Music for April 23, 2017 + The Second Sunday of Easter

Vocal Music

• An Easter Greeting – Martin How

Instrumental Music

• O Sons and Daughters, Let Us Sing – Jean-François Dandrieu (c. 1682 - 1738)
• That Easter Day With Joy Was Bright – Rudy Davenport (b. 1948)
• Good Christians all, rejoice and sing! – Paul Manz (1919-2009)

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

• Hymn 205 - Good Christians all, rejoice and sing! (GELOBT SEI GOTT)
• Hymn 492 - Sing, ye faithful, sing with gladness (FINNIAN)
• Hymn 206 - Alleuia! O sons and daughters, let us sing! (O FILII ET FILIAE)
• Hymn R258 - To God be the glory (TO GOD BE THE GLORY)
• Hymn R271 - Alleluia, alleluia! Give thanks to the risen Lord (ALLELUIA NO. 1)
• Hymn R91 - Open our eyes, Lord (OPEN OUR EYES)
• Hymn 193 - That Easter Day with joy was bright (PUER NOBIS)
• Psalm 116 – simplified Anglican Chant

If ever there was a hymn that was just perfect for a particular Gospel reading, it has to be this Sunday's hymn before the Gospel (and the inspiration for the opening organ voluntary. O Sons and Daughters, Let Us Sing. It is a version (in song) of today's Gospel reading.

The original hymn, which was in Latin, is usually attributed to a French cleric named Tisserand in the fifteenth or early sixteenth century. The first known publication of the text was in an untitled booklet in Paris between 1518 and 1536. Other Latin stanzas were also added at a later date. John Mason Neale translated the hymn into English in 1851.

This hymn tells the story of those who witnessed the resurrected Christ based on the gospel accounts, particularly that of John. After describing the scene at the tomb on Resurrection Sunday morning, the text narrates the disciples' responses, from the sudden appearance of Jesus in a locked room where a group of them were meeting (John 20:19-23) to the proof of Jesus' physical resurrection when He appeared to doubting Thomas (John 20:23-29).

This text appears in nine or ten stanzas in some hymnals, but ours divides these stanzas into two separate hymns because the first part of the hymn tells the story of the scene at the tomb on Resurrection Sunday, while the second part tells the story of the disciples' response to the news from John 20:19-29. A refrain of jubilant alleluias opens and closes the hymn.

The Incredulity of Saint Thomas, c.1601-1602, 

Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (1573-1610)

The opening voluntary is a set of variations on the 15th cenutry French tune for "O Sons and Daughters, Let us Sing. The tune name comes from the original Latin text which began "O filii et filiae, Rex coelestis."  The composer of these variations is Jean-François Dandrieu, who, though largely forgotten today, was regarded as one of the finest composers of harpsichord music of his time. He came from a well-to-do family and showed rare musical talent in his early childhood. Before the age of 5, he gave a harpsichord concert for Princess Palatine Elisabeth-Charlotte of Bavaria and other royalty. Both he and his sister Jeanne Françoise were pupils of composer and keyboard player Jean-Baptiste Moreau. 

In July 1705, Dandrieu was formally installed as organist at St. Merry Church in Paris. In addition to this enviable position, he got a more prestigious post in 1721 he was installed as one of the organists at the royal chapel. Twelve years later he added yet another organist post to the two he already held, when he succeeded his uncle Pierre Dandrieu as organist at St. Barthelemy, upon the latter's death in 1733. It is likely that the busy Dandrieu delegated some of his duties at St. Merry and St. Barthelemy to his sister.

It's in his first book of organ pieces (ironically published after his death) that we find these variations of the Easter hymn we are singing today.