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was soon seen that there was a need to understand musical notation; so
music theory and practice began to be taught in the communities. But the
Shaker hymns gradually lost the conventional metric verse and stanza form
and there was less and less borrowing from folk music and other sects. In
1847 two Shaker brethren, Isaac Youngs and (?) Haskell, published a manual
of instruction on an TT unworldly" method of music writing--in other words,
one conceived by the Shakers and, at that time, in use about 10 years.
Instead of the round notes we use, they used the small letters of the alphabet--
a , b , c , d , e,f, g.
If in a major pitch, "c" was the basic note; if a minor key,
"d" was basic. They finally did away with the lines or staffs, leaving only
the letters and placing them to indicate their relation (closer together,
quicker in pace) and pitch (above previous letter, higher in pitch). They
might use many tempos in the same song--some for only one measure--
but the tempo was always distorted to conform to the requirements of the
Shaker ritual, so as to coordinate gesture and dance. Their usual method
of hymn writing was to present a melody in "skeleton" form, to be filled in
by singers, with harmony and tune "twisting." But they also did not use har-
mony in the conventional sense.
The words of one verse of a Shaker song are:
"In the Church of Christ and Mother,
Carnal feelings have no place;
Here the simple love each other,
Free from ev T rything that's base. "
Instrumental music was not approved until 1870 and a small cabinet
organ was purchased at Canterbury, N. H. Two years later a convert