Southern Musical Convention

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The Southern Musical Convention was the first Sacred Harp musical convention, organized by B. F. White and others in 1845. It was formed at Huntersville in Upson County, Georgia.

From its founding until 1867, White's The Sacred Harp was the "textbook" of the convention. After that it adopted a policy of using other song books and began to slowly drop out of significant influence in the history of Sacred Harp. The Southern Musical Convention, under White's leadership, sponsored three revisions of the Sacred Harp (1850, 1859, 1869). The 1849-1850 committee consisted of B. F. White, Leonard P. Breedlove, E. L. King, Joel King, R. F. M. Mann, A. Ogletree, S. R. Pennick and J. R. Turner. The second revision committee of the Sacred Harp in 1858-1859 consisted of B. F. White, R. F. Ball, J. T. Edmunds, A. Ogletree, E. T. Pound, J. P Reese, T. Waller, and A. S. Webster. The Southern Musical Convention selected White, Edmund Dumas, R. F. M. Mann, Absalom Ogletree and Marion Patrick as the committee to revise the Sacred Harp in 1869-1870.

Not only did the convention provide a gathering for vocal musicians, but also created an authoritative body to approve of teachers for singing schools. In January of 1852, the Convention authorized a newspaper, The Organ, which was published at Hamilton, Georgia. B. F. White was "Superintendent" of the publication.

The Southern Musical Convention supplied the pattern for many subsequent Sacred Harp musical organizations, including the two oldest existing Sacred Harp Conventions - the Chattahoochee Musical Convention and the East Texas Musical Convention.