“Lining out” is the practice of singing or stating the upcoming lines of a hymn for the congregation by a song leader or preacher. Typically, the words are stated quickly, and then sung in a drawn-out ...

It’s one of the most distinctive sounds in country and bluegrass music. You can hear it in the singing of Patty Loveless, Keith Whitley and Ricky Skaggs. The way these Appalachian-born singers bend ...

In 1983, Esther Burroughs penned some lyrics about keeping a Christian home and entered them in a Southern Baptist hymn-writing contest. Some time later, her husband, Bob — who had made a name for ...

'Amazing Grace' as it appears in Ginny Hawker's family heirloom songbook, Lloyd’s Primitive Baptist Hymns. You can see stains in the margins, left by the tobacco-covered hands of her aunt Annie Maud ...