William Billings led a generation of "Yankee tunesmiths" in Revolutionary-era America. Like his fellow Bostonian Paul Revere, Billings was a productive craftsman in his own idiosyncratic style in times of prosperity, and sought other work in leaner times. Both were also ardent patriots. Billings, the son of a Boston shopkeeper, was first apprenticed in the leatherworking profession. He went on to become highly successful as a singing teacher, church musician, and composer of music, though he still had to ply the tanner's trade at times during his life. His prolific output of choral music includes six volumes of Psalms, hymn settings (especially the poetry of Isaac Watts), choral anthems, and fuguing tunes—anthems using canonic procedures. I Am the Rose of Sharon, his lengthy anthem on texts from the Song of Solomon, first appeared in his published Singing Master's Assistant of 1778. Its charm has led I Am the Rose of Sharon to become one of his best-loved works today. Billings composed I Am the Rose of Sharon in a somewhat atomistic style: each successive image of his text receives a new and distinct musical motive. This technique presents the luscious erotic poetry of the Song of Solomon in a very affective manner, but can also lead to disjunct and somewhat sectionalized music. Choral solos, duets, and full, four-voiced textures freely alternate, highlighting both the sectional nature of the writing as well as the social nature of the text. The sopranos once proclaim, "The voice of my beloved," to which the basses dramatically answer, "Behold, he cometh, leaping upon the mountain"; later, the same pair of voices intimately dialogue, "My beloved spake," "...and said unto me: Rise up, my fair one and come away!" Several times the composer similarly uses changes in tempo and time signature to evoke small contrasts in the text: after the opening passage, the choral basses begin a lilting compound meter as the text exults, "He brought me to the banqueting house, his banner over me is love!" The same dance-meter returns for the joyful climax of the piece, as the entire chorus sings, "For lo, the winter is past; the rain is over and gone!" Whether reading the text in its original celebration of the marriage bed, or its allegory of Christ and His bride the church, or even as a rite of spring, Billings celebrates the facets of life.

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