Music for Sunday, April 22 + Good Shepherd Sunday

Vocal Music

• The Lord is My Shepherd – Allen Pote (b. 1945)
• Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead Us – William Bradley Roberts (b. 1947)

Instrumental Music

• Variations on “St. Columba” – Don Freudenberg (1939-2007)
• Prelude in D Minor, Op. 16, No.3a – Clara Schumann (1819-1896)
• Prince of Denmark’s March – Jeremiah Clarke (1674-1707)

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

• Hymn 518 - Christ is made the sure foundation (WESTMINSTER ABBEY) 
• Hymn 417 - This is the feast of victory (FESTIVAL CANTICLE)
• Hymn 208 - The strife is o’er, the battle done (VICTORY)
• Hymn 380  - From all that dwell below the skies (OLD 100th)
• Hymn R106 - The King of love my shepherd is (ST. COLUMBA)
• Hymn R226 - Ubi caritas (Taize)
• Hymn 343 - Shepherd of souls, refresh and bless (ST. AGNES)
• Psalm 23 - Dominus regit me - setting by Hal H. Hopson

The fourth Sunday after Easter is traditionally referred to as "Good Shepherd Sunday,"  the name coming from the gospel reading for the day, which is always the tenth chapter of John's Gospel. In this reading Christ is described as the "Good Shepherd" who lays down his life for his sheep. Our two anthems reflect that description, one being a setting of the 23rd Psalm, and the other a setting of the hymn "Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead Us." Both of these were composed by men who have Houston connections.

The Lord is My Shepherd was written by Allen Pote. A native of Halstead, Kansas, and educated at Texas Christian University, he has served Memorial Drive Presbyterian Church in Houston as director of music. He is currently a full-time composer living in Pensacola, Florida, where, with his wife Susan, he was founder of the Pensacola Children's Chorus, an organization of over 200 singers which has achieved national recognition. He has collaborated with Tom Long for several very successful children's musicals, including The Three Trees, which our children's choirs have performed several times.

The composer of the communion anthem, Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead Us, is William Bradley Roberts is an Episcopal priest who is Professor of Church Music at Virginia Theological Seminary (Episcopal) in Alexandria. Previously he was Director of Music at St. John's, Lafayette Square, in Washington, D.C. Prior to this, he was in similar positions in Tucson, Ariz., Newport Beach, Calif., Louisville, Ky., and Houston, where he got his undergraduate degree at Houston Baptist University. 

The opening voluntary is a set of variations on the communion hymn, The King of Love My Shepherd Is. This Gaelic hymn tune appears in over 125 hymnals under the tune name St. Columba after the Irish abbot and missionary credited with spreading Christianity in the 6th century in what is today Scotland. He founded the important abbey on Iona. These variations were written by Don Lee Freudenburg, a Lutheran pastor and musician who served churches in New York State and Missouri.

The communion voluntary is a piano piece by Clara Wieck Schumann, a German musician, who was one of the leading pianists of the Romantic era, as well wife of composer Robert Schumann.

Clara Schumann was trained from the age of 5 with her father, the well-known piano teacher Friedrich Wieck. She had a brilliant career as a pianist from the age of 13 up to her marriage to Schumann which was opposed by her father.

Clara Schumann

She continued to perform and compose after the marriage even as she raised seven children. An eighth child died in infancy.  In fact, she was the main bread winner, making money by performing - often Robert Schumann's music. She continued to play not only for the financial stability, but because she wished not to be forgotten as a pianist. She had grown up performing and desired to continue performing. Robert Schumann, while admiring her talent, wanted a traditional wife to bear children and make a happy home, which in his eyes and the eyes of society were in direct conflict with the life of a performer. Furthermore, while she loved touring, Robert Schumann hated it and preferred to sit at the piano and compose.

Clara Schumann considered herself a performing artist rather than a composer and no longer composed after age 36. It is suggested that this may have been the consequence of the then prevalent negative opinions of women's ability to compose, which she largely believed as her statements show: "I once believed that I possessed creative talent, but I have given up this idea; a woman must not desire to compose - there has never yet been one able to do it. Should I expect to be the one?" 

However, today her compositions are increasingly performed and recorded. Her works include songs, piano pieces, a piano concerto, a piano trio, choral pieces, and three Romances for violin and piano. Inspired by her husband's birthday, the three Romances were composed in 1853 and dedicated to Joseph Joachim who performed them for George V of Hanover. He declared them a "marvelous, heavenly pleasure."

If you don't know the closing voluntary, go back under your rock. You may, however, think of it as the Trumpet Voluntary by Henry Purcell, but it is really the The Prince of Denmark's March written c. 1700 by English baroque composer Jeremiah Clarke (who was the first organist of the then newly rebuilt St Paul's Cathedral). I'm not going to tell the story here, but there is a fun piece in the Houston Press about Clarke which you can read here: Why you shouldnt play trumpet voluntary at your wedding.. I disagree. It's better than "Here comes the Bride." (and I KNOW you finished that title in your head.)