Collected Works

A prolific exponent of the American musical idiom developed by Daniel Read and other Connecticut composers in the 1780s and 1790s, Stephen Jenks contributed 127 pieces to the ten collections of psalmody he issued from 1799 to 1818. His “Mount Vernon” (1700) is the best known of the many pieces mourning George Washington's death; “Sorrow's Tear” (1804) may be the earliest American setting of a poem by Thomas Moore. Compositions by Jenks were reprinted by other compilers throughout the nineteenth century, and songs like “Liberty,” “Evening Shade,” and “North Salem” survive today in the Southern tradition through their appearance in shape-note tunebooks. The present edition includes all of Jenks's surviving compositions along with a biography of the composer and a detailed study of his music. Containing over two hundred vocal compositions for three and four voices, this edition includes all of Jenks's surviving works.