

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Mennel, Christina . Change in Early Cincinnati's Musical Identity: Shape-Note Tunebooks from Timothy Flint's Columbian Harmonist (1816) to Timothy and Lowell Mason's Sacred Harp (1834). 1997. Ohio State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1364291804.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Mennel, Christina . "Change in Early Cincinnati's Musical Identity: Shape-Note Tunebooks from Timothy Flint's Columbian Harmonist (1816) to Timothy and Lowell Mason's Sacred Harp (1834)." Master's thesis, Ohio State University, 1997. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1364291804

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1364291804
172
© 1997, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.