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COMPOSITIONS SHAPED BY COMMUNITY

ited for each contribution. As she described the work: tune has undergone many changes, such that it can no
longer be identified as the work of a sole composer;
It’s totally part of the tradition [that] these songs instead, it is a product of the community (Figure 7).
47
get just gone over and over and over again by Hall hopes future communities would feel that they
people in different generations and cobbled to- had her permission to change things in her own com-
gether. Things get stuck together that were nev- positions. “The beauty of the tradition,” she reflected,
er meant to be together before. People change “is that you can choose. You can take any one of the
notes and sometimes they pick completely dif- versions that has existed throughout history or you can
ferent poetry for it or change the title or all sorts change them and make it your own. It’s not for sure that
of things like that. So it’s not weird. It’s not like the original is the best one.”
we took some Bach and altered it. 46 Revision committees ultimately decide which new
compositions enter the repertoire and which do not.
She shared an example of one of her favorite songs, Currently, a committee of nine active singers is revising
devotion, written by Alexander Johnson in 1818. The the Denson edition of The Sacred Harp, with the expec-

18 CHORAL JOURNAL March/April 2025 Volume 65 Number 7