David's Lamentation: A Song History

← Back to Browse By Song

William Billings (1746–1800) was a Boston tanner who taught himself music, and his New-England Psalm-Singer of 1770 was the first collection made up entirely of music by an American composer.[1] "David's Lamentation" first appeared in his tunebook The Singing Master's Assistant, printed in Boston by Draper and Folsom in 1778.[2][3] Britannica records that the book came to be known as "Billings' Best."[1] The piece is a four-part anthem setting King David's grief over the death of his son Absalom, from 2 Samuel 18:33.[3][4]

Color lithograph of a tall stone monument with a conical top in a rocky valley, with small figures resting in the foreground

David Roberts, Absalom's Pillar, Valley of Jehoshaphat, color lithograph, 1839. Shown for the name it bears; it has no connection to Billings's anthem.

Later shape-note tunebooks kept it in circulation, among them a revised and enlarged edition of The Southern Harmony, where it is No. 213.[5] It is on page 268 of the 1991 edition of The Sacred Harp, and keeps that page number in the 2025 edition, which credits its alto part to Kentucky Harmony of 1816.[4][6] The Watersons recorded it on their 1977 album Sound, Sound Your Instruments of Joy, where A. L. Lloyd's sleeve notes observed that Billings's music by then lived on only in circles that still sang from old books like Southern Harmony and Sacred Harp.[7]

Gail L. Van Amberg includes it in her MaxDAD Songbook, a collection of 33 tunes for the five-string Folkcraft MaxDAD mountain dulcimer in DADAD tuning, published by Fingers Of Steel.[8]

Our book that contains the song "David's Lamentation"

Sources

  1. Britannica: "William Billings".
  2. Library of Congress: "The singing master's assistant, or, Key to practical music (1778)".
  3. Choral Public Domain Library: "David's Lamentation (William Billings)".
  4. Sacred Harp Musical Heritage Association (fasola.org): "Indexes for The Sacred Harp, 1991 Edition: 268, David's Lamentation".
  5. Hymnary.org: "The Southern Harmony, and Musical Companion (New ed. thoroughly rev. and much enl.), 213 (tune: David's Lamentation)".
  6. Sacred Harp Musical Heritage Association (fasola.org): "Indexes for The Sacred Harp, 2025 Edition: 268, David's Lamentation".
  7. Mainly Norfolk: "David's Lamentation" (The Watersons).
  8. Fingers Of Steel: "Gail L. Van Amberg, MaxDAD Songbook".
  9. Image: David Roberts, Absalom's Pillar, Valley of Jehoshaphat, color lithograph, 1839. The Cleveland Museum of Art.

← Back to Browse By Song