Music for August 2, 2020 + The Ninth Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

• En Prière– Gabriel Faure (1845-1924)

Instrumental Music

• Hyfrydol – Gregg Sewell (b. 1953)
• Chorale – Ola Gjeilo (b. 1978)

Congregational Music (all hymns from the Hymnal 1982 with the exception of those marked “LR” which are from Lift Every Voice and Sing II.)

• Hymn L146 - Break thou the bread of life (BREAD OF LIFE)
• Song of Praise S-280 - Glory to God (Gloria in Excelsis) – Robert Powell (b. 1932)

Gabriel Fauré

This Sunday we get to hear one of our former (and returning) staff singers, Anna Zhang, who will offer a lovely sacred song by Gabriel Fauré,  one of the most influential of French composers, bridging the the Romantic period with the beginnings of the modern era in music.

His early training was for a life as a church organist. At age nine he was sent to the École de Musique Classique et Religieuse (School of Classical and Religious Music), which Louis Niedermeyer was setting up in Paris. There he stayed for 11 years, training to become a church musician. Although he played the organ professionally for over four decades, his real strength lay in composition. His Requiem and Pavane remain among the best-loved classical pieces.

Fauré is regarded as one of the masters of the French art song, or mélodie. Maurice Ravel wrote in 1922 that Fauré had saved French music from the dominance of the German Lied. Today's solo is a great example of that. En Prière, or In Prayer, is a beautifully poetic song written in 1890 and based on the text of a devotional poem by Stéphan Bordèse. Stylistically and textually, En Prière is a musical glimpse into the prayer of a sincere believer. The delicate yet intense melodic line is supported, even sheltered, by the piano’s repetitive triplets.

Pianist Graham Johnson had this to say about the piece:

The creation of an atmosphere of heartfelt piety seems effortless, the progression of harmonies a miracle of fluidity. Only Fauré could have written this music. At ‘Révélez-Vous à moi’ the triplet accompaniment cedes to a motif of crotchets which wafts across the stave as if the Holy Spirit revealed; on the song’s last page this alternates in an almost liturgical manner with triplets, and is repeated no fewer than five times, as if in benediction.

from notes by Graham Johnson © 2005

The piano voluntary is a beautiful, meditative piece by the Norwegian composer, Ola Gjeilo, one of the bright "Northern Lights" in the modern musical atmosphere. This piece is taken from a recording of piano improvisations recorded in 2012.

Music for July 26, 2020 + The Eighth Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

• Be Thou My Vision– Irish Folk Tune, Margie VanBrackle, soprano, Hans VanBrackle, guitar

Instrumental Music

• Allegro from Concerto No. 3 in F major, Op. 8, RV 293, "Autumn" (L'autunno)– Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741)
• Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee – arr. Carolyne Taylor (21st C.)

Congregational Music (all hymns from the Hymnal 1982.)

• Hymn 615  "Thy kingdom come" (ST. FLAVIAN)
• Hymn of  Praise S-236 – Canticle 13: Glory to You – John Rutter (b. 1945)

The best-laid schemes of mice and men
Go often askew,
And leave us nothing but grief and pain,
For promised joy! - To a Mouse, by Robert Burns

I had every intention of including a virtual choir anthem by the Good Shepherd Choir in the July 26 Worship service, but a gremlin in the system (or one of the submitted videos) made it an almost impossible task. As I am away this week in Memphis, my laptop computer didn't want to fully cooperate, so the Anthem this week is a beautiful setting of the Irish folk tune, SLANE, with the familiar words, Be Thou My Vision. Margie and Hans VanBrackle recorded this for us back in April for one of our earlier services. It was so lovely I included it again this week.

I DID get to use the choir in singing this Sunday's hymn, which goes along well with both the Epistle and the Gospel readings. So sing along with the choir on "Thy kingdom come, on bended knee."

Music for July 19, 2020 + The Seventh Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

• Thou Fount – setting by Roland E. Martin (b. 1955)

Instrumental Music

• Prelude in C Minor – Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
• Magnificat in G Major, Opus 41, No. 2 - Alexandre Guilmant (1837-1911)

Congregational Music (all hymns from the Hymnal 1982.)

• Hymn 290 - Come, ye thankful people, come (ST. GEORGE'S, WINDSOR)

“Do not cry for me, for where I go music is born”

-Bach, to his wife, on his deathbed

Today, when almost every serious student of the cello learns the unaccompanied cello suites of J. S. Bach, it is hard to imagine that these works were almost lost. There is no manuscript of the music in Bach's own handwriting, just a copy of the music by Bach's second wife, Anna Magdalena, and three other handwritten copies from the 18th century. They seemed destined for oblivion.

The suites were discovered and finally published in 1825. But in spite of their publication, they were not widely known by anyone besides a few cellists who viewed them as exercises. The development of the cello as a solo instrument continued without Bach's influence for another century, during which, again, virtually no music for solo cello was written.

In 1889, A 13-year-old Catalan wunderkind cellist by the name of Pablo Casals went for a stroll with his father, and they stepped into a second-hand music shop. There, Casals stumbled upon an old copy of Bach's Cello Suites. He took them home, began to play them, and fell in love. When he recorded them in 1936, the works were suddenly thrust into the consciousness of every cellist.

I tell you all this, because one of the Suites is hidden within the offertory duet sung by our KHS graduate Camyrn Creech and Ole Miss student Harrison Boyd. Much like Charles Gounod used the Prelude in C from Bach's Das wohltemperierte Klavier for his Ave Maria, Roland Martin used the Prelude from the G Major Suite as the basis for the accompaniment. (Except it's played on the piano, and in the key of D.)

