The American composer Aaron Copland incorporated the original Shaker tune into the music for his 1944 ballet and subsequent 1945 orchestral work Appalachian Spring.
The fact that many Christians have regarded dancing as a bit ungodly (in a church, at any rate) does not mean that Jesus did.
This sect flourished in the United States in the nineteenth century, but the first Shakers came from Manchester in England, where they were sometimes called the "Shaking Quakers".
They established celibate communities - men at one end, women at the other; though they met for work and worship.
It's worth a try.Verse 3 of the hymn, which includes the line that "[t]he Holy People said it was a shame", has been analysed as implying collective Jewish responsibility for the death of Jesus.
[4] However, Sydney Carter also criticised holier-than-thou religious attitudes through his other work, including song lyrics such as "The Vicar is a Beatnik" about social conservatives in the Church of England.