Introduction

WILLIAM BILLINGS was one of the best-known American musicians of the eighteenth century. He was born in Boston, October 7, 1746, and he died there September 26, 1800. Billings wrote more than three hundred compositions, virtually all of them settings of sacred texts, and he was active for three decades as a teacher of singing-schools. He also wrote vigorous prose and verse. The introductions to several of his tunebooks contain detailed pedagogical material as well as more fanciful, literary sections. He developed his music from British sources and, guided by the needs of the singing-school, attained an idiom of considerable individuality. His works were extremely popular in eighteenth-century America but were gradually overshadowed by European concepts of composition.

Almost all of Billings’s music was originally printed in six collections and seven brief, occasional publications that he brought out himself. A few pieces first appeared in tune-books compiled by others; a few more survive only in manuscript and presumably were not printed in the composer’s lifetime. The critical edition of Billings’s works takes Billings’s own publications as its main source. Its four volumes reflect the order in which the collections first appeared: Vol. I, The New-England Psalm-Singer (1770) [NEPS]; Vol. II, The Singing Master’s Assistant (1778) [SMA] and Music in Miniature (1779) [MM]; Vol. III, The Psalm-Singer’s Amusement (1781) [PSA], The Suffolk Harmony (1786) [SH], and the occasional publications; Vol. IV, The Continental Harmony (1794) [CH]. Collections with an introduction by Billings begin in this edition with the same introduction; the compositions in each collection follow in their original order. The sole exception is Music in Miniature. Music in Miniature is the only one of Billings’s publications to include music other than his own; moreover, it reprints pieces in both The New-England Psalm-Singer and The Singing Master’s Assistant. The pieces in Music in Miniature not by Billings are omitted from this edition, which is restricted to pieces by Billings that he published nowhere else and pieces printed in Music in Miniature in versions significantly different from versions in other Billings publications.

Each of Billings’s three major tunebook introductions describes precisely how performers are to derive the correct tempos from the time signatures. Billings’s time signatures are retained, except for 𝇎, which is replaced by 2/2. Table I reduces Billings’s instructions to their metronomic equivalents, which remain fairly consistent over the twenty-four years separating his earliest explanation (1770) from his last (1794).

Table I. Metronomic Equivalents of Billings’s Time Signatures

Time signature Beat note NEPSa SMAb CHc

𝇋

𝅘𝅥

60

60

60

𝇍

𝅘𝅥

60d, 80e

80

80

𝇎

𝅗𝅥

60

60

60

2/4

𝅘𝅥

120

120

120

3/2

𝅗𝅥

60

60

60

3/4

𝅘𝅥

80

80

80

3/8

𝅘𝅥𝅭

53

53

53

6/4

𝅗𝅥𝅭

60, 80f

80

6/8

𝅘𝅥𝅭

80

80

a. New-England Psalm-Singer, Introduction, Lesson VI.

b. Singing Master’s Assistant, Introduction, Lesson VI.

c. Continental Harmony, Introduction, Lesson VI.

d. In psalm tunes.

e. In anthems and “other brisk Pieces of Music.”

f. In the fourth edition [1786–89] only.

. . . denotes no information.

In this edition metronomic markings based on Billings’s instructions are given for each piece and for each tempo change. The metronomic markings are a reminder of the tempos that Billings wanted his time signatures to represent, but they are to be taken merely as suggestions, as they are in most other musical styles. Occasionally Billings adds a verbal tempo marking. These are to be taken as modifications of the basic pace,1 and the metronome markings supplied in the edition at such places derive from the composer’s directions.2

Slurs mark all melismas in the original printings of Billings’s music. Slurs are here removed, with melismas indicated by a combination of beaming and extended lines within the text.

Billings’s use of accidentals varies from work to work. The New-England Psalm-Singer lacks them almost entirely. The Singing Master’s Assistant and Music in Miniature introduce them, but most are valid only for the note with which they appear. In the present edition Billings’s accidentals are reproduced; consistent with modern practice, they are valid for the entire measure unless otherwise indicated. It is likely that some accidentals were freely applied by the singers in Billings’s time. For example, in The Singing Master’s Assistant the composer twice puts a natural sign in front of a potential leading-tone, perhaps a warning that performers not follow their inclination to raise it.

