Music for the Fifth Sunday of Easter + May 15, 2022

Vocal Music

• Thy Perfect Love – John Rutter (b. 1945)

Instrumental Music

• Partita on ‘Salzburg’ - Johann Pachelbel (1653–1706)
• Land of Rest – George Shearing (1919-2011)
• Fugue in D – Johann Pachelbel

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

• Hymn R75 - Praise the Lord! O heavens adore him (AUSTRIA)
• Hymn 576 - God is love, and where true love is (MANDATUM)
• Hymn 304 - I come with joy to meet my Lord (LAND OF REST)
• Hymn 529 - In Christ there is no East or West (MCKEE)
• Psalm 148 – setting by Hal H. Hopson

John Rutter has written a beautiful little anthem based on an anonymous 15th century poem, Thy Perfect Love. Written in 1975, you'll hear the text and tune twice; first, in a solo soprano setting, then again with the full choir singing the text with a lot of suspensions and harmonies that just seem to "float." 

John Rutter

London-born John Rutter has written a large body of sacred music: anthems, carols, a Requiem and other choral works, as well as orchestral and other secular music. He has also made significant contributions as an arranger and editor.

Rutter studied at Cambridge and stayed on to found The Cambridge Singers in 1981. He still conducts this ensemble, which records on its own label, Collegium. For his services to music, Rutter was awarded a Lambeth Doctorate of Music by the Archbishop of Canterbury in 1996, and a CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) in the Queen’s New Year Honours List in 2007.

The opening and closing voluntaries are by the South German composer Johann Pachelbel. You know him by his celebrated Canon in D, which has been used at weddings and for diamond commercials ever since it was rediscovered in 1968, when the Jean-François Paillard chamber orchestra made a recording of the piece that would change its fortunes significantly.

But during his lifetime, Pachelbel was best known as an organ composer. He wrote more than two hundred pieces for the instrument, both liturgical and secular, and explored most of the genres that existed at the time. Much of Pachelbel's liturgical organ music, particularly the chorale preludes, is relatively simple and written for manuals only, no pedal is required. This is partly due to Lutheran religious practice where congregants sang the chorales. Household instruments like virginals or clavichords accompanied the singing, so Pachelbel and many of his contemporaries made music playable using these instruments. The quality of the organs Pachelbel used also played a role: south German instruments were not, as a rule, as complex and as versatile as the north German ones which J. S. Bach was accustomed to.

Johann Pachelbel

Chorales and chorale preludes constitute almost half of Pachelbel's surviving organ output, in part because of his organist post in Erfurt which required him to compose chorale preludes on a regular basis. Usually they were composed with one or two verses of the hymn, but today we have an example of a partita, or set of variations on the chorale. You'll hear the chorale first, followed by four different settings of the hymn tune. This is the familiar chorale, SALZBURG, which is used several times in our hymnal. Today we recall the Easter text that goes with it, At the Lamb's high feast we sing.

The communion voluntary is a setting of another hymn-tune, LAND OF REST, which we will sing with the text, I come with joy to meet my Lord. It is by the pianist George Shearing, a British jazz musician who rose to become something of a household name in the US. Blind from birth, Shearing had a natural flair for playing the piano (he started lessons at age five) and was able to memorize tunes he learned from listening to the radio. He studied music at Linden College, a residential school for blind children, where he stayed until he was 16, at which point he began working as pub pianist.

George Shearing

Shearing was much honored during his long career. He played for three different US presidents (Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and Ronald Reagan) and was awarded an OBE in 1996 before receiving a knighthood from the Queen in 2007. “In the quiet moments when I reflect on all this,” wrote Shearing in his autobiography, “I can’t help thinking, not bad for a kid from Battersea!”

Though Shearing became an American citizen in 1956, in later years he spent a lot of time at his home in the Cotswolds, England. A bad fall in 2004 put an end to his performing career and he died seven years later, on Valentine’s Day 2011, aged 91.

Music for June 13, 2021 + The Third Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

• Hymn of Promise – Natalie Sleeth (1930-1992)

Instrumental Music

• Symphonie Gothique: 2. Andante Sostenuto - Charles-Marie Widor (1844 –1937)
• Jerusalem My Happy Home – George Shearing (1919-2011)
• Praeludium from Suite in D Minor – Johann Krieger (1651–1735)

Congregational Music (all hymns from the Hymnal 1982.)

• Hymn 525 The Church’s one foundation (AURELIA) 
• Hymn 302 Father, we thank thee who hast planted (LYONS)
• Hymn 657 Love divine, all loves excelling (HYFRYDOL)
• Psalm 92 – Tone VIIIa

This Sunday the Good Shepherd SUMMER Choir will sing one of the simplest and loveliest anthems in our library, the beautiful Hymn of Promise by Natalie Sleeth. I have written about it before, so if you want to read the story of how it came to be, please go here.

