Description
Edited by Joseph Stephen James, 1911. Centennial Edition edited by Jesse P. Karlsberg, 2015.
Note: This is a commemorative reprint of a historical edition of The Sacred Harp. The Sacred Harp Publishing Company also publishes The Sacred Harp: 2025 Edition, the most widely used current edition of the tunebook.
This commemorative edition celebrates the century that has passed since the 1911 publication of Original Sacred Harp, the direct progenitor of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company’s Sacred Harp: 2025 Edition. Each song in the book includes a historical note written by James. These annotations comprised the most ambitious and accessible record of the history of the songs and hymns in The Sacred Harp and their writers until David Warren Steel’s 2010 reference work, The Makers of the Sacred Harp. Although of variable accuracy, the annotations are a valuable source of information, and a frequent source of humor! Original Sacred Harp included all the songs in the 1870 Sacred Harp, the last edition Sacred Harp co-compiler B. F. White edited. In addition, it restored two thirds of the songs removed from the songbook in the nineteenth century, and introduced new songs that are among the most loved in the book today including “Present Joys,” “Praise God,” and “Traveling On.”
The Original Sacred Harp: Centennial Edition reprints the entire contents of the 1911 tunebook in meticulously reproduced facsimile, preserving the book’s quirky then-modern typographical style. The book features a new introduction by Jesse P. Karlsberg placing Original Sacred Harp in historical and social context, describing how it came to be published, and detailing its reception and legacy.
A handsome hardbound volume reproducing the 1911 tunebook’s original cover, Original Sacred Harp: Centennial Edition makes newly accessible James’s fascinating historical notes and a trove of engaging music.
Joseph Stephen James (1849–1931) was a lawyer, businessman, and politician who grew up in rural West Georgia and became a leader in Sacred Harp singing upon his retirement. He edited three tunebooks including Original Sacred Harp.
Jesse P. Karlsberg is senior digital scholarship strategist at the Emory Center for Digital Scholarship and associated faculty in the Department of Music at Emory University and serves as the vice president of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company.
Hardcover, 584 pages
Publishers: Pitts Theology Library and the Sacred Harp Publishing Company
