Music for April 10, 2022 + The Sunday of the Passion

Vocal Music

• Ride On, King Jesus – arr. Hall Johnson (1888-1970)
• O Savior of the World – John Goss (1800-1880)

Instrumental Music

• O Sacred Head, Now Wounded – Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)
• Ah, Holy Jesus – Johannes Brahms

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

• Hymn 154 - All glory, laud, and honor (VALET WILL ICH DIR GEBEN)
• Hymn 435 - At the name of Jesus (KING’S WESTON)
• Hymn R235 - O sacred head, now wounded (HERZLICH TUT MICH VERLANGEN)
• Hymn R214 - Your only Son, no sin to hide (LAMB OF GOD)
• Hymn R227 - Jesus, remember me (Taizé)
• Hymn 474 - When I survey the wondrous cross (ROCKINGHAM)

Two composers of the Romantic era are featured in the 10:15 service this Sunday, one of them being arguably more famous than the other. Let's look at the music of the lesser known composer.

Sir John Goss was an English composer, chiefly of English cathedral music and hymnody. His position in the London musical world was an influential one as a teacher, writer, composer and critic.

Born to a musical family, Goss was a boy chorister of the Chapel Royal, London, and later a pupil of Thomas Attwood, organist of St Paul's Cathedral. After a brief period as a chorus member in an opera company he was appointed organist of a chapel in south London, later moving to more prestigious organ posts at St Luke's Church, Chelsea and finally St Paul's Cathedral, where he struggled to improve musical standards.

As a composer, Goss wrote little for the orchestra, but was known for his vocal music, both religious and secular. In The Hymnal 1982 his tune LAUDA ANIMA is used as the setting for the hymn "Praise, My Soul, The King of Heaven" (#410). The music critic of The Times described him as the last of the line of English composers who confined themselves almost entirely to ecclesiastical music. One such composition is today's anthem, O Savior of the World. 

O Savior of the World uses as a text the prayer of adoration of the cross found in the Good Friday service (as well as the laying on of hands in the Ministration of the Sick in the Book of Common Prayer, p. 455). This had become one of the most popular Passiontide anthems, as much for congregations as for choirs. It has just the right combination of melodic interest and chordal structure, the later emphasising key words in such a way as to make the whole readily relevant to the listener. There is also just enough repitition of the words to emphasize the poignancy of "save us and help us."

The two organ voluntaries are settings of hymns commonly associated with the Passion, HERZLIEBSTER JESU (Ah, Holy Jesus, how hast thou offended, #158) and HERZLICH TUT MIR VERLANGEN (O Sacred head, sore wounded, #168), from Johannes Brahms's collection Eleven Chorale Preludes, Op. 122. 

Brahms may well be the greatest composer of the Romantic period. He is sometimes grouped with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven as one of the "Three Bs" of music, a comment originally made by the nineteenth-century conductor Hans von Bülow. He wrote symphonies, concerti, chamber music, piano works, choral compositions, and more than 200 songs. The only major form in which he did not write was opera.

Brahms was the great master of symphonic and sonata style in the second half of the 19th century. His music is rooted in the structures and compositional techniques of the Classical masters such as Joseph Haydn, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Ludwig van Beethoven in a period when the standards of this tradition were being questioned or overturned by the Romantics.

Unlike the great classical masters, Brahms wrote several works for organ. The collection I am drawing from this morning, the Eleven Chorale Preludes, is a work written in 1896 at the end of the composer's life and published posthumously in 1902. They are based on verses of nine Lutheran chorales, two of them set twice, and are relatively short. 

The communion voluntary is the second of two variations on the PASSION CHORALE (O Sacred Head). This setting of the “passion” melody is remarkably uniform in texture.  The melody itself is placed in the pedals.  In the manuals, the almost hypnotic motion begins in an introduction.  The right hand, set in the tenor register, piano and molto legato, plays flowing, winding arpeggios in sixteenth notes.  The left hand has two voices, most notably a throbbing bass line with repeated notes. The changes of pitch in this bass line are slow and deliberate, but they actually reflect the notes, and even the rhythm, of the first line from chorale melody itself.  The upper left hand line is in longer notes.  

