Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air

Subject: Lyr Add: MEETING IN THE AIR (from Highwoods String
From: harpgirl
Date: 27 Aug 02 - 10:31 PM

MEETING IN THE AIR
as done by the Highwoods String Band No. 3 Special

You have heard of little Moses in the Bulrush
You have head of fearless David and his sling
You have heard the story told of dreamin Joseph
And of Jonah and the whale you often sing
There's going to be a meeting in the air
In that sweet, sweet by and by
I'm going to meet you, meet you over there
In that home beyond the sky
Such singing you will hear
Never heard by mortal ears
'Twill be glorious I do declare
And God's own son will be the leading one
In that meeting in the air

There are many, many others to the Bible
I would like to meet them all I do declare
By and by the lord will surely let us meet them
At that meeting in the air
There's going to be a meeting in the air
In that sweet, sweet by and by
I'm going to meet you, meet you over there
In that home beyond the sky
Such singing you will hear
Never heard by mortal ears
T'will be glorious I do declare
And God's own son will be the leading one
At that meeting in the air

There's going to be a meeting, meeting in the air
In that sweet, sweet by and by
I'm going to meet you, meet you over there
In that home beyond the sky
Such singing you will hear
Never heard by mortal ears
'Twill be glorious I do declare
And God's own son will be the leading one
In that meeting in the air


This song has been mentioned in several threads but I didn't find the words. hg

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 27 Aug 02 - 10:40 PM

Hi, Harp: This is the first thread I've read that answers the question before anyone asks it. Does anyone know the words to Meeting in the Air? :-)

Warmest Regards (as another thread suggests)

Jerry

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: harpgirl
Date: 27 Aug 02 - 10:49 PM

Well, Jerry, I know you can appreciate this hymn. But I was raised Episcopalian. We were mostly concerned with hats! *wink*

Do you remember Bernice Reagon from Folkways Records, BTW?

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 27 Aug 02 - 11:03 PM

Harp: No, I didn't actually know Bernice Reagon... just her name. I kinda grew up Lutheran, myself. Not a barrel of laughs in the Lutheran church when I was a kid. Wrote a song about growing up in a minister's family... not mine.. my Dad didn't go to church much...

"Poppa was a preacher down in Kankakee, where the soil was black as coal
And the only job he ever had was planting of the seed, and the harvesting of the soul
And when we got together 'round the table every night, he always sang the grace
And I can hear my Momma singing high harmony, while my Poppa sang the bass

And We sang Old One Hundred, and Walking in the Garden
And A Closer Walk With Thee
And there never was a song that my Poppa didn't know
And he taught 'em all to me

But, I never sang Meeting In The Air. Truth be told, I've never actually even heard the song...

Jerry

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: Nancy King
Date: 27 Aug 02 - 11:17 PM

If you haven't heard Helen Schneyer singing "Meeting in the Air," you haven't lived! I think it's on her "On the Hallelujah Line" recording (available from Folk-Legacy and elsewhere). Check it out, Jerry!

Cheers, Nancy

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: masato sakurai
Date: 28 Aug 02 - 03:38 AM

The Carter Family recorded it in 1940 (now on In the Shadow of Clinch Mountain, Bear Family). The lyrics are almost the same as those posted above by harpgirl.

~Masato

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: harpgirl
Date: 22 Jan 04 - 02:47 PM

rebop

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Jan 04 - 03:27 PM

Anybody have a MIDI they can send me?
[e-mail]

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: GUEST
Date: 22 Jan 04 - 05:50 PM

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: GUEST,Dale
Date: 22 Jan 04 - 05:59 PM

RA or MP3 won't do? I have it by the Carters ~~ of course!, and by Watson, Thompson and Craver of The Red Clay Ramblers. That's the one I prefer. I only have it on LP, but it's worth digging out.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: Stewie
Date: 22 Jan 04 - 06:40 PM

I agree, Dale. The Watson, Thompson and Craver rendition would be hard to beat - lovely, as is their album of the same name. 'Meeting In The Air' is an album that cries out for reissue on CD - the finest tribute to the Carter Family ever.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: GUEST,Mary V.
Date: 22 Jan 04 - 06:55 PM

June Carter Cash's version is the version I have and it is so good.
Its on the Press On C.D.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: wysiwyg
Date: 22 Jan 04 - 11:47 PM

I'll try a MIDI if anyone can email me a sound file.

