Baldridge ’25 Explores SU’s Musical History in Dissertation Research

Polly Baldridge ’25 (Doctor of Musical Arts in Pedagogy – Voice) explored aspects of Shenandoah University’s (SU) rich musical history in her dissertation, “Singing Instructions in American Tunebooks.” As part of her work with the project, she catalogued 290 American tunebooks, selected 25 for a bibliographic study and completed a sonic evaluation of the 200 year period in which they were published for the purpose of mapping the buried history of American voice pedagogy and its historic entanglements with politics, culture, race and religion.

Her research includes details about Joseph Funk and the tunebooks/singing instructions he published. The final tunebook in her bibliographic study, “The Messenger of Song,” is co-authored by James Hott Ruebush and gives a sense of his (and his colleagues J.H. Hall and E.T. Hildebrand) priorities for the teaching of singing.

“When I started my dissertation research three years ago, I did not know that it would lead me to the work of J.H. Ruebush and Shenandoah Conservatory,” said Baldridge. “In searching for tunebooks, I found ‘The Messenger of Song’ that he compiled with his colleagues in 1893, published by The Ruebush-Kieffer Company in Dayton, Virginia. I included the book in my dissertation because it contains insight about how music was taught by Ruebush in this region of the country, especially connected to shape-note singing and training new singing teachers at the Shenandoah Institute, now Shenandoah Conservatory. When it became clear that I could finish my project in 2025, I got so excited about the timing. My dissertation research led me to discover the life and voice teaching legacy of J.H. Ruebush, who helped establish Shenandoah Conservatory, and I graduate with a D.M.A. in Pedagogy (Voice) from the conservatory in May 2025, SU’s 150th anniversary year.”