The closing voluntary is  based on hymn 158. The melody is heard in long, sustained notes on top, while the accompaniment has a three-note upbeat pattern throughout, while a shorter, downward leap pattern appears in the pedal. It is slow, majestic, and tragic.

Music for November 1, 2020 + All Saints Sunday

I'm taking the Sunday off this week (I was supposed to be on a cruise 😞) So my friend and our consummate substitute organist Rob Carty will be playing the organ for us.  Staff singer Anna Zhang will be singing the classic anthem by English composer Sir John Goss, These Are They Which Follow the Lamb, based on the passage from Revelation 14:

These are they which follow the Lamb
whithersoever He goeth.
These were redeemed from among men,
being the first-fruits unto God and to the Lamb.
And in their mouth was found no guile,
for they are without fault before the throne of God.

Born to a musical family, Goss was a boy chorister of the Chapel Royal, London, and later a pupil of Thomas Attwood, organist of St Paul's Cathedral. After a brief period as a chorus member in an opera company he was appointed organist of a chapel in south London, later moving to more prestigious organ posts at St Luke's Church, Chelsea and finally St Paul's Cathedral, where he struggled to improve musical standards.

As a composer, Goss wrote little for the orchestra, but was known for his vocal music. You'll know his hymn tune LAUDA ANIMA, which we use for "Praise, my soul, the King of heaven." He has been  referred to as the last of the line of English composers who confined themselves almost entirely to ecclesiastical music.

Goss and his student John Stainer were the two most prominent Victorian composers of church music. Goss was organist of St Paul’s Cathedral from 1838 until his death, and most of his church music dates from his time there. These are they which follow the Lamb, written in 1859, belies the belief that all Victorian church music is sentimental or vulgar: it is simple, chaste, and almost completely diatonic.

Music for March 8, 2020 + Lent II

Vocal Music

• God So Loved the World – John Goss (1800-1880)

Instrumental Music

• Wär Gott nicht mi tuns diese Zeit – Dietrich Buxtehude (1637-1707)
• (Had God Not Been With Us This Time)
• Contemplation on “Beautiful Savior” – Matthew Compton (b. 1994) 
• Good Shepherd Handbell Guild
• Lift High the Cross – Charles Callahan (b. 1951)

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 R 132 - As Moses raised the serpent up (GIFT OF LOVE)
• Hymn 635 - If thou but trust in God to guide thee (WER NUR DEN LIEBEN GOTT)
• Hymn 691 - My faith looks up to thee (OLIVET)
• Hymn 313 - Let thy Blood in mercy poured (JESUS, MEINE ZUVERSICHT)
• Hymn 473 - Lift high the cross (CRUCIFER)
• Psalm 121 – tone IIa

Sir John Goss, looking for all
the world like Franz Schubert.

This Sunday's anthem is a setting of a verse from Sunday's Gospel reading, a verse that is probably the most well known and memorized verse from the Bible. Most choirs know and sing John Stainer's setting of God So Loved the World, but few know the setting by Stainer's teacher and predecessor, Sir John Goss, who was an English organist, composer and teacher.

Born to a musical family, Goss was a boy chorister of the Chapel Royal, London, and later a pupil of Thomas Attwood, organist of St Paul's Cathedral. After a brief period as a chorus member in an opera company he was appointed organist of a chapel in south London, later moving to more prestigious organ posts at St Luke's Church, Chelsea and finally St Paul's Cathedral, where he struggled to improve musical standards.

As a composer, his best-known compositions are his hymn tunes "Praise, My Soul, the King of Heaven" and "See, Amid the Winter's Snow". The music critic of The Times described him as the last of the line of English composers who confined themselves almost entirely to ecclesiastical music.

