simple gifts

A Gift to be Simple

Shaker Village

Maggie McAdams, Assistant Program Manager

“’Tis a gift to be simple, ‘tis a gift to be free, ‘tis a gift to come down where you ought to be…” 

The effortless spiral of The Trustees’ Office staircase, Pleasant Hill, KY.

Simplicity has become synonymous with the Shaker experience – as has the song Simple Gifts, emphasis on simple.  The most obvious visible manifestation of the Shaker legacy of simplicity can be seen today in the form and function of their architecture and furniture, but in reality this value infused all aspects of the Shaker’s life. What we see, however, was far from simple to achieve.

Today, the word simple has come to mean plain or easily done, basic or uncomplicated, but for the Shakers, it meant something so much more.    

The Shakers considered simplicity to be a sacred gift, one that members worked their entire lives to achieve.  Simplicity to the shakers meant modesty and humility, and was a constant reminder to focus on faith and their spiritual path.

In music written for Shaker worship, simplicity is often portrayed as a willow tree, humbly bowing, and bending, and being open to accept God’s gifts.  

“I will bow and be simple, I will bow and be free, I will bow and be humble, yea, bow like the willow tree.”

Shaker side chairs hang on pegs to reduce clutter, and to keep the space clean, Centre Family Dwelling, Pleasant Hill, KY.

Themes of simplicity can also be found in the Millennial Laws, the rules that the Shakers lived by. Upon entering the Pleasant Hill community, members deeded their personal possessions to the society, and were given modest goods and attire to meet their basic needs. 

All members lived communally and supported one another.  To live simply meant to shed all excess and focus on the inward path of the soul, rather than on pride and vanity and material goods.

Hand labor was thought to be good for the soul, and craftsmanship in this way became a symbol for moving closer to God.  “Put your hands to work, and your hearts to God.”

Detail view of the built-in dresser on the third floor of Centre Family Dwelling,
Pleasant Hill, KY.

To create a perfect piece of furniture was not an aesthetic pursuit, but a spiritual one.  Craftsmanship was not perfected for personal gain or glory, and the difficult process helped to teach members humility.  The Millennial Laws reiterated this by prohibiting signatures and unnecessary markings on items of manufacture so that the end product would not distract from the process and utility of the piece. 

The spiral staircase winds up three floors, and ends with a dome of light brought in by the dormer windows.

The Shakers wasted no design detail, and even their structures were built based upon functionality.  As a result they appear quite simple.  The peg lined walls, the large built-in cupboards, and the spacious floors of the dwelling houses – it took thoughtful design to create such orderly and simple spaces.

At Pleasant Hill, the dual spiral staircase in the Trustees’ Office is the perfect juxtaposition between the simple and the complex, as what appears to flow upward with such ease hides the intricacy that lies just beneath the surface.

Accessible through a stairwell door, the heavy structure that supports the staircase is an impressive work of engineering. The technical elements (like the massive timbers and the cantilevered steps), however, are concealed in favor of the simple and graceful free flowing aesthetic.  What we are left with in the upward movement of the staircase is the embodiment of simplicity, of elevating the spirit toward the light. 

Hidden beneath the simple exterior are the structural components of the spiral staircase, Trustees’ Office, Pleasant Hill, KY.

The next time you see the Trustees’ Office staircase, or a piece of Shaker furniture, or you hum the tune to Simple Gifts, or you hear the lines ”When true simplicity is gained,” remember that true simplicity was hard to achieve – but that’s what made it so worth striving toward.

Simplicity is a gift.

“‘Tis the gift to be simple, ’tis the gift to be free…”

Billy Rankin

Jacob Glover, PhD., Program Manager

By all accounts, most readers of this blog, and probably anyone who has heard any examples of Shaker Music, will recognize the lyrics quoted above. Many of you all probably even hummed the tune along as you read these memorable words. Written in 1848, Simple Gifts is undoubtedly the most recognized song attributed to the Shakers.

Popularized by Aaron Copland’s 1944 composition Appalachian Spring, the melody entered the canon of American popular culture. Subsequently, English songwriter Sydney Carter used the same melody with his own, original lyrics to write the hymn “Lord of the Dance” in 1963—a tune that American congregations have sung in worship ever since! From there it gets complicated, but to put it simply, popular musicians, car companies, the American Olympic Committee and many other groups have utilized the melody in one version or another for their own purposes.

Due in large part to its popularity, Simple Gifts has come to be synonymous with Shaker music as a whole. Nothing, however, could be further from the truth.

As a group, the Shakers have written over 20,000 songs since their founding in 18th century England. At Pleasant Hill, songwriters and singers proliferated and produced a stunning collection of American music that still resonates to this day. Many of these songs, in fact, were notated in beautiful hymnals that we currently have in our archival collections!

Instead of traditional music notation, the Shakers used ‘letteral’ notation, so that all members of their communities could participate and sing along. –“A Hymn Book, Containing a Collection of Ancient Hymns…Compil’d and Recorded by Paulina Bryant,” Item 361, Library of Congress Shaker Collection

It’s not just the sheer volume of Shaker music that’s impressive. The Shakers also wrote many different types of songs (hymns, anthems, marches, celebratory songs, and more) over the years, and different eras of Shaker history often led to remarkably different creations. Within the Shaker societies, active participation in worship through both singing and dancing was vital to community life. More than just a social and creative outlet for the Shakers, music also served devotional and instructional purposes while providing structure to the very rhythms of their daily life.

Shaker music can also shed fascinating insight into the lives of individual songwriters. The Pleasant Hill community, in fact, was widely regarded by other Shaker settlements as possessing quite a number of members with exceptional musical talent.

Patsy Williamson was one such individual. Born an enslaved person in North Carolina, Patsy was brought to Pleasant Hill in 1812 by her enslaver and family. Within a year, the Shaker community had purchased her legal freedom and Patsy quickly became an integral member of the growing sect. Patsy would spend the rest of her life as a good and faithful Shaker—and prolific songwriter—in Mercer County.

One of Patsy’s most exceptional creations, Pretty Mother’s Home, speaks to some of the core tenets of Shaker theology and her belief that one day she would have a “pretty home” in Heaven. These ideas—and the fact that they were shared through music—would have been eminently familiar and relatable to Shakers living in disparate communities across America at this time.

The 1820 Meeting House at Pleasant Hill was built to allow the Shakers to worship in their unique style. During services, the Shakers used no musical instruments. They regarded human voices as the ideal instruments for worship.

To hear Patsy’s song (and many others!) that together comprise a buried treasure of American music, come out to Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill and take part in our daily Shaker Music program that runs in the 1820 Meeting House at 11:00 am and 2:00 pm daily throughout the year.

I promise, there’s more to Shaker music than simple gifts, no matter how free they may be!