In Billings’s original publications anthems have the full text underlaid, and, except in The New-England Psalm-Singer and Music in Miniature, psalm and hymn tunes have a single stanza of text, usually printed between the counter (alto) and tenor parts. In The New-England Psalm-Singer the only psalm or hymn tunes with text are those set to words by local poets. The textless tunes were to be sung to the standard devotional poetry of Brady and Tate, Isaac Watts, and other British divines, printed in metrical psalters and hymnbooks and widely circulated in New England. Music in Miniature, a tune supplement designed to be bound at the end of such a psalter or hymn book, consists entirely of textless tunes. Like the psalm and hymn tunes in the rest of Billings’s collections, each is assigned a metrical indication; the performer is free to sing any appropriate tune to any devotional text in the same meter. Billings’s metrical indications and their meanings are as follows:

Metrical designation Number of syllables in each line

CM. (Common Meter)

8.6.8.6.

S.M. (Short Meter)

6.6.8.6.

L.M. (Long Meter)

8.8.8.8.

H.M. (Hallelujah Meter)

6.6.6.6.4.4.4.4.

P.M. (Particular Meter)

Any pattern of syllables and lines different from the above schemes

In the present edition texts have been supplied for tunes left textless in The New-England Psalm-Singer and Music in Miniature. The following priorities have governed the editor’s choice of texts:

  1. 1. Where Billings printed the tune in one of his other publications, the text to which he set it is retained.
  2. 2. Where another compiler of Billings’s time printed the tune, the text to which he set it is retained.
  3. 3. Where no contemporaneous printings of the tune with text are known, the editor has chosen one according to his personal preference and Billings’s injunction that singers choose “chearful” words for music in major and “melancholy” words for music in minor.3

Billings himself wrote the texts for some of his compositions, and he took texts from local poets as well. He also wrote the text for at least one of his anthems; for others he borrowed passages from the Bible, often varied them and inserted into them prose and verse additions of his own. For all such texts the version in Billings’s publication is considered authoritative—they were not printed elsewhere—and in all the capitalization has been left intact, with punctuation restored, where necessary, according to eighteenth-century practice.

By far the majority of the texts come from standard British devotional poetry. As copied into Billings’s publications the texts are inconsistent in spelling, capitalization, and punctuation, and there would have been no virtue in preserving the inconsistencies here.4 Instead, contemporaneous New England printings of Billings’s text sources have been chosen whenever possible, and texts in this edition conform with them. The Commentary (pages 344–355, below) gives the text source for each piece; all text sources used in this edition are listed on page 342. Details of capitalization and punctuation in the text sources are followed here, except in rare cases where obvious mistakes have been tacitly corrected in conformity with other editions.

Like his contemporaries, Billings customarily printed only one stanza of text with a psalm tune or hymn tune. Yet more than once he supplied original texts in many stanzas for pieces in his collections. And the Singing Master’s Assistant carries text attributions with many pieces to show the singer where to find additional stanzas. Almost all of Billings’s psalm and hymn tunes are strophic pieces, with each of several stanzas sung to the same music. Hence, all stanzas of each text, with a few unavoidable exceptions explained in the Commentary, are reproduced here. The intent is not necessarily that the present-day performer sing every available stanza of each piece, but that he be supplied with all the text his eighteenth-century counterpart had at hand.

Billings makes frequent use of abbreviations (𝄈𝄁𝄈, &c) indicating text repetition. All such repetitions are here written out in full, and repeated words or groups of words are separated by commas. Certain archaic spellings that might confuse the modern performer are also modernized without mention in the Commentary. For example, “ye” when used as an article is replaced by “the.” Such spellings as “sav’our” or “glor’ous”—examples of the eighteenth-century practice of apostrophizing vowels—are here written out as they are pronounced, i.e., “saviour” and “glorious.” Beginnings of lines in poetic texts are here marked by a capital letter, even if they do not appear that way in the originals. Finally, all printing in italics is here eliminated. The significance of Billings’s printing of a few texts in italics is not known; their occurrence is noted in the Commentary.

Square brackets in Billings’s original are indicated in this edition as follows: 〈 〉.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This volume is the result of a cooperative effort. Professor Richard Crawford helped to develop the editorial policy. He meticulously checked the music and the commentary, and his suggestions led to notable improvements. He also provided most of the Introduction as well as the checklist of Billings’s publications. Jael Nathan worked on the texts; Professor John A. Yunck answered many questions when the texts were edited; and Susan Eareckson prepared the basic manuscript of the music. Editorial assistance was offered by Lila and Gary Aamodt of A-R Editions, Inc.

The edition was begun by the editor as a private project. Through the efforts of Professors H. Wiley Hitchcock and Charles Hamm as well as those of Cynthia Adams Hoover it became an official project of the American Musicological Society in honor of the bicentennial.

Grateful acknowledgment is made to the National Endowment for the Humanities for a grant for work on the edition.

hans nathan