Often we sing hymns which we have sung all our lives, and never think about what they mean. This Sunday, we are closing the 10:15 service with Charles Wesley's great hymn, Love divine, all loves excelling. It's one of the few hymns of that era that depicts God as a loving god, and not a judgmental deity. Every line in this hymn can be traced back to the Bible. Every thought is based on God's word. Here is an example of just the last stanza of the hymn:

Finish then thy new creation (2 Cor. 5:17)
Pure and spotless* let us be, (Cant. 4:7, Eph. 5:27
Let us see thy great salvation, (Heb 2:3, 2 Peter 3:14)
Perfectly restored in thee; (Psalm 51:12, Isaiah 49:6, 58:12)
Changed from glory into glory (2 Cor. 3:18)
Till in heaven we take our place (John 14:2-3)
Till we cast our crowns before thee (Rev 4:10)
Lost in wonder, love, and praise (Rev. 8:1)
* the original word was "sinless," influenced by John Wesley's belief that humans could strive toward perfection, thus being sinless.

But a couple of lines are a bit obscure. I want to lift those out and give an explanation of them.

Line five of the third stanza says we are "changed from glory into glory." This comes from 2nd Corinthians 3:18

And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.

You have to remember the story of Moses coming down from the mountain with the Ten Commandments. It's said that his face was shining so brightly from being around the glory of God that he had to veil his face to keep from blinding his people. This glory comes from knowing the Law of God. But with Christ, we are a new creation (see the first line) and, as William Barclay says in his Commentary,

...we see the glory of the Lord with no veil upon our faces, and because of that we, too, are changed from glory into glory. Just possibly what Paul means is that, if we gaze at Christ, we in the end reflect him. It is a law of life that we become like the people we gaze at. (William Barclay, The Letters to the Corinthians, The Westminster Press, 1954)

And in the penultimate line, we sing about casting our crowns before him. In the book of Revelation, the Apostle John describes an event that will take place sometime after the Judgment Seat of Christ. The scene involves twenty-four elders, sitting upon twenty-four thrones, all of which encircle the throne of God.

Around the throne were twenty-four thrones; and upon the thrones I saw twenty-four elders sitting, clothed in white garments, and golden crowns on their heads …. (Revelation 4:4)
The twenty-four elders will fall down before Him who sits on the throne, and will worship Him who lives forever and ever, and will cast their crowns before the throne. (Revelation 4:10)

For the saints to cast their crowns before the throne of God is to publicly acknowledge Christ’s right (and His alone) to wear those crowns. At this time they will “give credit where credit is due.” During their lives, these believers had faithfully represented Christ to the world in both character and service. But the ability to do so had not been generated by their own will and power but, instead, by the will and power of God. 

Music for October 6, 2019

Vocal Music

• O Lord, Increase My Faith – Henry Loosemore (c.1600-1670)

Instrumental Music

• By the Water of Babylon, BWV 653 – Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
• Amazing Grace – George Shearing (1919-2011)
• Chaconne – Louis Couperin (1626-1661)

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

• Hymn R 49 - Let the whole creation cry (LLANFAIR)
• Hymn 671 - Amazing grace, how sweet the sound (NEW BRITAIN)
• Hymn 380 - Praise God from whom all blessings flow (OLD 100TH)
• Hymn 660 - O Master, let me walk with thee (MARYTON)
• Hymn 488 - Be thou my vision (SLANE)
• Hymn 535 - Ye servants of God, your Master proclaim (PADERBORN)

George Michael, who has nothing to do with this Sunday's music, but got your attention.

As George Michael said, "You Gotta Have Faith."

In Sunday's Gospel, the apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!” The Lord replied, “If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you. (Luke 17:5-6)

The Good Shepherd Choir asks the same thing in this Sunday’s anthem.

O Lord, increase my faith,
strengthen me and confirm me in Thy true faith;
endue me with wisdom, charity, and patience,
in all my adversity, Sweet Jesu, say Amen.

Attributed for many years to the English composer Orlando Gibbons (1583-1625), modern scholarly research reveals the composer as Henry Loosemore, an English composer and organist. His father, John Loosemore, built the organ at Exeter Cathedral.  Henry Loosemore served as the organist at King's College, Cambridge.  In 1640, Loosemore was granted the degree of B.Mus by the University, on the supplication of King's College avowing that 'he had studied the art of musical composition for seven years, together with its practice, and has achieved approval of those skilled in the art.'

Psalm 137 is an alternate Psalm for the day. (We will be singing Psalm 37). The text,

1. By the rivers of Babylon— there we sat down and there we wept when we remembered Zion.
2. On the willows there we hung up our harps.
3. For there our captors asked us for songs, and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”
4. How could we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?

describes the desperate situation of the Israelites in exile.