~S~

Subject: Chords Add: MEETING IN THE AIR
From: wysiwyg
Date: 23 Jan 04 - 09:59 AM

O there's [E] going to be a meeting,
A meeting in the air
In the sweet, sweet by and [B] by.
And I'm [B7] gonna meet you,
Meet you over there
In our [B] home beyond the sky.
Such singing you will hear,
Never heard by mortal ear.
T'will be glorious I do de[A]clare.
And God's own [B] Son,
Will [E] be the leading [C#] one,
At that [F#] meeting in the air.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: wysiwyg
Date: 23 Jan 04 - 10:29 AM

THIS IT?

Or HERE or HERE...

How I found these was Google Advanced Search, "Meeting in the Air" for phrase and then containing the word "MIDI".

~S~

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: wysiwyg
Date: 23 Jan 04 - 11:10 AM

Oops, those sites would prefer you to download to listen, not click directly to the file. And yes I know they are overproduced. But if one of you can OK it as the right tune, I can try to pare it down to a melody line if that would be helpful. A clip as an MP3 would be helpful in that.

~S~

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: GUEST,Pete Peterson
Date: 23 Jan 04 - 09:14 PM

AAAAAAAAAAAAAKK!

Glad to see interest in this song which is one of my favorites. WYSIWYG, one of the things that made the Carter Family so distinctive was that they only used the I, IV and V chords even when the song cried out for the more complicated chords. Thus Maybelle and Sara are playing:
And (IV)God's own son will (I) be the leading one
At that (V)meeting in the (I) air.

About every year at NEFFA, when we do the Carter Family workshop we demonstrate this and say "we are not telling you what to do, but WILL say that if you want to sound as much like the Carter Family as possible, this is one of the ways to do it."
And by the way, if you choose to do it with the more complicated chords, it makes a very nice quodlibet with Just Because, Bill Bailey, and the Washington & Lee Swing.
Harpgirl, have a wonderful time on the cruise!

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: wysiwyg
Date: 23 Jan 04 - 10:36 PM

Yeah, I agree aaaaak, and I want to post it to Mudcat MIDIs with just the melody line, but I wasn't going to fool with the MIDI file till I was sure it was the same song.... and I WOULD like to HEAR it as recorded first, too.

~S~

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: wysiwyg
Date: 24 Jan 04 - 04:12 PM

I've taken the most promising of the MIDIs linked above and separated the voices. I've discarded all but the two voices where the melody clearly crosses. I'm ready to finish tinkering it as a single melody line-- if someone would just send me a good sound clip.

~Susan

[e-mail]
Put MUDCAT in the subject line to pass the spam filters!

If the sound file is longer than one verse, it probably will not arrive at that mailbox. If you have a longer clip, just PM me for another addy.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: Joe Offer
Date: 24 Jan 04 - 04:38 PM

The first link Wizzy posted seems to work fairly well. It sounds like what I remember of the song. I wish there were a decent Carter Family songbook available. Anybody know of one?
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: wysiwyg
Date: 24 Jan 04 - 05:06 PM

Yes, that's one I am working from now; I discarded all but the top staff and thens plit the voices in that to separate the two voices it holds. As the MIDI is now, in what displays as the top staff, I'm pretty sure the lower of those two voices shown carries the melody, except for a measure or so where I think the melody crosses to the higher voice.... in a number of the Carter family pieces I've heard, AP is singing melody but the higher voice(s), which carry better, seem to be the leader, till you actually try to sing it, and then you realize, no, that's the harmony. And I have heard songs where they cross. But to be sure I do want to hear a clip. From there it will be a simple matter to edit the MIDI in NWC.

