This past Sunday was the tenth anniversary of the attacks on 9/11. A round often attributed to William Billings, “By the Waters of Babylon,” seemed like a good tune to sing for that anniversary: healing, and appropriate. I adapted it somewhat for us Sacred Harp singers: placed it in the key of C minor; changed a few notes in the treble line (m. 11) to keep the trebles more in the range to which they’re accustomed, and to provide some forward momentum (rounds can feel pretty static) and make it feel more like a fuguing tune; lowered the bass part an octave from the original (mm. 9-12) to provide a lower foundation (again, more like a fuguing tune) and to set off the treble part in mm. 11-12; and finally added choice notes in the tenor line (mm. 5-8, 17-20) so that the altos could feel more comfortable singing the tenor line.
Purists will be horrified at these changes, but editors of tune books regularly changed tunes, altered parts, etc., so I feel it is within the bounds of the tradition. If you want the original round, take the tenor line mm. 1-12 and drop the lower choice notes in mm. 5-8. And while this tune is attributed to Billings, it probably originated as a Hebrew round, so it has already been modified by the folk process. (N.B.: The sheet music should read “attributed to William Billings”.)
I presented this at the Palo Alto singing on September 11, the tenth anniversary. The fifty-plus singers there sang it beautifully — all credit to them, and to whomever wrote the original tune. One or two people asked about it, so I’ll post a PDF of the tune here:
By the Waters of Babylon, by William Billings.
One final note: the tenth anniversary of 9/1 hit me harder than I expected, and I wound up being unable to sing while I was leading this.
