Billings Birthday 1996: more photos

[Photo: Singers stand in background listening as a document is read aloud.]

Roland Hutchinson of the Ad-Hoc Billings Birthday Committe reads aloud greetings sent by Karl Kroeger, principal editor of William Billings, The Complete Works (4 vols. published by the American Musicological Society and the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, 1977-1990). The Billings edition was the first complete critical edition of the works of any American composer. Photo: Margaret Bornick

Sacred Harp singers from across North America and abroad joined in the celebration of William Billings' 250th birthday on Boston Common. Their tunebook of a cappella hymns and anthems, The Sacred Harp, has kept music by Billings continuously in print since its first edition in 1844. Berkley Moore (Springfield, IL; standing center facing camera) and Sarah Smith (Bessemer, AL; seated against tree) visit with young Sacred Harp singers from New England during a break in the singing. Photo: Laura Densmore

[Photo:
Singers chatting under a tree.]

[Singers singing on the
Common. The woman closest to the camera carries a blue banner with a
drawing of a lyre and the words "Old Stoughton Music Society
1786-1986" in gold letters.]

Singers from the Old Stoughton Musical Society, the oldest choral society in America.The Society sings Billings' music in an unbroken tradition founded when the composer visited Stoughton in 1774 to teach a "singing school" (a course in music reading and singing) and--as it developed--to court his future bride, Lucy Swan, who sang treble in the singing school. Photo: Margaret Bornick

[Photo: Reporter with microphone half-kneeling on ground in front of singers.]

Reporter Lisa Mullins of WGBH Radio (Boston) records a portion of William Billing's 250th birthday party on Boston Common, Oct. 6 1996, for broadcast by NPR's Performance Today. Photo: Laura Densmore

Roland Hutchinson of the Ad-Hoc Billings Birthday Committee extols the virtues of William Billings' music to the assembled multitude. Is this preaching to the choir, or what? Photo: Laura Densmore

[Photo: A man speaks, holding music aloft in his right hand. Singers in background.]