Music for May 31, 2020 + The Day of Pentecost

Vocal Music

• Holy Spirit, Dwell In Me – K. Lee Scott

Instrumental Music

• Choral varié sur le thème du 'Veni Creator', Op 4 - Maurice Duruflé

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

• Hymn 421 - All glory be to God on high (ALLEIN GOTT IN DER HÖHE)
• Hymn 508 - Breathe on me, Breath of God (NOVA VITA)
• Hymn R 207 - Sanctus (Holy, holy, holy) (LAND OF REST)

There's a first for us this Sunday during our worship online. The choir, which has not sung together since March 11, comes together virtually to sing for our Pentecost celebration. This has been a real growing experience for our choristers, for not only did they have to learn how to do a recording on their phones or tablets (we are not the most tech savvy bunch), but they also had to stretch far outside some of their comfort zone and sing by themselves, making a recording without anyone else singing with them, or even a piano backing them up. Then they had to submit it to me, the director, so that I could layer it with all the other voices.

This morning's anthem is a hymn which, as written by Thomas Toke Lynch, is based upon Scripture from the books of Ezekiel and Galations. Born the son of a doctor in 1818, Lynch was a minister in The Church of England.  In 1871, his dying words were “Now I am going to begin to live”.

The version we sing this morning is based upon Lynch's text, but arranged and expanded to fit another hymn melody arranged by contemporary composer Keaton Lee Scott, whose works are found in eight hymnals and some 300 published compositions. That tune is one we frequently sing to the words "Humbly I adore thee, Verity unseen." The tune, ADORE DEVOTE, is a Benedictine plainsong from the 13th century.

Maurice Duruflé

All the organ music is from a larger work by the French organist Maurice Duruflé, based on a Gregorian Chant which is used for the Latin hymn Veni Creator Spiritus ("Come Creator Spirit").  The opening voluntary contains the opening theme, followed by the first variation. Written in four parts, the theme appears in the pedals while the right hand plays an elaboration of the theme. I'm not playing the second variation due to time, But will play the the third variation during a meditation after communion. The third variation is a canon at the interval of the fourth. The closing voluntary is the final variation, a brilliant toccata, introducing the theme in canon between right hand and pedals. The music winds up to a glorious climax; Duruflé saves his master-stroke for the coda marked ‘tempo poco più vivo’ when he presents the plainsong ‘Amen’ (only hinted at in the organ music until that point) in the pedals on full organ.

The text to this hymn is believed to have been written by Rabanus Maurus in the 9th century. As an invocation of the Holy Spirit, it is sung in the Roman Catholic and Anglican churches during celebrations on the feast of Pentecost. The hymn is also widely used in the Anglican Communion in the Ordering of Priests and in the Consecration of Bishops. Since the English Reformation in the 16th century, there have been more than fifty English language translations and paraphrases of Veni Creator Spiritus.

The version in our own hymns was first included in the 1662 revision of the Book of Common Prayer, and compresses the content of the original seven verses to four (with a two-line doxology), keeping the Latin title. It was written by Bishop John Cosin for the coronation of King Charles I of Great Britain in 1625. The same words have been used at every coronation since. The first verse is:

Come, Holy Ghost, our souls inspire,
and lighten with celestial fire.
Thou the anointing Spirit art,
who dost thy sevenfold gifts impart.