Finding Their Voices - Amherst College

instrument was convenient for many small American churches: it was relatively
inexpensive, portable, unobtrusive, and easily learned by an amateur. Before the
Protestant discrimination against organs began to wane in the early nineteenth century,
the bass viol was a standard feature in colonial churches, appearing, as we have seen, in
the church of Amherst and in the Singing Society of Harvard.
The opinions of such ministers are highly important to this study, as they very
often held positions of influence in institutions of higher education. Cotton Mather was
central to the early success of Yale College, originally known as the “Collegiate School,”
as he secured the financial assistance of Elihu Yale, whose name the institution soon
bore. From the founding of Harvard to the very end of the nineteenth century, with very
few exceptions, presidents of colleges around the nation were also ordained ministers. 191
As such, the prevailing religious attitudes towards music in each institution presented the
most important factor influencing the inclusion of the study of music in the collegiate
course. Considering our exploration of early American theology it comes as no surprise,
then, that colleges originally supported the study of music only when it served to improve
the quality of singing in their religious services.
Inventing “Classical”: The American Musical Reform Movement
Beginning at the end of the eighteenth century, a movement began to arise against
the recent wave of American sacred composers writing in the style of William Billings.
Encouraged by a new religious revival spreading throughout the country, conservative
members of the church began to reject their compositions, specifically their fuguing
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
191 A comprehensive list of Harvard, Yale, and Amherst presidents and their religious statuses can be found
in Appendix G.
! 135!