~S~

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: GUEST,Pete Peterson
Date: 24 Jan 04 - 06:08 PM

Joe, as you probably know, the Bear Family set of the Carter Family has a wonderful book with lots of pictures and the words to all the Carter Family songs, in the order they recorded them, WITHOUT a cross-index. (Oh well). In the notes to the songs, they also give the true authors of the songs, where known. Contrary to what Southern Music, Inc, would have us believe, very few actually WERE "by A.P. Carter." But I digress. They don't have the tunes, you have to listen to the CDs and learn them yourself. I was told that Southern Music, Inc. has been unreasonable when people have suggested reprinting one of the Carter Family songbooks, all of which have been allowed to go out of print. Samizdat collections of words & music ARE available-- wouldn't be surprised if our own Camsco Music has something available. . . but I don't know.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: wysiwyg
Date: 24 Jan 04 - 08:36 PM

I have a 29 second clip now. Could use more, but it's a good start.

Pete, would you agree AP has the meldoy on this one, and would you go with his voice for all of it, or do you think the melody crosses over anywhere to the ladies?

~S~

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: GUEST,Pete Peterson
Date: 25 Jan 04 - 07:25 PM

Sorry it's aken me so long to put CD 10 from the Bear Family Set (In the Shadow of Clinch Mountain) in the player and listen.

Sara is singing on the verses, and lead (melody) on the choruses. As is pretty standard, Maybelle is singing the harmony immediately above the lead, and AP is in and out-- now you hear him, now you don't, but he is definitely lower than the other two voices.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: Stewie
Date: 25 Jan 04 - 09:00 PM

Pete,

What are the details of the recording you refer to on CD 10 of the Bear Family set? I do not have that set, but I have all pre-1941 recordings of The Carter Family. The recording I have of 'Meeting in the Air' is with Sara and Mabelle only - 4 Oct 1940 [OK 05931). I have Alec Davidson's discography in Old Time Music Booklet #1 and I cannot find any recording of the song by the trio. The only other reference by Davidson is to a March 1956 recording on Acme [Acme DF-103] by The A.P. Carter Family - A.P., Sara, Janette Carter and Joe Carter. Is Davidson's discography at fault or have I missed something?

Susan,

I have converted the October 1940 recording to an MP3 file [1.47 Mb]. Two guitars, Sara on lead with Maybelle joining her on choruses. If you care to PM me with your email address, I'll try to sent it to you.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: GUEST,Pete Peterson
Date: 26 Jan 04 - 08:40 AM

It IS the October 4 1940 recording from Chicago, IL. The session notes (page 183 of that Bear Family set) are for the WHOLE session and simply say "AP Carter, vocal, SARA CARTER vocal/autoharp/guitar, MAYBELLE CARTER vocal/guitar. The song (OK 05931, Cq 9666) is credited, as usual to AP Carter. I've listened a number of times and feel certain that AP is singing at least SOME of the time on the chorus, mostly on the root of the I chord -- I just listened again and can hear AP on the 3rd line of the chorus . . . "singing you will hear" -- song is in the key of C and AP is singing that low C. Tell me if you hear it!

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: wysiwyg
Date: 26 Jan 04 - 08:52 AM

I have the MP3 now.

~Susan

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: Stewie
Date: 26 Jan 04 - 08:01 PM

Pete, I listened a few times, with and without headphones, but I am unable to hear him. You may well be right though as I am no great shakes at distinguishing voices in harmony.

Susan, I'm glad you got the MP3. Can you hear A.P. in the chorus?

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: wysiwyg
Date: 26 Jan 04 - 08:30 PM

Yes, when I play with the EQ settings he's sometimes quite clear.

The melody has some differences from the MIDI I'm working on... and the MIDI is constructed in a pretty weird way as to key signature and some of the notation conventions.

I think the MIDI (which seems to have been copied in several places on the Net with various voices in addition to the main vocal lines) may have been transcribed from sheet music. If so, and it is "correct," I guess I'm not making a "correct" MIDI. So, do we want it to come out Carter, or whuh? Is there some sheet music one of you Netdiggers can find, that you think would be "original"?

~S~

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: Janie
Date: 23 Aug 06 - 11:15 AM

refresh to trace

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Meeting in The Air
From: GUEST,Pete Peterson
Date: 23 Aug 06 - 01:48 PM

can't believe people still care about this. I wish that 3rd verse (mourner's bench) were as good as the first two, or maybe it is just that I am so used to hearing the Carter Family that it couldn't possibly be improved on.

Our friend Jerry Dallal (Google on his name to find) has completed an index to the Bear Faily set which has made searching for a song MUCH easier