Music for October 16, 2016 + The Twenty-second Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

• I Will Lift Up Mine Eyes – Leo Sowerby (1895-1968)

Instrumental Music

• Trumpet Prelude – Johan Helmich Roman (1694-1758)
• Aria – Philip Baker (b. 1934)
• Prelude in G, BWV 568 – J. S. Bach (1685-1750)

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

• Hymn 372 - Praise to the living God! (Leoni)
• Hymn 631 - Book of books, our people’s strength (Liebster Jesu)
• Hymn 424 - For the fruit of all creation (East Acklam)
• Hymn 669 - Commit thou all that grieves thee (Passion Chorale)
• Hymn 711 - Seek ye first the kingdom of God (Seek Ye First)
• Hymn 535 - Ye servants of God, your Master proclaim (Paderborn)
• Psalm 119:97-104 (Tone VIIc)

Leo Sowerby was the leading composer of American church music and many virtuoso organ works during the first half of the twentieth century and, at the same time, the most distinguished Anglican musician to be produced by the Protestant Episcopal Church in North America. During his career he would compose music in all genres, with the exception of opera, but it is in the field of church music that his life's major work was accomplished.

He was a largely self-taught musician, beginning his study of harmony and music theory from a textbook at age eleven and composing his first works shortly thereafter. His interest in choral music and the pipe organ date from as early as 1910, when he began to study the works of César Franck and Max Reger. By 1913 the eighteen-year old composer received his first major public recognition when the Chicago Symphony premièred his Violin Concerto. Three years later the Symphony would give an unprecedented all-Sowerby concert, beginning his relationship as resident composer which would last into the 1940's.

Sowerby served as bandmaster for the 332nd Field Artillery in the U. S. Army during World War I, during which time he completed his graduate work through the American Conservatory in Chicago and prepared several earlier works, including A Liturgy of Hope of 1917, for publication.

Between his discharge from the Army and his appointment in 1927 as organist/choirmaster at St. James Episcopal Church (later Cathedral) in Chicago, Sowerby held a number of church jobs, including  Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago, where he served as associate organist/choirmaster.

Leo Sowerby came of age at the same time as did American music. With a few isolated exceptions, American composers before the 1920s had merely tried to imitate the voices of their Central European teachers, but Sowerby's generation, led by such men as George Gershwin, Virgil Thomson, Aaron Copland,  and Walter Piston, took the old European forms and poured into them music which sounded distinctly American in its melody, harmony, and rhythm. You can hear that distinctive America sound in today's anthem, I Will Lift Up Mine Eyes. Sowerby's most popular work of all, it is a masterful expression of genuine religious faith. Taking Psalm 121 as his text, Sowerby avoids counterpoint, choosing a simple, unaffected melody with choral accompaniment, including a gentle whiff of blues-tinged harmony. What resulted has remained a repertory staple of church choirs for over 75 years.

Early on, a publisher had purchased the anthem outright for a one-time payment of $10. Much to the composer's great regret after the fact, he would receive no royalties on what was destined to become a "best seller."

Music for August 31, 2014 + The 12th Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

When Jesus Wept – William Billings (1746-1800), arr. A. F. Schultz (b. 1942)

 Instrumental Music

Voluntary         If thou But Trust in God to Guide Thee – Paul Manz (1919-2009)

Piano                Hymne – Vangelis (b. 1943)

Voluntary         Trumpet Prelude – Johan Helmich Roman (1694-1758)

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

Hymn 401        The God of Abraham praise (LEONI)

Hymn 421        All glory be to God on high (ALLEIN GOTT IN DER HOHE)

Hymn 635        If thou but trust in God to guide thee (WER NUR DEN LIEBEN)

Hymn              I have decided to follow Jesus (Indian folk song)

Hymn R 226    Ubi caritas et amor (Taizé)

Hymn 450        All hail the power of Jesus’ name (coronation)

Psalm 26:1-8 - mode IV

The tune for the anthem today is a “fuguing tune,” or round, by the first American to achieve lasting fame and respect as a composer. William Billings of Boston, Massachusetts was born on October 7, 1746 with vision in only one eye and uneven legs. He started music lessons as a young boy with a local choirmaster, and by the late 1760’s had become America’s first professional composer. A leather tanner by trade, Billings began teaching a singing class in Stoughton, Massachusetts, which would later become the Stoughton Musical Society (America’s oldest music society and first singing school). He organized the first church choir in America. In 1770, Billings made history with the publication of the first hymnal in America, The New England Psalm Singer, which included this melody, When Jesus Wept.

Alan F. Schultz arranged the anthem, beginning with the entire choir singing the tune in unison, using the original text by Billings based on John 11:35. He then includes two stanzas of the hymn Take up thy cross, the Savior said, the first stanza being sung in canon, and the third stanza being sung in unison with a grand organ accompaniment. Schultz was for many years conductor and music director of The Southern Arizona Symphony and the Tucson Masterworks Chorale, as well as organist/choir master of St. Michael’s Episcopal in Tuscon. 

The opening voluntary is was originally an improvisation for organ on hymn 635, If thou but trust in God to guide thee (WER NUR DEN LIEBEN),  by the Lutheran organist Paul Manz. Typical of his improvisational style, he begins with a ritornello, a section that is repeated throughout the piece, “returning” again and again as the name ritornello (Italian for return) would suggest. The ritornello uses a fragment of the opening of the German Chorale-tune as its basis, played by two different flute stops (sounds) on the organ, before playing a four-part setting of the hymn on the string stops of another manual.

The communion voluntary is a piano piece by the Greek composer of electronic orchestral music, Vangelis. Born Evangelos Odysseas Papathanassiou, he is best known for his Academy Award–winning score for the film Chariots of Fire. This is a simple, meditative melody in three quarter time.