Music for September 1, 2019

Vocal Music

• Bread of the World – Carlton Young (b. 1926)

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

• Hymn 376 - Joyful, joyful, we adore thee (HYMN TO JOY)
• Hymn R 141 - Come, ye sinners, poor and needy (ARISE)
• Hymn - Through north and south  (LAAST UNS ERFREUEN)
• Hymn R 148 - Brother, let me be your servant (SERVANT SONG)
• Hymn R 29 - He is Lord (HE IS LORD)
• Hymn 477 - All praise to thee, for thou, O King divine (ENGELBERG)
• Psalm 112 – Tone Va

Carlton Young

I am away this weekend, mourning the last gasp of summer. In my stead, Rob Carty will be playing the organ, and the choir will sing a setting of the hymn Bread of the World in Mercy Broken, set to the early American tune, CHARLESTOWN, by the Methodist composer Carlton R. Young. This tune was a folk tune included in a 1799 tunebook, The United States Sacred Harmony. (You guessed it; it was discovered in Charleston, South Carolina.) This tune is in our hymnal, but set with a completely different text, "All who love and serve your city."

Young wrote this arrangement for Christ Memorial Lutheran Church here in Houston. A native of Hamilton, Ohio, he was a teacher, editor, composer and conductor, with the unique distinction of serving as editor of two revisions of hymnals for Methodists: The Methodist Hymnal, 1966; and The United Methodist Hymnal, 1989.

The opening hymn is that great hymn, Joyful, joyful, we adore thee, with its tune from Beethoven's 9th Symphony. Here are some notes on the hymn from the website Hymnary.com.

Henry Van Dyke’s brilliant hymn of praise has many layers that add to the beauty of his text. As hymnologist Albert Bailey writes, within Van Dyke’s text, “creation itself cannot conceal its joy, and that joy is appreciated by God the center of it all; likewise all nature fills us with joy, caused fundamentally by our recognition of God as the giver” (The Gospel in Hymns, 554). We experience joy on many levels: we witness the joy expressed by Creation, we bask in the joy of God as He delights in us, and we experience our own joy as we reflect on all God has done for us and through us. We have all heard this line over and over again, but it’s worth repeating: we rush through life too quickly to stop and be filled with joy. We allow the phone calls we have to make, the laundry we need to fold, the paper we need to write, and the porch we need to fix get in the way of simply stopping, looking around, and being filled with joy and gratitude at the world God has given us. It’s a world where we have people to call, children to clothe, knowledge to express, and parties to host. And more so than anything, even when it seems to be crumbling around us, it’s a world redeemed by Christ. What can we raise to our Savior but this outburst of joy?

ODE TO JOY or HYMN TO JOY is the adaptation of Beethoven’s famous final movement in his Ninth Symphony into a melody fit for congregational singing. Around 1908, Henry Jackson Van Dyke wrote his text to be “sung to the music of Beethoven’s ‘Hymn to Joy.’”  It is a tune of grandeur and, fittingly, joy. It almost begs to be sung in a fast, upbeat manner; Jerry Jenkins writes, “the tune is so reminiscent of sprightly harpsichords that the words begin to bounce, and suddenly I’m singing it the way it was meant to be sung – at least in style” (Hymns for Personal Devotions, 132).

The only point of contention about this tune revolves around one note. In Beethoven’s symphony, there is a pick-up note into the third line – many try to imitate this. Paul Westermeyer argues that using this syncopated rhythm allows the congregation to sing music “in its integrity” (Let the People Sing, 202). Austin Lovelace, however, argues that “syncopation is a stumbling block to congregational singing and does nothing to make the hymn easier to sing or understand” (Let the People Sing, 202). In this case, Lovelace is probably right. 

Hymnary.org, Featured Hymn: "Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee" Sat, 08/17/2019