History
Although the privilege of leading is currently extended by and large to anyone who wishes to lead, this was not always so. Around the turn of the 20th century, leading was normally assigned to a small group of experienced singers. This earlier practice explains the traditional terminology whereby a turn of leading is called a "lesson" and the group of singers a "class." Earlier leaders, being experts who wielded authority, would have been in a position actually to instruct the group, as respected senior leaders will sometimes do even today.
Read more about this topic: Leading Sacred Harp Music
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“It would be naive to think that peace and justice can be achieved easily. No set of rules or study of history will automatically resolve the problems.... However, with faith and perseverance,... complex problems in the past have been resolved in our search for justice and peace. They can be resolved in the future, provided, of course, that we can think of five new ways to measure the height of a tall building by using a barometer.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)
“The history of progress is written in the blood of men and women who have dared to espouse an unpopular cause, as, for instance, the black man’s right to his body, or woman’s right to her soul.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)
“So in accepting the leading of the sentiments, it is not what we believe concerning the immortality of the soul, or the like, but the universal impulse to believe, that is the material circumstance, and is the principal fact in this history of the globe.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)