From 1827 to 1874, Goss was a professor at the Royal Academy of Music, teaching harmony. He also taught at St Paul's. Among his pupils at the academy were Arthur Sullivan, Frederic Cowen and Frederick Bridge. His best-known pupil at St Paul's was John Stainer, who succeeded him as organist there.

Goss was noted for his piety and gentleness of character. His pupil, John Stainer, wrote, "That Goss was a man of religious life was patent to all who came into contact with him, but an appeal to the general effect of his sacred compositions offers public proof of the fact." His mildness was a disadvantage when attempting to deal with his recalcitrant singers. He was unable to do anything about the laziness of the tenors and basses, who had lifetime security of tenure and were uninterested in learning new music.

I can relate.

Music for November 5, 2017 + All Saints Sunday

Vocal Music

• I Heard a Voice from Heaven – John Goss (1800-1880)

Instrumental Music

• Fanfare Flourish – Ron Mallory (B. 1973)
• Chant de Paix – Jean Langlais (1907-1991)
• Placare Christe Servulis (O Christ Forgive Thy Servants) – Marcel Dupré (1886-1971)

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

• Hymn 287 - For all the saints, who from their labor rest (SINE NOMINE)
• Hymn 526 - Let saints on earth in concert sing (DUNDEE)
• Hymn 618 - Ye watchers and ye holy ones (LASST UNS ERFREUEN)
• Hymn R127 - Blest are they, the poor in spirit (BLEST ARE THEY)
• Hymn 625 - Ye holy angels bright (DARWALL’S 148TH)
• Hymn - Taste and See (James Moore) Paraphrase of Psalm 34:1-4, 8

The choral music of the English composer Sir John Goss is among the core works of Anglican choirs’ repertoire; our choir often sing his works and we sing his best known hymn tune, LAUDA ANIMA with the text, “Praise, my soul, the King of heaven” (#410). Goss is best remembered for his vocal music and is one of the last English composers who devoted their work almost entirely to writing church music.

Sir John Goss, by unknown artist, circa 1835.

Born in Fareham, Hampshire, England, Goss was a descendant of a long line of English musicians. Several in his family were excellent singers, and his father was the organist of the parish church in Fareham. Goss was educated in London, sang as a chorister for the Chapel Royal, and studied organ with Thomas Attwood, organist of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London. Goss was appointed to several prestigious organist positions in London including Stockwell Chapel in South London, St. Luke’s Church in Chelsea, and St. Paul’s Cathedral, succeeding his former teacher there in 1838. While at St Paul’s, Goss had little influence over the music of the cathedral, and he struggled to improve musical standards there.

Goss was also an active teacher, serving as a professor at the Royal Academy of Music where he taught harmony from 1827 to 1874, and taught at St. Paul’s. His instructional book written in1833, An Introduction to Harmony and Thorough-Bass, was a standard music text of the era.

Goss was remembered by his students for his pious, religious life, patience and gentleness of character. Following years of poor health during the 1870s, Goss died in his home in Brixton. He is buried in St. Paul’s Cathedral.

Goss was knighted by Queen Victoria when he retired from St. Paul’s in 1872. In 1876, he received an honorary doctorate in music from the University of Cambridge. Numerous posthumous memorials honoring Goss were erected in London and Fareham.

The closing voluntary is a wonderful work by Marcel Dupré on the chant Placare Christe Servulis which is traditionally sung at Vespers on the Feast of All Saints in the Roman Breviary. It is the last piece in Dupré's organ collection, Tombeau de Titelouze (16 Chorals sur des Hymnes liturgiques), Op 38. During an Organ Week held in Rouen in 1942, the Abbé Robert Delestre, Maître de Chapelle of Rouen Cathedral showed Dupré the unmarked grave of Jean Titelouze, the founding father of French organ music. It immediately inspired Dupré to compose this volume which he inscribed to the Abbé. Placare Christe servulis treats the hymn melody in the form of a toccata (D major, 12/8) for All Saints Day.