MusicScribe BLOG

1 | Daniel J. Mount

April 21st, 2008 at 11:45 am

DBM, I have a book on the tune “Amazing Grace” that goes into the tune’s history in depth and concludes that the song may well have come from slave roots.

2 | Onlooker

April 21st, 2008 at 12:24 pm

Disparaging comments on his lack of research would perhaps be more meaningful if you had cared enough to research Mr. Phipps enough to at least get his name correct. Or, were you possibly “duped and passed on the story out of ignorance”?

3 | admin

April 21st, 2008 at 12:42 pm

Daniel,
That’s entirely possible. The origin of the tune has never been pinned down. Some people think it’s Scottish, but that’s primarily because there was a popular bagpipe version of the tune recorded in the 1960s.

The point is that the tune and the lyric were joined in the 1830s in America.

Phipps’ error laden story is that Newton heard the tune sung by slaves sometime prior to 1748, kept it in the back of his mind for decades, and wrote the lyrics to fit the tune. He backs up his story with a claim that, after all, it’s based on a slave scale, which is, in reality, the very common pentatonic scale. “Yankee Doodle” uses the same scale, by the way.

Phipps also makes an error when he tries to draw a racial distinction between the “do re mi” scale and the pentatoni scale. “Somebody else wrote that scale,” he says.

The fact is that the pentatonic scale is completely contained within the “do re mi” scale (the scale musicians commonly call “major”). The major scale merely fills in a couple of gaps in the pentatonic scale by adding two more notes.

Here’s why the video clip is so convincing to anyone who fails to look beneath the surface:
Phipps first plays on natural prejudice (“somebody else wrote that scale”) and stereotypes (the ever wise Southern black woman) to juice up his yarn. He then “proves” his hypothesis that the black notes equal this “slave scale” by playing a couple of spirituals on the black notes. By this point, he has musical luminaries like Bill Gaither, Larnelle Harris, and a Carnegie Hall crowd nodding along.

He can then toss the chronology of history completely out the window and say the lyrics were inspired by the tune. The way he sets up and delivers his yarn is so inspiring, it’s impossible to consider that it may not hold an ounce of truth.

4 | Daniel J. Mount

April 21st, 2008 at 12:54 pm

By the way, another side point: For whatever it’s worth, he didn’t originate the story. The book I read on the history of the song tracked that story being told by various (mostly black) performers over the last several decades, with most of the same spins.

5 | admin

April 21st, 2008 at 4:35 pm

Onlooker,
Your point is acknowledged and corrected.

Meanwhile, Phipps’ yarn lives on.

6 | Mark Rhoads

April 22nd, 2008 at 9:50 am

We love to hear romanticized and often fabricated stories of how hymns and tunes came into being. Mr. Phipps’ “yarn” fits this description precisely. Yarns about origins make us feel good, but our greatest source of genuine feeling should the words of this hymn which contain the truth of the Gospel.

In reality the origin of most hymns and tunes is rather mundane. “Amazing Grace” was one of hundreds of hymns (he only wrote the words) Newton wrote and published in Olney Hymns 1779. It was barely known in England until the mid 20th century. From the early 19th and well into the 20th century American revivalists found it useful and sang it to a number of different tunes until we finally settle on the now familiar tune called NEW BRITAIN. David has referred to my website which documents some of the story. Here’s the home page

http://markrhoads.com/amazingsite/index.htm

7 | Grigs

April 22nd, 2008 at 4:09 pm

What next? Are you going to scour Wendy Bagwell’s itineraries from the 70′s to prove that he was never scheduled to sing in a church that practiced snake handling or booked on the same program with a blind group? Go to the Akron area and look at the sales records of every pet shop to see if Van Payne ever bought a parrot? Interview Glen Payne’s insurance agent to see if Mrs. Payne ever drove a car into their swimming pool? Bring out the Nielsen ratings for 1966 and show Jeff Steele that “Andy Griffith” was not the top rated show 30 years before he wrote “We Want America Back”?

Coming soon…”No, Virginia, there is NOT a Santa Claus”. (This will appear in the Singing News. Subscribe, you freeloaders!)

Stop spoiling our fun and let the artists tell their little stories.

NOTE: The preceding was not written with a straight face.

8 | admin

April 23rd, 2008 at 12:17 am

Grigs,
Do you ever write anything with a straight face? :o)

9 | Ken Clark

September 2nd, 2008 at 9:00 pm

D. Mount twice mentions the “book” he read about Amazing Grace, but never tells us the name of the book. Is he afraid that someone will read it and contradict him?

Also, does anyone know the history and origin of the song “New Britain”?

10 | smchew3

September 6th, 2008 at 2:01 pm

OMGosh, lighten up folks! Wintley Phipps did not claim all assertions to be fact, but rather what he believes to be probable, and in particular, how he chooses to envision the song’s delivery. This is called “literary license”. When taken within its proper context, any reasonable person soon realizes, he is delivering his message as an artist and not as a scholar. It is a given fact that the tune cannot be traced, as he asserts after having discovered for himself, within the walls of the Library of Congress. Beliefs aside, here are the facts for which he was “spot on”: Most African songs depend on short melodic phrases in which a leader sings first and the group repeats the phrase in a slightly different way. Although the phrases are short, they lend themselves to many forms of rhythmic and melodic variations. The “African pentatonic” or five-tone scale, gives the music its unique sound, and in early America were referred to as the “slave scale”. They build the power and pathos of the negro spirituals with their unique West African sorrow chant sound. The pentatonic scales are very common and found all over the world, but widely accepted as having West African origins. It is true that John Newton was a writer of hymns – poetry chanted by rote throughout many a congregation. However, this is not to negate the elusive possibility that he wrote to well beloved tunes familiar to him.

11 | admin

September 6th, 2008 at 4:26 pm

There is no record of the tune and the lyric appearing together until years after John Newton died. That’s the whole point on which Phipps’ story hangs.

As for the pentatonic scale being called “commonly called” the “slave scale,” do a Google search on the term. What do you find? You find dozens of references to Phipps and this particular tale along with some non-music related links.

If the terms “pentatonic” and “slave scale” have been considered to be synonymous for as long as you claim, there should be a wealth of references to tunes other than New Britain that demonstrate the same connection. That isn’t the case.

You are correct that the scale is common all over the world. It’s as popular in Chinese and Celtic tradition as it is in American or African tradition.

You said,
“When taken within its proper context, any reasonable person soon realizes, he is delivering his message as an artist and not as a scholar.”

Yes, he’s giving a performance, but he’s speaking as one who has authority in the subject. There’s a distinct difference between this performance and him reading a passage from _God’s Trombones_ by James Weldon Johnson.

He’s taken a peculiarity of a European instrument…the black notes of the piano…which have absolutely nothing to do with race. Then he’s taken a lyric written in England and a tune of folk origin that was paired with the lyric only years later.

He’s then associated it all with the African race, when there’s not a shred of evidence to support any of it.

People buy it, because he’s a gifted communicator.