Author Archives: Jesse P. Karlsberg

About Jesse P. Karlsberg

Jesse P. Karlsberg is the vice president of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company. He edits the Sacred Harp Publishing Company Newsletter and is a member of the Revision-Music Committee for The Sacred Harp: 2025. Edition Born in Boston, he lives in Decatur, Georgia, and is senior digital scholarship strategist at Emory University.

Introducing Vol. 6, No. 1 of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company Newsletter

Posted on September 1, 2017 by and

The twelfth issue of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company Newsletter shares the stories of composers and singers, printers and cooks who contributed to Sacred Harp in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries—some well-known and others largely forgotten. It also features the … Continue reading →

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Orin Adolphus Parris: At Home Across the Shape-Note Music Spectrum

Posted on September 1, 2017 by

We often think of Sacred Harp and gospel music as opposites. Especially for singers from the 1991 Edition, the style can seem anathema; its relative exclusion a sign of the tunebook’s fidelity to the “old paths” invoked in its dedication. … Continue reading →

Posted in Read the Old Paths | 3 Comments

Introducing “Raymond Cooper Hamrick on The Sacred Harp,” Vol. 5, No. 2 of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company Newsletter

Posted on December 31, 2016 by

The eleventh issue of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company Newsletter features esteemed Sacred Harp singer, composer, and scholar Raymond C. Hamrick (1915–2014), a recipient of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company’s posthumous citation. The issue includes insightful essays by Hamrick himself, … Continue reading →

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Raymond C. Hamrick’s Contributions to Sacred Harp Singing and Scholarship

Posted on December 31, 2016 by

Raymond Cooper Hamrick (1915–2014), of Macon, Georgia, was a well-loved singer, composer, and scholar whose intellectual curiosity, generosity of spirit, and kindness seemed boundless. Perhaps the greatest Sacred Harp composer of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, Hamrick imparted … Continue reading →

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Introducing Vol. 5, No. 1 of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company Newsletter

Posted on August 22, 2016 by and

The tenth issue of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company Newsletter looks behind the scenes, exploring fascinating processes of composing, singing, and documenting Sacred Harp. Our issue opens with Andy Ditzler’s interview with prolific Sacred Harp photographer Robert Chambless, showing how … Continue reading →

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Introducing Vol. 4, No. 2 of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company Newsletter

Posted on December 31, 2015 by and

The ninth issue of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company Newsletter shares stories from Sacred Harp’s past, explores the leading choices of singers today, and offers thoughts on how our singings continue to expand as well as suggestions for how each … Continue reading →

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Regional Roots: Growing Sacred Harp in the Netherlands, Alaska, and British Columbia

Posted on December 31, 2015 by

Introduction Sacred Harp’s first wave of expansion beyond the southern United States was boosted by the dedication of dozens of long-time southern singers who traveled repeatedly to sing with newcomers across the country. These emissaries exemplified the sincere fellowship and … Continue reading →

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Seasonal Songs

Posted on December 31, 2015 by and

Introduction One choice every singer at a Sacred Harp singing faces is what song to lead. The songs leaders choose are building blocks that construct our experience of the day, and how leaders make such choices is surely as individual … Continue reading →

Posted in Number, Measure, Weight | 1 Comment

Introducing Vol. 4, No. 1 of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company Newsletter

Posted on May 28, 2015 by and

The eighth issue of the Sacred Harp Publishing Company Newsletter features the experiences of singing school teachers and students (young and old, on both sides of the Atlantic), shares a new documentary on Sacred Harp in Ireland, and commemorates the … Continue reading →

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Old Strings on a New Harp

Posted on May 28, 2015 by

On Valentine’s Day, 2015, over one hundred people gathered at Cannon Chapel on the Emory University campus in Atlanta, Georgia, to celebrate the publication of the new Centennial Edition of Joseph Stephen James’s Original Sacred Harp, the 1911 precursor of … Continue reading →

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