\n
\nSome of the older treasures on display are hymnals from the early nineteenth century, including an 1840 Cherokee Hymn Book<\/em> as well as Hymns and Spiritual Songs<\/em>, published in Nashville in 1825, the earliest known hymnal published in Tennessee.<\/p>\n
Also on display is an 1849 edition of The Harp of Columbia<\/em>, a shape note hymnal printed in Knoxville. Shape note singing developed in New England in the early eighteenth century as a way to teach church members to sight-read music. Shape note hymnals and singing schools were introduced to Tennesseans in the early nineteenth century, and harp singing remains popular in East Tennessee to this day.<\/p>\n An 1876 photograph of the Fisk Jubilee Singers is presented along with contemporaneous sheet music for traditional spirituals. The student a cappella group likely performed these songs on the nationwide tour they undertook in 1871 to raise funds for Fisk University in Nashville. The Jubilee Singers\u2019 popularity helped to introduce spirituals to the world and to preserve this unique American musical tradition.<\/p>\n Mementoes from the career of Grace Moore are also showcased. Moore, the \u201cTennessee Nightingale\u201d from Cocke County, was an opera singer and actress. In the 1930s, her films helped to popularize opera by introducing it to a larger audience.<\/p>\n East Tennessee can also claim an impressive classical heritage. Composer, conductor, educator, and flutist David Van Vactor came to the University of Tennessee in 1947 to serve as head of the newly created Department of Fine Arts, and to take up the baton as the third conductor of the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra. He conducted the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra until 1972, taught at UT until his retirement in 1976, and continued to compose until his death in 1994. The scores for several of Van Vactor\u2019s compositions are displayed.<\/p>\n Those scores are part of the David Van Vactor Music Collection housed in UT\u2019s Betsey B. Creekmore Special Collections and University Archives. The collection includes the composer\u2019s personal collection of music scores (including autograph scores of works composed or arranged by Van Vactor), concert programs and audio recordings, correspondence, and other materials. The UT Libraries recently digitized selected scores of his compositions to create an online version of the David Van Vactor Music Collection<\/a>.<\/p>\n One of Van Vactor\u2019s UT students who also became a professor and successful composer is represented in the exhibit as well. Gilbert (Gil) Trythall is best known for his experimental compositions using electronics and synthesizers. Photos of Trythall, the score for one of his compositions, and the cover art for his Country Moog<\/em> are on display.<\/p>\n The exhibit also contains musically-themed artworks from our Special Collections such as Marion Greenwood\u2019s sketches of harp singers (Greenwood was an artist in residence at UT in the 1950s) and posters for local bands created by Yee-Haw Industries. From 1996 to 2012, Yee Haw delighted Knoxville with graphic designs combining woodblock images and handset type.<\/p>\n From Love Letters to Marital Guides<\/strong><\/p>\n Just in time for Valentine\u2019s Day, a display in the Special Collections reading room celebrates love and romance. All You Need is Love: Romantic Selections from the Betsey B. Creekmore Special Collections and University Archives<\/em> includes display cases featuring \u201cLove Letters and Valentines,\u201d \u201cLove Poems,\u201d \u201cClassic Love Stories,\u201d \u201cTales of Romance in the South\u201d and \u201cMarital Guides and Weddings.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cLove Letters and Valentines\u201d includes commercially printed Valentine\u2019s cards and handwritten love letters drawn from our manuscript collections, as well as Valentine\u2019s-themed cartoons from the Charlie Daniel Editorial Cartoon Collection<\/a>.<\/p>\n Selections from our Rare Books collection represent celebrated love poems — including the verse of Robert Barrett Browning and Edgar Allan Poe — and the classic love story. A 1917 edition of Sir Thomas Malory\u2019s The romance of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table<\/em>, illustrated by Edmund Dulac, and a 1910 retelling of The Sleeping Beauty and other Fairy Tales from the Old French<\/em>, illustrated by Arthur Rackham, exemplify a golden age in children\u2019s book illustration. Also on display is an engraving of Romeo and Juliet from an 1874 reproduction of the famous Boydell Shakespeare. British publisher and engraver John Boydell initiated his three-part project in 1786, conceiving of an illustrated edition of Shakespeare\u2019s plays, a folio of prints, and a London gallery of paintings by notable artists of the day. By 1805, the project had bankrupted Boydell\u2019s firm.<\/p>\n \u201cTales of Romance in the South\u201d highlights modern novels by familiar authors such as Gone With the Wind<\/em> by Margaret Mitchell, Delta Wedding<\/em> by Eudora Welty, and Suddenly Last Summer<\/em> by Tennessee Williams.<\/p>\n Wedding souvenirs from the Libraries\u2019 manuscript collections as well as printed guides to domestic happiness adorn the exhibit case titled \u201cMarital Guides and Weddings.\u201d This admonition from an 1819 work titled The Moral Instructor, and Guide to Virtue and Happines<\/em>s may not be romantic, but its inherent wisdom has not aged:<\/p>\n \u201cMarried people who must see each other every day, and therefore have opportunities enough to get acquainted with each others faults and humours, and suffer many inconveniences even from the most trifling of them, cannot be too circumspect in their conduct; and it is highly important for them to find out means of preventing their society from being troublesome and tedious to one another, and to guard against mutual indifference, coldness and aversion.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Visit the Special Collections reading room, 121 Hodges Library, before Valentine\u2019s Day to enjoy romantic selections from our archives.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"![\"Harp](\"http:\/\/live-utk-volumes.pantheonsite.io\/files\/2019\/01\/HarpSingers.jpg\")
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