This year the New Traditions Singing will take place around 4:30 PM right after a brief social at the Great Falls Grange. We'll sing new songs, old songs, and rearranged songs not found in The Sacred Harp 1991 Edition but written in shape notes (either the more familiar 4-shape system or the 7-shape system). Generally we shall sing from photocopies rather than loaner tunebooks, which would not be available in sufficient supply. Based on experience at past New Traditions singings, each leader will be restricted to two songs. If you wish to present a song, you should provide 40 copies of it for the group (or at least 20 copies if funds are tight). These copies will be returned to the leaders, or destroyed.
Please check on and observe copyright restrictions for songs that you photocopy. If the song is unpublished and if you are not the composer, you must obtain permission from the composer to make photocopies, and you must ask him/her what to do with the copies after the singing. If the song is published, you need to determine whether the song and/or its typeset presentation are still under copyright, who owns the copyright (the composer or the publisher), and where to obtain permission if required. Several fine tunebooks published in recent years have retypeset presentations of old songs, in which case the songs themselves are out of copyright but the retypeset presentations are still under copyright. Regrettably tunebooks often do not explain this explicitly, although an exception is the J. L. White Sacred Harp, 2007 Edition. On the other hand, tunebook publishers are usually willing to have one or two songs photocopied for a performance or special singing, because they want appreciation (and sales) of the tunebook to be heightened. Our view is that if explicit permission for photocopying one or two published songs cannot be obtained in time for the New Traditions singing, one can assume that permission would be granted, but the leader must inform the group which tunebook the song is published in, and all copies must be recovered by the leader after the singing and either destroyed or saved for another special singing occasion. Facsimile reprintings of old tunebooks, such as Southern Harmony and Musical Companion (1854 edition), do not require copy permission.
For more information or assistance, contact Beverly Yaeger at "bjyaeger at ntelos dot net".
Please note that Singing during the Saturday and Sunday sessions of the Convention will be restricted to The Sacred Harp 1991 Edition, so as not to compromise the musical and emotional momentum during those sessions.