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Lowell Mason was a prominent North American music educator and church musician. He was instrumental in the practice of having worship music be performed by the Presbyterian congregations instead of something they listened to.
At the same time, his music generally emphasized the instrumental accompaniments (namely pipe organ), and the melody lines, making the other parts less interesting in general.
In his attempts to edify American church music, he popularized classical European music, and even though he helped establish congregational singing as the standard of worship across denominational boundaries, he also helped establish the boundaries of "High Church" music and "Backwoods Church" music.
The results have been mixed. Probably without his influence the Sacred Harp, Southern Gospel and numerous other home grown styles of music would never have sprung up diverged as much as they have and flourished.
Lawell Mason was a banker as well as a music director and hymn writer. One thing that happened in his life, that woud affect his banking career was the panic of 1837Everything on the St Song website is either public domain or licensed under a Creative Commons License