In 1525, Wolfgang Dachstein wrote a German Chorale based on the psalm, and many 17th century organists used the chorale in both organ and choral settings. J. S. Bach was one of those. In his collection known as the 18 Choräle or Leipziger Choräle, Bach included two different versions. One of them, BWV 653b, has five voices, and the melody sounds ethereally in the upper voice, against a sombre double pedal part. In the other version, BWV 653a, the ornamented melody in the middle voice is wedged between two upper voices and pedal. This is the version I will play as the opening voluntary.

This latter version was clearly Bach’s favourite, as he revised the material in his later years in Leipzig, by adding even more ornamentation to the melody and further accentuating the drawn-out rhythm as a slow sarabande (a slow, stately Spanish dance in triple time). In this way, he emphasised the point of this chorale, which is expressed in the later verses of the text, where the Israelites are forced to sing a song of praise. But how are they to sing in such hopeless circumstances? That is precisely what Bach conveys in this chorale prelude. Although the oppressors have got the exiles right where they want them, the timid middle voice keeps going courageously, and with all the ornamentation displays faith in a good outcome.(1)

The closing voluntary is also in an ancient dance form, this time the chaconne, a composition in a series of varying sections in slow triple time, typically over a short repeated bass theme. Originally a stately dance performed to a chaconne, popular in the 18th century, here we have an organ arrangement of a harpsichord piece by French composer Louis Couperin. Couperin moved to Paris in 1650–1651, where he worked as organist of the Church of St. Gervais in Paris and as musician at the court.

This arrangement is by the early 20th century French organist, Joseph Bonnet.

(1) A Somber Sarabande, Netherlands Bach Society, https://www.bachvereniging.nl/en/bwv/bwv-653/

Music for April 29, 2018 + The Fifth Sunday after Easter

Vocal Music

• O Lord, I will Praise Thee – Gordon Jacob (1895–1984)
• Ave Verum - W. A. Mozart (1756-1791)
• The Light of God’s Love – Mark Burrows (b. 1971)

Instrumental Music

• Partita 1 from “O God, Thou Faithful God", BWV 767 – J. S. Bach (1685-1750)
• Land of Rest – George Shearing (1919-2011)
• Fugue in G Minor, BWV 578 – J. S. Bach

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

• Hymn 379 - God is love: let heaven adore him (ABBOT'S LEIGH)
• Hymn R18 - Come, let us with our Lord arise (SUSSEX CAROL)
• Hymn 304 - I come with joy to meet my Lord (LAND OF REST)
• Hymn 610 - Lord, whose love through humble service (BLAENHAFREN)
• Psalm 22:26-27, 28, 30, 31-32 – setting by Jeff Ostrowski

The offertory anthem this Sunday is one that we have been rehearsing off and on since late January. Originally planned for a Sunday in Lent, we have had to push it back on the calendar as it just didn't fall together like we planned. That is ironic, as it is from the Oxford Easy Anthem series from Oxford University Press. But as many church musicians (and most choir members) know, "easy" is a relative term to OUP, and this piece is not without its challenges.

Gordon Jacob

Written in 1951, it is a setting of the first six verses of Isaiah 12, a hymn of praise, set to music by English musician Gordon Jacob. Though there is a lot of unison writing, and the organ doubles the voices quite a bit, there are just enough syncopated rhythms, harmonic shifts, and wide, angular melodic motives that make it challenging for a choir such as ours that is used to square, predictable harmonies of Bach and Handel or the flowing melodies of Mendelssohn or Brahms.

A native of London, Jacob studied at the Royal College of Music in London, where his teachers included Sir Charles Villiers Stanford, Sir Hubert Parry and Herbert Howells. He taught briefly at other schools before returning to the Royal College as a lecturer in 1926; he was to remain there until his retirement in 1966.

Gordon Jacob is remembered for his achievement in a number of fields, including education, composition and arranging, but unlike many of the British composers we regularly hear at Good Shepherd, church music was not an important part of his output. He wrote much instrumental music for orchestra, symphonic band, and chamber and vocal ensembles, but just a handful of pieces for church choir or organ.

The other anthem is the lovely Ave Verum Corpus (Hail, true body) of W. A. Mozart. We have sung it quite a bit, the last time being 3 years ago. It is a setting of the 14th century Eucharistic hymn in Latin "Ave verum corpus". Mozart wrote it in 1791 for Anton Stoll, the musical coordinator in the parish of Baden bei Wien while in the middle of writing his opera Die Zauberflöte, and while visiting his wife Constanze, who was pregnant with their sixth child and staying in a spa near Baden. It was fewer than six months before Mozart's death.

