H.L. Mencken on Shape Note

Subject: H.L. Mencken on Shape Note
From: Dave Swan
Date: 31 Mar 01 - 01:18 PM

Now I've got nothing against shape note singing, been know to do it myself.

I cracked up when I ran across this quote from the sage of Baltimore who said that shape note "sounds like a cross between a steam calliope and a Ukranian peasant chorus."

Maybe I've been doing it right after all...

D

Subject: RE: H.L. Mencken on Shape Note
From: Dave Swan
Date: 31 Mar 01 - 01:19 PM

Make that KNOWN to do it. Blast. Joe, can you help me out with a quick fix? Jeri? Anybody?

Subject: RE: H.L. Mencken on Shape Note
From: GUEST
Date: 31 Mar 01 - 02:58 PM

Mencken's eyes and ears never did work right. I think he must have been an illegimate son of Ambrose Bierce.

Subject: RE: H.L. Mencken on Shape Note
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 01 Apr 01 - 02:51 PM

Guest, PLEASE tell me that characterization of H.L. Mencken was your original! It's great! (Spoken as a great fan of both A.B. and H.L.M.)

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: H.L. Mencken on Shape Note
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Apr 01 - 03:59 PM

So far as I know, but it's so obvious that it's probably been re-invented about a hundred times.

Subject: RE: H.L. Mencken on Shape Note
From: GUEST,John Garst
Date: 07 Mar 06 - 11:10 AM

I think that the "steam calliope/peasant chorus" quote actually belongs to Alan Lomax, not Mencken. I have a vague recollection that Mencken may have characterized Sacred Harp singing as "whining."

Subject: RE: H.L. Mencken on Shape Note
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 07 Mar 06 - 11:36 AM

Well, the snideness is self-evident. But how did a Ukrainian peasant chorus sound in Mencken's time? What does any of this actually mean in terms of musical performance? Mencken probably had no idea. He just thought that if he said "peasant" and named a poor, foreign country, he had conveyed cutting contempt.

Did you see the movie Winged Migration? The deep, powerful sound of male voices which you hear during the Gtand Canyon scene comes from a Bulgarian (or was it Romanian) men's choir. I am just back from a weekend in Las Vegas, and nothing I heard there could compete with that music for beauty.

I say to hell with 'em.

Subject: RE: H.L. Mencken on Shape Note
From: michaelr
Date: 07 Mar 06 - 06:43 PM

If you went to Las Vegas for any sort of beauty, you must have been misinformed.

;-)
Michael

Subject: RE: H.L. Mencken on Shape Note
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 07 Mar 06 - 06:53 PM

"steam calliope/Ukrainian peasant chorus" sounds much more like admiration rather than "snideness", so Alan Lomax sounds a likely source for it.

Subject: RE: H.L. Mencken on Shape Note
From: Burke
Date: 08 Mar 06 - 05:42 PM

Lomax would have known what a Ukrainian peasant chorus sounded like. He also liked Shape Note singing, so I agree that there's no snideness in his attitude. Mencken OTOH....

Subject: RE: H.L. Mencken on Shape Note
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 09 Mar 06 - 10:25 AM

"If you went to Las Vegas for any sort of beauty, you must have been misinformed."

Heavens, no. I was dragged there against my will. I mentioned the music in Vegas to contrast the irritating stuff that people have come to accept as popular music with the the beautiful sonority of the men's choir.

I did hear one piece that I enjoyed, "Time to Say Good-bye" with Sarah Brightman and Andrea Bocelli. However, you have to imagine the the water jets at the Bellagio going off at the same time.

Laaa la-la laaa la-la la laaaaa...
BOOH DA BOOH DA BOOH DA BOOH DA BOOM!