Together Let Us Sweetly Live: The Singing and Praying Bands (Music in American Life)

About this book

Together Let Us Sweetly Live offers a rare look at the unique grassroots African American religious institutions called the Singing and Praying Bands. This folksong and ring shout tradition began in Chesapeake Bay country in the early nineteenth century with a fusion of Methodist prayer meeting worship and African religious danced song traditions. Although scholars have assumed ring shouts died out long ago Jonathan C. David shows otherwise ushering us inside tidewater communities of Maryland and Delaware where they continue to thrive. A traditional band service represents a cultural commitment to mutual aid called "help " operating as a system of social reciprocity as a performance aesthetic and as the foundation of community spirituality. The books nine chapters tell the story of the Singing and Praying Bands at these services through oral histories each told by a different member of a group. Seventy-eight photographs along with twenty-one song notations bring the spirit of the culture to life. The authors introduction provides the historical and ethnographic context needed to understand the bands and their tradition. An accompanying CD of original field recordings offers an opportunity to hear the service as if you were there.