When bass viols were first made, early New Englanders used the term to refer to both English cellos and their American counterparts, thus differentiating by adding the name “Yankee” in front to denote certain instruments as distinctly American. New England was the first area in America to really produce stringed instruments, such as this instrument in our collection, and used many English influences. Such bass viols were designed for churches, products of Puritan congregational singing’s need for an accompanying instrument. The earliest dated church bass viol is from 1788, made by eventually-famous viol maker Benjamin Crehore. Another famous viol maker was Abraham Prescott, who began in 1809 and reached a wide range of people due to his job as a teacher at a singing school and his role as a dean in the Baptist church. Jeremiah Wait is a far less well-known viol maker.

During the 16th century, the musical talent the original Massachusetts Bay colony pilgrims brought with them eventually died out, leading to a rut in the musical abilities of American churches. At one point, a group of ministers from Harvard University stepped in to swap common, flat church singing for training in “regular singing.” Singing out of tune remained a large problem, but during the Revolutionary War, American composer and Bostonian William Billings began using the bass viol as a means of keeping in tune. This instrument could be widely found in churches until the 1840s, when reed organs began to replace them and they fell out of fashion. By 1849, even Prescott had left the business and the short age of these pioneering American instruments had come to a close.