Next month sees the release of Dave Douglas and Uri Caine’s Present Joys, a new album drawn from the Shape Note Sacred Harp singing tradition. To be released by Greenleaf in late-July, Douglas and Caine interpret five pieces from shape-note tunebooks adding new matching Douglas compositions. “I’ve always loved the Sacred Harp songs and started thinking about how to do them in the wake of Be Still,” Douglas says on the Greenleaf website referring to his 2012 album. The Shape Note tradition is American sacred folk choral music sung a cappella in four parts with the aid of a 19th-century songbook The Sacred Harp that uses shape notes. The ‘shape’ refers to the graphic representation of the notes on the page that connects directly to solfège, for a quick grasp of pitching. Dave Douglas, above on the left, and Uri Caine