Music for September 28, 2014 + The Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost + St. Michael and All Angels

Vocal Music

• Wondrous Love – Robert Shaw/Alice Parker (1916-1999/b. 1925)

Instrumental Music

• Prelude on “Wondrous Love” – Gordon Young (1919-1998)
• Choral – Michael Larkin (b. 1951)
• Voluntary on “Engelberg” – Charles Callahan (b. 1951)

Congregational Music (all hymns from the Hymnal 1982 with the exception of those marked “R” which are from Renew.)

• Hymn 492 - Sing, ye faithful, sing with gladness (FINNIAN)
• Hymn 435 - At the Name of Jesus (KING'S WESTON)
• Hymn R173 - O Lord hear my prayer (Jacques Berthier)
• Hymn R228 - Jesus, remember me (Jacques Berthier)
• Hymn 477 - Al praise to the, for thou, O King divine (ENGLEBERG)
• Psalm 25:1-8 - Tone Ig

5:00 P.M.  – Choral Eucharist for St. Michael and All Angels

Vocal Music

• Behold Now, Praise the Lord – Everett Titcomb (1884-1968)
• Call to Remembrance – Richard Farrant (c. 1525-1580)

Instrumental Music

• Basse des Trompette – Jean-François Dandrieu (1682-1738)
• Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence – Charles Callahan (b. 1951)
• Rigaudon - André Campra (1660 –1744)

Congregational Music (all hymns from the Hymnal 1982)

• Hymn 618 – Ye watchers and ye holy ones (LASST UNS ERFREUEN)
• Hymn 282 – Christ, the fair glory of the holy angels (CAELITES PLAUDANT)
• Hymn 625 – Ye holy angels bright (DARWALL’S 148TH)

The scripture readings for today reminded me of the wondrous love that God in Christ has for us. Especially poignant is this passage from the epistle reading for today from Philippians 2:

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross.

That is indeed a wondrous love, so I was lead to use the hymn What wondrous love is this, O my soul as the choir’s offering today. The hymn is taken from one of the early American shape note books, hymnals (or song books) in which the note heads are printed in one of seven different shapes to indicate a place on the scale. These compositions are folk hymns, using secular tunes for the setting of religious texts. Wondrous Love was first found in The Southern Harmony, a compilation of hymns, tunes, psalms, and songs published by William Walker in 1834. Wondrous Love also is found in the most famous of these shape note books, The Sacred Harp, first published by Benjamin White in 1844. Both of these compilations still are published today.

Alan Lomax, noted folk song authority, relates the secular background of the tune:

This hymn is a member of the “Captain Kidd” family, so called because the ballad of Captain Kidd is set to one form of the tune. The ‘Captain Kidd’ type has for several centuries been responsible for a very large number of beautiful songs, including The Wars of Germany, Johnny, I Hardly Knew Ye, Sam Hall and Sugar Babe.” Captain William Kidd (1645-1701), an English sailor, was commissioned by New York and Massachusetts to hunt pirates. He supposedly turned pirate himself and killed one of his crew, an action for which he was hanged in 1701. The following ballad appeared soon after his death. You will find that the words easily fit the tune for Wondrous Love.

My name is William Kidd, as I sailed, as I sailed
My name is William Kidd, as I sailed
My name is William Kidd, God’s laws I did forbid
And most wickedly I did, as I sailed, as I sailed.

This arrangement is one of the many hymns and folk songs that Alice Parker arranged in collaboration with Robert Shaw. Shaw early achieved recognition as a consummate choral conductor while still in college. Fred Waring, the popular musician, bandleader and radio personality, enlisted Shaw to move to New York and direct his group, “The Pennsylvanians” in 1937. Four years later, Shaw founded and directed the Collegiate Chorale, a highly dedicated amateur New York chorus of 185 singers that grew into a significant symphonic chorus under his leadership. After intense studies with Julius Herford, Shaw formed the Robert Shaw Chorale, which toured the United States and later performed in thirty countries throughout Europe, the Soviet Union, the Middle East, and Latin America under the auspices of the U.S. State Department. The Robert Shaw Chorale was signed to an exclusive recording contract by RCA Victor. Shaw wished to record only choral masterworks, but RCA Victor also wanted recordings of the Shaw Chorale performing light popular music, in the hope that these would sell well to the American public. Shaw enlisted one of his former students, Alice Parker to do research and create choral arrangements for the new touring and recording ensemble. This resulted in a collaboration that lasted over 17 years, producing many settings of American folksongs, hymns and spirituals which have for many years been standard repertoire for high school, college, and community choruses, and are to this day widely performed.

The St. Michael Window at Good Shepherd, Kingwood

The opening voluntary is also based (loosely) on Wondrous Love. In this arrangement, Gordon Young takes liberties with the notes in the melody, changing it just enough to make the listener familiar with the hymn to go "Huh?" and wonder if the organist has missed a note. He has not.

The closing voluntary is an improvisation by Charles Callahan on the hymn tune ENGELBERG. Charles V. Stanford composed ENGELBERG as a setting for William W. How's "For All the Saints" in 1904 edition of Hymns Ancient and Modern but lost out as the definitive tune for that text when Ralph Vaughan Williams published the New English Hymnal in 1906, using his own tune, SINE NOMINE for that text. ENGELBERG came into its own, however, when it was used as the tune for today's closing hymn. You will also remember it as the tune for "When in our music God is glorified" and "We know that Christ is raised," both hymns that we sing regularly at Good Shepherd.

In his improvisation, Callahan uses several of the attractive, energetic motives in his composition. Listen for the "Alleluia" and "All praise to thee" motives used over and over (and over) again.