Music for February 17, 2019 + The Sixth Sunday after Epiphany

Vocal Music

• Blessed Is the Man - Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893)
• O How Amiable – Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958)

Instrumental Music

• Grazioso – Arnold B. Sherman (b. 1948)
• Partita on  Wer nur den lieben Gott lässt walten - Georg Böhm (1661–1733)
• Präludium in A Minor - Georg Böhm

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

• Hymn 423 - Immortal, invisible, God only wise (ST. DENIO)
• Hymn R191 - O Christ, the healer, we have come (ERHALT UNS, HERR)
• Hymn 635 - If thou but trust in God to guide thee (WER NUR DEN LIEBEN GOTT)
• Hymn R127 - Blest are they, the poor in spirit (BLEST ARE THEY)
• Hymn R224 - Healer of my soul (John Michael Talbot)
• Hymn 493  - O for a thousand tongues to sing (AZMON)

Two anthems by the choir, plus a work for Handbells, are featured in this Sunday's music. 

First is a work by Pyotr Tchaikovsky. Known primarily for his symphonies, concertos and ballets, Tchaikovsky was also deeply interested in the music and liturgy of the Russian Orthodox Church. In 1878 he set the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom to music, followed by the All-Night Vigil and nine sacred songs. All of these were of seminal importance in the later interest in Orthodox music, which up until this time was highly controlled by the Imperial Chapel.

This anthem, Blessed Is the Man, is not the "Blazhen Muzh" (Blessed is the man - Psalm 1) from his All-Night Vigil, but is a creation by Gene Lowell, an American choral director active in the 1950s, who took a piano work of Tchaikovsky (In Church, the last number in his collection Album pour enfants, Op. 39) and added words based on two verses from Psalm 1.

 The offertory anthem is the grand work by Ralph Vaughan Williams, the great English symphonist of the 20th century. Though he was described as "a cheerful agnostic," he was highly influential in the music of the Anglican church, not only writing some beautiful choral works, but serving as Musical Editor of the English Hymnal (1904) and writing two of our most beautiful and well-known hymntunes, SINE NOMINE (For all the Saints) and DOWN AMPNEY (Come Down, O Love Divine). His interest in folk songs and hymn tunes is evident in many of his works, including today's anthem. Terry Blaine, in his notes to the CD Anthem - Great British Hymns & Choral Works recorded by the Huddersfield Choral Society, wrote this about the anthem:

Simplicity is a keynote in Vaughan Williams’s O how amiable, and the reason is the circumstances in which it was composed. In 1934 the novelist E.M. Forster wrote “The Abinger Pageant”, a play about the history of England, performed to aid preservation work at a church near where he lived in Surrey. Vaughan Williams’s anthem was written to be sung by amateur performers as part of the festivities, and the mainly unison writing reflects this. It also emphasizes the communal nature of the pageant experience, as does the addition of a verse from the famous hymn “O God our help in ages past” at the conclusion. (c) 2016 by Terry Blaine

The Handbell piece at communion is a beautiful work written in memory of Norma Taubert Brown, a handbell ringer, who died of cancer in 1988. The music tells the story of Norma's life, her struggle with illness, and her ultimate journey to heaven.  Each section of the music reflects this journey.

It was commissioned by Area 10 of the Handbell Musicians of America right after Norma had been in Seattle to share the podium with Arnold Sherman, the composer of Grazioso. She was ill at that time but wanted to keep her commitment to conduct at the Greater Puget Sound Festival. When she was not conducting, she would lay on a couch  that had been moved into the gym. When it  was her turn to conduct, she  seemed to have extra strength to ascend the podium,  conduct her rehearsal as if she were in perfect health and then return to the couch after she had finished.  She passed away two weeks later.

Arnold Sherman is director of Music and Fine Arts at Pollard United Methodist Church in Tyler, Texas as well as a free-lance composer and co-founder of Red River Music. His undergraduate work in music education was done at Montgomery College, Rockville, Maryland, and Baylor University, Waco, Texas. Arnold was the founder and Director of the East Texas Handbell Ensemble. A clinician and guest conductor, he has led choral and handbell workshops, festivals, and reading sessions throughout the United States, Canada, England, Japan and the Bahamas. Arnold has over four hundred choral and handbell pieces in print and has been an active member of the AGEHR where he has served as Area IX Chairman.