Mark Burrows

The choristers of the Coventry Choir will sing an anthem by Mark Burrows, who just directed our choir with 100 children at the Houston Choristers Guild Children's Choir festival this month at Atascocita United Methodist Church. Burrows received his undergraduate degree in music education from Southern Methodist University and his graduate degree in conducting from Texas Christian University. Mark is currently the Director of Children's Ministries at First United Methodist Church – Fort Worth. He directs choral ensembles of all ages and oversees programs in visual arts and theater. Prior to his work in Fort Worth, Mark was a music teacher at Stephen C. Foster Elementary School in Dallas, Texas.

Mark resides in Fort Worth, Texas, with his wife, Nina, and daughters, Emma and Grace

Music for September 10, 2017 + The Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

• Immortal, Invisible – Eric Thiman (1900-1975)

Instrumental Music

• Prelude in Classic Style – Gordon Young (1919-1998)
• Land of Rest – George Shearing (1919-2011)
• Thou Art the Rock – Henri Mulet (1878-1967)

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 440 - Blessed Jesus, at thy word (LIEBSTER JESU)
• Hymn 302 - Father, we thank thee who hast planted (RENDEZ A DIEU)
• Hymn R192 - God forgave my sin in Jesus’ name (FREELY, FREELY)
• Hymn R226 - Ubi Caritas (TAIZE)
• Hymn 674 - “Forgive our sins, as we forgive” (DETROIT)
• Psalm 149 - ToneVIIIa

This Sunday the choir finally returns to the 10:15 service after their summer break and Hurricane Harvey. We've only had two rehearsals, so we turn to an anthem by the Englishman Eric Thiman. A church and recital organist and superb improviser, Thiman was a practical composer who aimed his output at the average choir and organist, rather than the cathedral choirs. Philip L Scowcroft, in his internet biography of Thiman said "His music rarely, if ever, touched the heights, yet we can admire its craftsmanship and take pleasure in its gracious tunefulness, which is well in the English tradition (or, properly, British tradition, since he used or set so many Scots and Irish tunes as well as English)." (1) In today's anthem, it is a Welsh tune that he arranges for choir, the hymn "Immortal, Invisible." It's a great choice for that first Sunday back with most of the choir singing the melody in unison, except for the third stanza that is in four part harmony (and unaccompanied.)

The opening voluntary is by the American counterpart, Gordon Young. Young was also a church musician and concert recitalist who published over 800 pieces in his lifetime. Like Thiman, most of it was aimed at the average church choir and organist, who loved singing his rhythmic and tuneful pieces. This opening voluntary is one that I have been playing since I was a high school senior. Prelude in Classic Style is one of Young's most popular pieces, even being recorded by the guitar master Christopher Parkening in an arrangement for guitar and harpsichord re-titled Hymn of Christian Joy. It's that joy that I wanted to express this morning as we celebrate Rally Day.

"Classic Style" refers to characteristics of the Classical period of Classical music, the years roughly covering 1750-1825 (think Mozart and Haydn). Classical music of this period has a lighter, clearer texture than baroque music (Bach or Handel) and is less complex. It is mainly homophonic—melody above chordal accompaniment. It also emphasizes light elegance in place of the baroque’s dignified seriousness and impressive grandeur. You will hear all of that in this morning's voluntary.

My closing voluntary is a piece that I have played since I was a Junior in college, the Toccata: Tu es petra, by Henri Mulet, from Esquisses Byzantines, a ten-movement suite published in 1920. Considered Mulet's most famous composition for organ, it was written over a period of at least ten years, dedicated "in memory of the Basilica of the Sacred Heart, Montmartre, 1914-1919. The tenth movement, the toccata, is thought to refer to the smaller, medieval church of Saint Pierre-de-Montmartre, an institution which had been consecrated over 700 years before the creation of the basilica. 

The ominous tonalities of the piece, the frequent use of the minor third, the development of contrasting motifs, and the brilliant finale in the parallel major key all suggest a spiritual battle in which good does indeed triumph.

Henri Mulet, c. 1937

Enrolled in the Paris Conservatoire before he was twelve years old, Henri Mulet studied cello, harmony, and organ. His primary organ instructors included Charles-Marie Widor, Alexandre Guilmant, and their assistant, Louis Vieme, all of whom thought highly of the young composer and organist. Louis Vieme claimed that Mulet was "one of the most brilliant of musical personalities, a solid virtuoso, and a very fine improviser." Although Mulet held several church organ positions, his most significant position was at Saint Philippe-du-Roule, a parish of about 30,000 members. In 1937, afflicted by poor health and poverty and disillusioned with music and life, Mulet moved to Draguignan, a town between Marseilles and Nice. He was taken into the convent of the Little Sisters of the Poor in 1958, where Mulet died several years later. 

1. Philip L Scowcroft, English Composers for Amateurs: No 2 - Eric Thiman