Music for March 26, 2017 + The Fourth Sunday in Lent

Vocal Music

• O Jesus, Every Moment – Philip Stopford (b. 1977)

Instrumental Music

• Psalm Prelude, Set1, No.3 - Herbert Howells (1892-1983)
• Erhalt uns, Herr, bei deinem Wort - Johann Walther (1684-1748)

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

• Hymn 7 - Christ, whose glory fills the skies (RATISBON)
• Hymn 645 - The King of love my shepherd is (ST. COLUMBA)
• Hymn R191 - O Christ, the healer, we have come (ERHALT UNS, HERR)
• Hymn 533 - How wondrous and great thy works, God of praise! (LYONS)
• Hymn R189 - Amazing grace! how sweet the sound (NEW BRITAIN)
• Hymn 149 - Eternal Lord of love (OLD 124TH)

A beautiful old Irish prayer provides the text for today's anthem. Philip Stopford has taken great care to write a simple melody and to treat this meaningful prayer with tender lyricism. Renowned for his beautiful choral music, Stopford is a British composer who is currently Director of Music at Christ Church, Bronxville, New York. This energetic 40 year old started life as a church musician as a chorister at Westminster Abbey in London. Since then, he has worked at Canterbury Cathedral, Chester Cathedral, St Anne’s Cathedral, Belfast, UK, before coming to the states. He's written much beautiful choral music, much of which can be heard on his YouTube channel, including this Sunday's anthem, under his direction. 

 After studying with Herbert Brewer at Gloucester Cathedral as a teenager, Herbert Howells moved to London to study at the Royal College of Music, where his teachers included Charles Villiers Stanford, Charles Wood, and Hubert Parry. Diagnosed with Graves’ disease in 1915, Howells was given six months to live, but survived after doctors treated him with radium injections, a previously untried treatment. The first set of Psalm-Preludes dates from this time and his illness may be the reason the second Psalm-Prelude is inspired by the fourth verse of the 23rd Psalm,‘Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death...’

Johann Gottfried Walther, student of J. Bernhard Bach (a second cousin of THE Bach), was an accomplished organist and composer of the Baroque period, In 1702, at the age of eighteen, he was made organist of the Thomaskiche in Erfurt. At twenty-three he was appointed Weimar town organist and music master to the ducal children. In 1721 he became a court musician.

Walther wrote much organ music; his compositions explore stylistic elements from across Europe. He is placed next to Bach as a composer of the chorale variation (he and Bach became friends while Bach lived in Wiemar). Outside of his organ music, Walther was also known for his book, Musikalishe Lexikon oder Musicalisches Bibliotek (Leipzig, 1732), the first dictionary/encyclopedia of music.