Roland E. “Ron” Martin is a member of the music faculty of The Buffalo Seminary, Daemen College, and the University at Buffalo. He is organist and Director of Music at St. Joseph University Church, Buffalo and the founder and director of Speculum Musicae, an ensemble for early music, and Music Director of the Freudig Singers of Western New York. He also serves as conductor/music director for Opera Sacra for many of its productions.

Félix-Alexandre Guilmant, the composer of the closing voluntary, was a French organist and composer living in Paris. He was the organist of La Trinité from 1871 until 1901. A noted pedagogue, performer, and improviser, Guilmant helped found the Schola Cantorum de Paris. He was appointed as Professor of Organ at the Paris Conservatoire in 1896

Music for July 12, 2020 + The Sixth Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

• Seek Ye The Lord – Richard DeLong (1951-1994), Jade Panares, soprano 

Instrumental Music

• My Great Savior – Carolyne Taylor (21st C.)
• A Festal Fanfare – J. S. Bach (1685-1750)

Congregational Music (from the Hymnal 1982)

• Hymn 440 - Blessed Jesus, at thy word (LIEBSTER JESU)

Richard DeLong was a friend of mine from my SMU days. At the time I was there, he had been out of school for several years and had developed an outstanding choral program at East Dallas Christian Church. At the time, EDCC was one of the largest Disciple of Christ Churches in America, but even then, I am sure the choir would surprise most visitors, as it was decidedly Anglican in its sound and in its repertoire. After leaving East Dallas Christian, he served as Director of Music for St. Mark the Evangelist Catholic Church in Plano, Texas where his choir had been chosen to perform dozens of world premiere performances.

Jade Panares

It was during this time that he gained a national reputation as a choral composer with a wonderful gift for creating fresh and appealing melodic lines. The solo this week is one of his works, a setting of the words from Sunday's Old Testament reading. I have asked Jade Panares, a former staff singer at Good Shepherd, to sing it for us. Jade is a recent graduate from the Moores School of Music at the University of Houston. I know you will love hearing her sing.

I am took some time off this summer, and my friend Rob Carty, who has played for us before, recorded two pieces for the opening and closing. The prelude is what the kids call a "mash-up," a musical composition that combines several different melodies in counterpoint, and often in a light-hearted, humorous manner. Carolyne Taylor has taken the hymntune HYFRYDOL and combined it with the beautiful accompaniment of Bach's "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" to craft a lovely, pleasing piano prelude.

Carolyne McGougan Taylor is a graduate of Florida State University School of Nursing. During her husband's Bible college and seminary days, she was able to pursue her interest in music with professors at both schools. She is actively involved in piano instruction and serves a church pianist and choir director.

July 5, 2020 + The Fifth Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

• The House I Live In – Music by Earl Robinson (1901-1991); words by Abel Meeropol (1903 –1986), Bruce Bailey, baritone

Instrumental Music

• Variations on “America” – Gary R. Smoke (21st C.)
• Prelude and Fughetta in C Major – Johann Kaspar Ferdinand Fischer (1656-1746)

Congregational Music (from the Hymnal 1982)

• Hymn 716 - God bless our native land (AMERICA)

The solo this Sunday is not a “sacred song,’ per se. It became a patriotic anthem in America during World War II, so I thought it would be good to remind us, today, what America means to us, all “races and religions,” as the song says.  The lyrics describe the wonderful things about the country, with images of the era like the grocer, the butcher, and the churchyard. The "house" is a metaphor for the country.

First introduced in the 1942 revue, Let Freedom Ring, it has lyrics by Abel Meeropol and music by Earl Robinson. Meeropol, who wrote it under the pen name Lewis Allan, had very liberal views and mixed feelings about America. He loved the constitutional rights and freedoms that America was based on, but he hated the way people of other races, religions, and political views were often treated. His lyrics do not reflect the way he thought America was but what it had the potential to be. With the country under attack, he wanted to express why it was worth fighting for.

It was first sung by Frank Sinatra for the 1945 short-subject film, The House I Live In. Made to oppose anti-Semitism at the end of World War II, the movie received an Honorary Academy Award and a special Golden Globe Award in 1946.

The song became a hit for Sinatra and was recorded by him several times. It was performed on radio, television, and in concert throughout his career, including at every stop of his 1974 national “Main Event” tour. Significantly, it was one of his final recordings (for the electronic duet with Neil Diamond).

Here's Sinatra's introduction to this song, live at Madison Square Garden in 1974:

It's a song about this great, big, wonderful, imperfect country. I say imperfect because if it were perfect it wouldn't be any fun trying to fix it, trying to make it work better, trying to make sure that everybody gets a fair shake and then some. My country is personal to me because my father, who wasn't born here, rest his soul, he made sure that I was born here. And he used to tell me when I was a kid that America was a land of dreams and a dreamland, well I don't know if our country fulfilled all of his dreams while he was alive, but tonight with all of us together for this hour, it sure fulfills my dreams. And to all of you in the country and all of you watching tonight, here's a song about a place we call home, probably the greatest nation ever put on this earth.

Our Handbell Choir includes two mother/daughter combinations, the Jenkins (Kathy, Bryn, and Meredith) and the Wilsons (Missy and Celeste). We could safely rehearse in three groups, 6 feet apart from each other, so we gathered to learn some arrangements of Patriotic songs for the Fourth of July.

The set of variations on “America” (or “God Save the Queen,” if you are a Royalist) is arranged by Gary Smoke, an organist, composer, and church musician from Alabama. He received a BM in Organ Performance and a MM and DMA in Music Composition from The University of Alabama.  His catalog of works includes an opera, orchestral music, choral music, organ music, piano music, and a large quantity of chamber music. He owns High Meadow Music Publishing, which specializes in handbell music.

He has been the organist at Mountain Brook Presbyterian Church near Birmingham since August 2004.