Camp Meeting Songs

An important influence on the development of gospel hymnody was the camp meeting song, a type of folk hymn (also called, "spiritual"). These were (musically) simple songs associated with the camp meetings which took place on the frontiers of Kentucky and the Carolinas in the early and middle 1800's. An outgrowth of 19th century American Revivalism, these outdoor gatherings drew people from a radius of a hundred miles (or more) to a camp area, usually in the wilderness, where people of both sexes and all races mixed and sang and socialized and worshiped together. In particular, slaves were common participants, bringing not only their religious enthusiasm, but their musical heritage -- the "black spiritual."

Camp meeting songs were simple, repetitive, and melodically contagious. Consequently, they appealed to the unlettered frontier folk. For example:

In addition, a chorus was often added to a standard hymn, such as Robinson's, "Come, Thou fount of every blessing" (BH 19):

Numerous collections of camp-meeting hymn texts appeared in the early decades of the 19th century. Later their tunes were written down in musical notation and published (in harmonized form) in such tunebooks as 'The Sacred Harp' (1844) and John G. McCurry's 'The Social Harp' (Hart County, GA, but printed in Philadelphia, PA, 1855). This latter collection has the largest single tunebook concentration of spirituals from this period.

Two "white spirituals" found in present-day hymnals are

Both of these tunes have British hymn texts, with refrains added during their associations with early 19th-century American [camp meeting revivals]. Although PROMISED LAND now appears in a major key, its early version in shape-note tunebooks is in minor, as in Walker's, 'Southern Harmony' (1835).

[From Sing with Understanding, by Harry Eskew and Hugh McElrath (Nashville: Church Street Press, 2nd edition, 1995.]

Structurally, the camp meeting song had these characteristics:

- a chorus
- free rhythms
- simple harmonic progressions
- minor keys were not uncommon, particularly the aeolian and dorian modes which are characterized by a "flatted" 7th scale degree.

The texts of camp meeting songs were often texts by the great hymn writers of the past, namely Watts, Wesley and others. By contrast, the gospel song which came later had fewer stanzas (verses) and employed simple diatonic music which was always in a MAJOR key, as opposed to the altered tones and modes of many folk melodies.

Other representative camp meeting songs: