Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Contributors
- Editor's Introduction
- SECTION I BACKGROUND ON RELIGIOUS TRADITIONS – PRE-1500S
- SECTION II RELIGIONS IN THE POST-COLUMBIAN NEW WORLD – 1500–1680S
- SECTION III RELIGIOUS PATTERNS IN COLONIAL AMERICA – 1680S–1730S
- SECTION IV RELIGIOUS DIVERSITY IN BRITISH AMERICA – 1730S–1790
- SECTION V AMERICAN RELIGIONS IN THE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY INTERNATIONAL CONTEXT
- SECTION VI THEMATIC ESSAYS
- 32 Religious Thought: The Pre-Columbian Era to 1790
- 33 Piety and Practice in North America to 1800
- 34 Sacred Music in Colonial America
- 35 Religious Architecture
- 36 Religion and Visuality in America: Material Economies of the Sacred
- 37 Religion and Race
- 38 Religions and Families in America: Historical Traditions and Present Positions
- 39 Religious History
- Index
- References
34 - Sacred Music in Colonial America
from SECTION VI - THEMATIC ESSAYS
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 July 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Contributors
- Editor's Introduction
- SECTION I BACKGROUND ON RELIGIOUS TRADITIONS – PRE-1500S
- SECTION II RELIGIONS IN THE POST-COLUMBIAN NEW WORLD – 1500–1680S
- SECTION III RELIGIOUS PATTERNS IN COLONIAL AMERICA – 1680S–1730S
- SECTION IV RELIGIOUS DIVERSITY IN BRITISH AMERICA – 1730S–1790
- SECTION V AMERICAN RELIGIONS IN THE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY INTERNATIONAL CONTEXT
- SECTION VI THEMATIC ESSAYS
- 32 Religious Thought: The Pre-Columbian Era to 1790
- 33 Piety and Practice in North America to 1800
- 34 Sacred Music in Colonial America
- 35 Religious Architecture
- 36 Religion and Visuality in America: Material Economies of the Sacred
- 37 Religion and Race
- 38 Religions and Families in America: Historical Traditions and Present Positions
- 39 Religious History
- Index
- References
Summary
Sacred music played a complex and crucial role in the development of colonial American religious cultures from the earliest encounters of Europeans and indigenous peoples to the Revolution of 1776. The ritual singing of sacred texts is a constituent part of most religious cultures, and colonial religions produced a rich diversity of such sacred music. This multiplicity, however, developed within the broader context of colonialism that imposed processes of transmission, assimilation, and hybridization on every religious community in the New World. Understanding sacred music in colonial America therefore demands attention both to its variety and to the common cultural processes that shaped it.
MUSIC AND MISSIONS
The original sacred music of North America was that of indigenous peoples. Hundreds of First Nations occupied the continent at the time of European encounter. Their cultures were grounded in traditional religious worldviews whose principal means of expression were singing and dancing. From shamanistic healing chants to calendric festival dances, the religions of Native Americans were filled with musical vocalization, typically accompanied by rhythm instruments like drums and rattles.
Indigenous religions understood humans to live in a sacred cosmos in which all natural forces and things were personified in spirit beings. The religious task of humans was to live in balance with these beings by honoring them in celebrative or sacrificial rituals and invoking them for aid in times of famine or disease.
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- Information
- The Cambridge History of Religions in America , pp. 708 - 727Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2000