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“Singin’ Billy” Walker and Carlisle Floyd inducted into the South Carolina Hall of Fame

“Singin’ Billy” Walker and Carlisle Floyd inducted into the South Carolina Hall of Fame

William “Singing Billy” Walker changed the songs we sing and the way we sing them.

On  March 28, 2011, William "Singin' Billy" Walker was inducted into the South Carolina Hall of Fame in Myrtle Beach.  Each year, two distinguished South Carolinians, one living and one deceased, are singled out for this honor. Walker (1809-1875) is also featured on the new downtown Spartanburg Music Trail.

Walker put the words and music of the familiar “Amazing Grace” together in print for the first time. He also introduced “Wondrous Love,” “My Shepherd Will Supply My Need,” and other tunes still familiar today. He helped bring musical literacy to remote country churches around the South.

Although he was born in Union County, S.C., Walker was a prominent citizen in Spartanburg throughout his lifetime, leading singing at First Baptist Church, operating a bookstore on Morgan Square, and spearheading improvements in education. He was among those who attended the laying of the cornerstone of Wofford College on July 4, 1851, and is buried at Magnolia Cemetery.

The traditional shape-note, a cappella Appalachian folk hymn singing style dates back to colonial times and was featured in the film “Cold Mountain,” starring Nicole Kidman and Jude Law.

His “Southern Harmony,” first published in 1835 in the widely used four-shape or fa-so-la notation, reportedly sold more than 500,000 copies before the Civil War. After the Civil War, Walker published his “Christian Harmony” in seven-shape notation using the do-re-mi system. “Southern Harmony” continues in use in a famous Big Singing Day in Benton, Ky., which has been held for more than 100 years. “Christian Harmony” is used in singings in several states.

Carlisle Floyd (1926-) of Latta, S.C. was also inducted into the SC Hall of Fame.  Desiring to become a Methodist minister, his father moved to Spartanburg, where he graduated from Wofford College in 1934. The Floyds lived in a bungalow on Evins Street, a location that is today is part of the Wofford Village, and the young man completed his early musical training at Converse College.

Completing his musical education at Syracuse University, Floyd soon emerged as an opera composer whose work after World War II helped energize the art form in the United States. Telling stories with which American audiences can easily identify and writing his libretti in commonly spoken English, Floyd has seen the number of first-rate opera companies in the United States grow from about a dozen at the end of World War II to more than 130 today. Floyd is most known for “Susannah” (1956), “Of Mice and Men” (1969) and “Cold Sassy Tree” (2000), all of which are performed regularly around the world.

In addition to a distinguished academic career at Florida State and the University of Houston, Floyd is also winning increasing recognition for his non-operatic works. In 2001, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts and Letters in a White House ceremony, and in 2008, he was the only composer among the first recipients of Opera Honors to be conferred by National Endowment of the Arts.