We currently have no singing schools planned for 2016.
If you're interested in hosting a singing school, contact sacredharpcatskills@gmail.com.
If you're interested in hosting a singing school, contact sacredharpcatskills@gmail.com.
Ben Bath, ethnomusicologist and instructor of the Sacred Harp singing school, leads a class in Stamford in March 2015.
Learn how to sight-sing in four-part harmony in one week. Below, students at the March 2015 Singing School, held in Stamford, NY, were sight-singing in harmony at a community potluck on March 7, 2015 after one week of singing school. This tune is 63 Coronation.
Eat, sing and be merry. Each singing school ends with a potluck, a graduation ceremony, and a public community singing. Below, the after-potluck community sing from the first Catskills singing school in Roxbury, NY in August 2013.
2015 Catskills Singing Schools
March 2 - 7
First Presbyterian Church of Stamford
Stamford, NY
April 20 - 25
Pine Hill Community Center
Pine Hill, NY
April 27 - May 2
Andes Presbyterian Church
Andes, NY
May 11 - 16
St. Francis de Sales Parish Hall
109 Main Street
Phoenicia, NY
June 1 - 6
Bovina Presbyterian Church
Intersection of Route 6 and Route 5
Bovina, NY
June 15 - 20
All Day Singing June 20
Walton First Congregational Church
4 Mead St
Walton, NY
Singing school is Monday through Friday, 6 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., for each session, with a pot luck, graduation & community singing held on each Saturday starting at 5 p.m. Cost for the week is $20. Participants will receive a FREE copy of The Sacred Harp tunebook.
Sacred Harp shape note singing is not a performance art, but a community activity. You sing to sing some more, and with each other. The music is sung with no instruments or accompaniment. It is loud! You sing in a full chest vosice, beating out the time and accenting the notes. It is not the sweet sound of hymns being sung, but a rich, unique sound like nothing you’ve ever heard.
Learn this uniquely American style of a Capella singing using the Sacred Harp tune book. Our Catskills singing schools are fashioned after singing schools of the early 19th century, using the shape note method.
Ben Bath, ethnomusicologist and graduate of Bard College, leads the class in a weeklong course in the basics of reading music and singing in harmony.
People who have no musical background are encouraged to attend. If you like to sing (even if it’s just in the shower) and have an interest in music, this is the place for you!
Learn this uniquely American style of a Capella singing using the Sacred Harp tune book. Our Catskills singing schools are fashioned after singing schools of the early 19th century, using the shape note method.
Ben Bath, ethnomusicologist and graduate of Bard College, leads the class in a weeklong course in the basics of reading music and singing in harmony.
People who have no musical background are encouraged to attend. If you like to sing (even if it’s just in the shower) and have an interest in music, this is the place for you!
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The 2015 Singing Schools were made possible, in part, with a grant from the A. Lindsay & Olive B. O'Connor Foundation, and with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts Decentralization Grant Program, with the support of Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the NYS Legislature, and is administered in Delaware County by The Roxbury Arts Group and in Ulster County by Arts Mid-Hudson. Additional support comes from the MARK Project and the Pine Hill Community Center |
