Title page
107 Kb (Jpeg)

Northfield
122 Kb (Jpeg)

A native of Massachusetts who moved to Vermont around 1800, Jeremiah Ingalls (1764-1828) at various times worked as a farmer, cooper, and tavern keeper, in addition to serving as a choirmaster in the Congregational church, teaching singing school and composing music. Ingalls' Christian Harmony contains many lively melodies, patterned after the secular songs and dances of the day. Such tunes were quite popular among the camp-meeting revival folk. In his hymn Innocent Sounds, Ingalls argues for the appropriateness of adopting these melodies for religious use.

Occasionally the texts also take on a personal note. For example, the fuguing tune entitled Crostic spells the name Judith Brock with the first letters of its text lines. This same name appears again in the tune Lamentation:

Death loud alarms, we feel the shock
   Louder than thunders roar,
With grief we mourn that Judith Brock is
   Known on earth no more.

One of the books most famous compositions is Northfield. This fuguing tune, marked by a typical homophonic beginning (with the melody in the tenor) and followed by a section of imitative writing, appears in many other sacred collections throughout the period and even later. It is in Ingalls' book, however, that the first printing of the popular tune occurs.