Music for January 17, 2021 + The Second Sunday of the Epiphany

Vocal Music

• O Jesus, Joy of Loving Hearts – Beverly Ward (b. 1935)
• The Summons – John Bell (b. 1949)
• Bidkar Cajina, baritone
• Hymn 707: Take my life, and let it be (HOLLINGSIDE)

Instrumental Music

• Suite for Organ – Henry Purcell (1659-1695)
• Sinfonia
• Ayre
• Trumpet Tune
• Rondeau
• Trumpet Tune
• Adagio
• Trumpet Tune
• Trumpet Tune in D Major – Henry Purcell

This Sunday I have a Men's Schola leading the music. In monasteries, the name schola cantorum is often applied to certain selected monks whose duty it is to chant the more elaborate portions of the liturgical music, such as the graduals and alleluias at Mass, the rest of the community joining only in the simpler parts. These men from the Good Shepherd Choir will be singing a setting (in English paraphrase) of the Latin hymn Jesu dulcis memoria, retaining the traditional plainsong melody, with a lovely organ accompaniment and a canonic verse in the middle. It is arranged by Beverly Ward. I was happy to see this piece as I am trying to find and use more music written by women composers.

Mr. Ward, however, is not a woman.

Mr. Ward was the organist and choirmaster at St. James Episcopal Church, Hendersonville, NC, and St. Mary's Episcopal Church, Asheville, NC, from 1994 until 2003. Mr. Ward has also served as organist and choirmaster at St. James Cathedral, Chicago.  A graduate of Furman University, Eastman School of Music, he is also a graduate of the College of Church Musicians of Washington, an elite group who studied at Washington National Cathedral. Mr. Ward undertook advanced study at the American Conservatory of Music, Chicago, while teaching there. He was a composition student of Leo Sowerby. His works can be found in the catalogs of Flammer, H.W. Gray, Augsburg, and St. James Music Press.

During Communion you will hear Bidkar Cajina sing the beautiful hymn "The Summons" by Scotsman John Bell. I wrote about this hymn and John Bell when he last sang this in October, so please check out my post here.

The organ music is all music of Henry Purcell, the finest and most original composer of his day. Though he was to live a very short life (he died at age 36), he was able to enjoy and make full use of the renewed flowering of music after the Restoration of the Monarchy.

Henry Purcell

As the son of a musician at Court, a chorister at the Chapel Royal, and the holder of continuing royal appointments until his death, Purcell worked in Westminster for three different Kings over twenty-five years.

He is responsible for much choral music for the church, but also music for opera and theatre. While Purcell was known for being the organist at Westminster Abbey, the English organ was nowhere near the size nor as elaborate as the organ in Germany, so what little organ music Purcell wrote was rather inconsequential to the great body of organ literature. Thus, modern organists have had to turn to transcriptions of his orchestral works for their portion of music from Purcell.  The Suite I am playing for the opening voluntary is an arrangement of various works from his incidental music for the English stage.

Music for October 11, 2020 - The FIRST SUNDAY back in church (10:15)

This Sunday will be our first Sunday back in church with a live service, which will also be livestreamed over You Tube. We'll have less music initially, with only one solo and instrumental music. For this week, you can expect to hear:

Vocal Music

• Will You Come and Follow Me? – John L. Bell (b. 1949), Bidkar Cajina, baritone

Instrumental Music

• Ciaconna in F Minor – Johann Pachelbel (1653-1706)
• Brother James’ Air – Larry Shackley (b. 1956)
• Little Prelude in C Minor – J. S. Bach (1685-1750)

The solo is a hymn by the Scottish minister John L. Bell, set to the Scottish folk melody KELVINGROVE. It's a gorgeous text call "The Summons."

Will you come and follow me if I but call your name?

Will you go where you don't know and never be the same?

Will you let my love be shown?

Will you let my name be known?

Will you let my life be grown in you,

and you in me?

Will you leave yourself behind if I but call your name?

Will you care for cruel and kind and never be the same?

Will you risk the hostile stare,

should your life attract or scare?

Will you let me answer prayer in you

and you in me?

Will you let the blinded man see if I but call your name?

Will you set the prisoners free and never be the same?

Will you kiss the leper clean,

and do such as this unseen?

And admit to what I mean in you,

and you in me?

Will you love the "you" you hide if I but call your name?

Will you quell that fear inside and never be the same?

Will you use the faith you've found

to reshape the world around

through my sight and touch and sound in you,

and you in me?

Lord, your summons echoes true when you but call my name.

Let me turn and follow you and never be the same.

In your company I'll go,

where your love and footsteps show,

thus I'll move and live and grow in you,

and you in me.

This is the kind of hymn that is typical of Bell's writing. He began writing hymns in the 1970s to address concerns missing from the current Scottish hymnal:

"I discovered that seldom did our hymns represent the plight of poor people to God. There was nothing that dealt with unemployment, nothing that dealt with living in a multicultural society and feeling disenfranchised. There was nothing about child abuse…,that reflected concern for the developing world, nothing that helped see ourselves as brothers and sisters to those who are suffering from poverty or persecution." [from an interview in Reformed Worship (March 1993)]

He is now employed full-time in the areas of music and worship with the Wild Goose Resource Group, the publishing arm of the Iona Community, an ecumenical Christian community of men and women from different walks of life and different traditions within Christianity which is headquartered in Glasgow, Scotland, with its main activities taking place on the island of Iona.

Another Scottish hymn-tune, BROTHER JAMES' AIR, will be played between scripture readings. Composed by James Leith Macbeth Bain (1840-1925), the Scottish healer, mystic, and poet known simply as Brother James, the tune was first published in his volume The great peace: being a New Year's greeting ... (1915) and is often used as the tune for the metrical setting of Psalm 23, "The Lord's my Shepherd; I'll not want." Psalm 23 is the Psalm for Sunday.