Andrew W. Johnson
Published by N.O. Wallace & Co
Shelbyville Free Press Office
Shelbyville, 1847
Book title page Eclectic Harmony represents the shape note system of music notation, which developed in the early 19th century. The system is historically associated with the Singing School Movement, a reform movement to raise standards of singing in Protestant churches in the Northeast. Between 1810 and 1820, the shaped notation as well as the style of folk hymnody it embodied fell out of favor in the North. But it continued to thrive in the rural South and West. Folk hymns in shape notation are among the earliest known music publications to carry a Tennessee imprint.
Little is known of Eclectic Harmony's publisher, Andrew Johnson, other than he seems always to have lived in Middle Tennessee. He compiled at least two other shape note collections, The American Harmony (1839) and The Western Psalmodist (1853), both published in Nashville.
The Center for Popular Music's copy of Eclectic Harmony is the only one known to exist.