Stephen Jenks was an American composer, teacher, and tunebook compiler. He was born in Glocester, Rhode Island

Glocester, Rhode Island

Glocester is a town in Providence County, Rhode Island, United States. The population was 9,746 as of the 2010 census. The villages of Chepachet and Harmony are in Glocester. Putnam Pike Glocester is a town in Providence County, Rhode Island, United States. The population was 9,746 as of the 2010...

 and raised in Ellington, Connecticut

Ellington, Connecticut

Ellington is a town in Tolland County, Connecticut, United States. Ellington was incorporated in May, 1786, from East Windsor. As of the 2000 census, the town population was 12,921...

. During his life he moved from town to town, living in Ridgefield

Ridgefield, Connecticut

Ridgefield is a town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. Situated in the foothills of the Berkshire Mountains, the 300-year-old community had a population of 24,638 at the 2010 census. The town center, which was formerly a borough, is defined by the U.S...

 and New Canaan, Connecticut

New Canaan, Connecticut

New Canaan is a town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States, northeast of Stamford, on the Fivemile River. The population was 19,738 according to the 2010 census.The town is one of the most affluent communities in the United States...

, Pound Ridge, New York

Pound Ridge, New York

Pound Ridge is a town in Westchester County, New York, United States. The population was 5,104 at the 2010 census.The town is located in the eastern corner of the county, bordered by New Canaan, Connecticut, to the east, Stamford, Connecticut, to the south, Bedford, New York, to the west and...

, and Providence, Rhode Island

Providence, Rhode Island

Providence is the capital and most populous city of Rhode Island and was one of the first cities established in the United States. Located in Providence County, it is the third largest city in the New England region...

, finally settling in Thompson, Ohio

Thompson Township, Geauga County, Ohio

Thompson Township is one of the sixteen townships of Geauga County, Ohio, United States. The 2000 census found 2,383 people in the township.-Geography:Located in the northeastern corner of the county, it borders the following townships:...

 in 1829. Between 1799 and 1810 he authored and coauthored more than ten printed collections of sacred and secular music; after moving to Ohio, he became a farmer and a maker of percussion instruments.

The music

Stephen Jenks' music is representative of the type of music being written at that time in rural New England

New England

New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...

 America, a cappella

A cappella

A cappella music is specifically solo or group singing without instrumental sound, or a piece intended to be performed in this way. It is the opposite of cantata, which is accompanied singing. A cappella was originally intended to differentiate between Renaissance polyphony and Baroque concertato...

 and an interest in melodic writing. However, his music contains striking harmonic progressions, unusual dissonances and cross relations

False relation

A false relation is the name of a type of dissonance that sometimes occurs in classical polyphonic music, most commonly in vocal music of the Renaissance....

. In "Weeping Nature" (The Delights of Harmony, 1805), for example, Jenks seems to revel in the clash of the E major / minor chord or in the song "Sorrow’s Tear," filled with cross relations between C sharp / C natural. Although many of these result from his use of modal harmony

Musical mode

In the theory of Western music since the ninth century, mode generally refers to a type of scale. This usage, still the most common in recent years, reflects a tradition dating to the middle ages, itself inspired by the theory of ancient Greek music.The word encompasses several additional...

 and, as previously mentioned, strong melodic writing for the individual parts, his use of these relations is not simply random, they are used to express the text being set. In "Weeping Nature" the lyrics (probably written by Samuel Stennett

Samuel Stennett

Samuel Stennett was a Baptist minister and hymnwriter.-Pastor and hymnwriter:He was born in Exeter, but at the age of 10 his family moved to London, where his father served as the minister of the Baptist church in Little Wild Street. Samuel succeeded his father as minister in 1758, a position...

) concern the death of the body:

With murm’ring eyes she [nature] doth survey

her fellow lump of mortal clay

Destroy’d by Death’s consuming spear

the King of Nature’s dread and fear.

while at the same time urging the pious to the divine will of resignation:

Nature is not subject, we find,

To the Almighty’s sacred mind

She cannot say, “Oh, sov’reign Son,

Thy ways are just, thy will be done.”

The pull of these two worlds presented in the text, the death of the body and the acceptance of this fact in the wait for eternal life beyond, is reflected in the music with the sudden shifts between a minor and C major, resulting in the clash between the G sharp and G natural, even at one point with a cadence

Cadence (music)

In Western musical theory, a cadence is, "a melodic or harmonic configuration that creates a sense of repose or resolution [finality or pause]." A harmonic cadence is a progression of two chords that concludes a phrase, section, or piece of music...

 of an E major/minor chord.

The group of tunebooks that Stephen Jenks helped release are as follows:

• The New-England Harmonist. Danbury, Connecticut, 1799.
• The Musical Harmonist. New Haven, 1800.
• The American Compiler. Northampton, Mass., 1803 (with Elijah Griswold).
• The Delights of Harmony. New Haven, 1804.
• The Delights of Harmony; or, Norfolk Compiler. Dedham, 1805.
• Additional Music, to the Delights of Harmony, &c. Dedham, not dated.
• The Delights of Harmony; or, Union Compiler. Dedham, 1806.
• The Jovial Songster. Dedham, 1806 (secular songs).
• The Hartford Collection of Sacred Harmony. Hartford, 1807 (with Elijah Griswold and John C. Frisbie)
• The Royal Harmony of Zion. Dedham, 1810.
• The Christian Harmony. Dedham, 1811.
• The Harmony of Zion; or, Union Compiler. Dedham, 1818.
• The Whistle. Dedham, 1818 (secular songs, words only).

Many of his tunes are still sung at Sacred Harp

Sacred Harp

Sacred Harp singing is a tradition of sacred choral music that took root in the Southern region of the United States. It is part of the larger tradition of shape note music.- The music and its notation :...

singings.

Books and editions

• Jenks, Stephen, Complete Works, edited by David Warren Steel ISBN0-89579-316-4

External links