<P> With the advent of recorded music and radio, "Amazing Grace" began to cross over from primarily a gospel standard to secular audiences . The ability to record combined with the marketing of records to specific audiences allowed "Amazing Grace" to take on thousands of different forms in the 20th century . Where Edwin Othello Excell sought to make the singing of "Amazing Grace" uniform throughout thousands of churches, records allowed artists to improvise with the words and music specific to each audience . AllMusic lists more than 7,000 recordings--including re-releases and compilations--as of September 2011 . Its first recording is an a cappella version from 1922 by the Sacred Harp Choir . It was included from 1926 to 1930 in Okeh Records' catalogue, which typically concentrated strongly on blues and jazz . Demand was high for black gospel recordings of the song by H.R. Tomlin and J.M. Gates . A poignant sense of nostalgia accompanied the recordings of several gospel and blues singers in the 1940s and 1950s who used the song to remember their grandparents, traditions, and family roots . It was recorded with musical accompaniment for the first time in 1930 by Fiddlin' John Carson, although to another folk hymn named "At the Cross", not to "New Britain". "Amazing Grace" is emblematic of several kinds of folk music styles, often used as the standard example to illustrate such musical techniques as lining out and call and response, that have been practiced in both black and white folk music . </P> <P> Mahalia Jackson's 1947 version received significant radio airplay, and as her popularity grew throughout the 1950s and 1960s, she often sang it at public events such as concerts at Carnegie Hall . Author James Basker states that the song has been employed by African Americans as the "paradigmatic Negro spiritual" because it expresses the joy felt at being delivered from slavery and worldly miseries . Anthony Heilbut, author of The Gospel Sound, states that the "dangers, toils, and snares" of Newton's words are a "universal testimony" of the African American experience . During the civil rights movement and opposition to the Vietnam War, the song took on a political tone . Mahalia Jackson employed "Amazing Grace" for Civil Rights marchers, writing that she used it "to give magical protection--a charm to ward off danger, an incantation to the angels of heaven to descend...I was not sure the magic worked outside the church walls...in the open air of Mississippi . But I wasn't taking any chances ." Folk singer Judy Collins, who knew the song before she could remember learning it, witnessed Fannie Lou Hamer leading marchers in Mississippi in 1964, singing "Amazing Grace". Collins also considered it a talisman of sorts, and saw its equal emotional impact on the marchers, witnesses, and law enforcement who opposed the civil rights demonstrators . According to fellow folk singer Joan Baez, it was one of the most requested songs from her audiences, but she never realized its origin as a hymn; by the time she was singing it in the 1960s she said it had "developed a life of its own". It even made an appearance at the Woodstock Music Festival in 1969 during Arlo Guthrie's performance . </P> <Table> <Tr> <Td> </Td> <Td> Sample of Judy Collins' version of "Amazing Grace" Collins transitions from her solo voice to the chorus backing her up Sample of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards' version of "Amazing Grace" A lone bagpipe transitions to a chorus of pipes and drums, similar to Collins' version </Td> </Tr> <Tr> <Td_colspan="2"> Problems playing these files? See media help . </Td> </Tr> </Table> <Tr> <Td> </Td> <Td> Sample of Judy Collins' version of "Amazing Grace" Collins transitions from her solo voice to the chorus backing her up Sample of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards' version of "Amazing Grace" A lone bagpipe transitions to a chorus of pipes and drums, similar to Collins' version </Td> </Tr>

Who is the original singer of amazing grace