John Feddersen

John Feddersen wrote “Dance in the Sky” no. 358 in The Shenandoah Harmony, 2013 edition.

A (Raleigh) News and Observer article (2015?) gives John's introduction to shapenote singing:

Nearly 50 years ago, John Feddersen heard what he described as “stark, just visceral singing” as he crossed the National Mall in Washington, D.C., that compelled him to go see where it came from.

There, on a stage, was a group from rural Georgia performing a style of music that was as old as America, but was missing from many of the 50 states. The singers organized in groups – tenor, bass, soprano and alto – and the groups all faced the center, where members took turns standing and leading the next song. There were no instruments. It was all a cappella.

The songs were deeply religious, often about deliverance after a life of temptation and struggle, and reflected a time when people were much more God-fearing than they are today. But the singers' delivery of the lyrics in four-part harmonies was eerily powerful, a wall of sound mightier than the sum of its parts.

Feddersen had discovered a style of folk music known as “Sacred Harp” or shape-note singing, and today he's an unofficial leader of Triangle shape-note singers, a chapter that recently got the green light to perform again in an ideal setting: the small, simple chapel at Mordecai Historic Park just north of downtown Raleigh.

Tunes led