Music for May 14, 2023 + The Sixth Sunday of Easter (Rogation Sunday)

Vocal Music

• Jesus Christ the Apple Tree – Sondra Tucker (b. 1957)
• Heidi Aulbach, flute
• If Ye Love Me – Thomas Tallis (1505-1585)

Instrumental Music

• Grazioso – Arnold B. Sherman (b. 1948)
• We Plow the Fields and Scatter – arr. Thomas Keesecker (b. 1956)
• Toccata – John Weaver (1937-2021)

Congregational Music (all hymns from The Hymnal 1982.)

• Hymn 398 - I sing the almighty power of God (FOREST GREEN)
• Hymn 455 - O Love of God, how strong and true (DUNEDIN)
• Hymn 288 - Praise to God, Immortal praise (DIX)
• Hymn 488 - Be thou my vision (SLANE)
• Hymn 400 - All creatures of our God and King (LASST UNS ERFREUEN)
• Psalm 66 - setting by Richard Proulx

Jesus Christ the Apple Tree

Today is Rogation Sunday on our liturgical calendar. The word rogation comes from the Latin verb rogare, meaning “to ask”, which reflects the beseeching of God for protection from calamities. As the Book of Common Prayer puts it: “Rogation Days are the three days preceding Ascension Day, especially devoted to asking for God's blessing on agriculture and industry.” 

They originated in Vienne, France, in the fifth century when Bishop Mamertus introduced days of fasting and prayer to ward off a threatened disaster. In England they were associated with the blessing of the fields at planting. The vicar “beat the bounds” of the parish, processing around the fields reciting psalms and the litany. In the United States they have been associated with rural life and with agriculture and fishing. The propers in the BCP (pp. 207-208, 258-259, 930) have widened their scope to include commerce and industry and the stewardship of creation. (https://www.episcopalchurch.org/glossary/rogation-days/)

For this reason, I have chosen a couple of hymns which talk about the wonders of Creation, an instrumental piece based on a good hymn for Rogation Sunday, and this anthem by my good friend, Sondra Tucker.

Jesus Christ the Apple Tree (also known as Apple Tree and, in its early publications, as Christ Compared to an Apple-tree) is a poem written in the 18th century. The first known publication, beginning The Tree of Life My Soul Hath Seen, was in London's Spiritual Magazine in August, 1761. This credits "R.H." as the submitter and presumed author. R.H. has been shown most likely to refer to Rev. Richard Hutchins, a Calvinist Baptist clergyman in Northamptonshire.

It has been set to music by a number of composers, most famously Elizabeth Poston and John Rutter. Sondra has set the words to an Scottish folk tune, O Waly, Waly. A flowing piano accompaniment and a lyrical flute part join together with the choir to make this an instant favorite among our choir.

The friendship between Sondra and me goes back over 26 years ago when we were both in Memphis. After I moved to Houston, her husband, Roger, got transferred to Houston, where they lived for many years. She was organist/choirmaster at Ascension Episcopal on the West side of Houston when Roger was transferred back to Memphis. Just this past week she described the horror and sadness when, in 2017, she saw on TV their neighborhood and former church under water from the flooding from Hurricane Harvey. She wrote this anthem for her former choir and their director, and it was published in 2022.

If Ye Love Me

Thomas Tallis was one of the greatest composers of Early English Music.  Most of his music was written for the church, which, at that time, did not use instrumental music, so almost all of his music is for singing without instruments. He composed music for all the Tudor kings and queens, except Henry VII (so he composed for Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary and Elizabeth I). This can’t have been easy because different Tudor kings and queens had very different ideas about what church music should be like!

During the reign of Edward VI (1547-1553) it was mandated that the services be sung in English, and that the choral music be brief and succinct "to each syllable a plain and distinct note." If Ye Love Me is the classic example of these new English anthems: mainly homophonic, but with brief moments of imitation. Like many early Anglican anthems, it is cast in ABB form, the second section repeated twice.

Grazioso

The Handbell piece at communion is a beautiful work written in memory of Norma Taubert Brown, a handbell ringer, who died of cancer in 1988. The music tells the story of Norma's life, her struggle with illness, and her ultimate journey to heaven.  Each section of the music reflects this journey.

It was commissioned by Area 10 of the Handbell Musicians of America right after Norma had been in Seattle to share the podium with Arnold Sherman, the composer of Grazioso. She was ill at that time but wanted to keep her commitment to conduct at the Greater Puget Sound Festival. When she was not conducting, she would lay on a couch  that had been moved into the gym. When it  was her turn to conduct, she  seemed to have extra strength to ascend the podium,  conduct her rehearsal as if she were in perfect health and then return to the couch after she had finished.  She passed away two weeks later.

Arnold Sherman is director of Music and Fine Arts at Pollard United Methodist Church in Tyler, Texas as well as a free-lance composer and co-founder of Red River Music. His undergraduate work in music education was done at Montgomery College, Rockville, Maryland, and Baylor University, Waco, Texas. Arnold was the founder and Director of the East Texas Handbell Ensemble. A clinician and guest conductor, he has led choral and handbell workshops, festivals, and reading sessions throughout the United States, Canada, England, Japan and the Bahamas. Arnold has over four hundred choral and handbell pieces in print and has been an active member of the AGEHR where he has served as Area IX Chairman.

We Plow the Fields and Scatter

This setting of the hymn found in our hymnal (hymn 291), whose text affirms that, while we need to plow the land and sow the seed, it is God who provides the increase; he sends the rain and the sunshine to produce a harvest. God also sustains his creation, for "all good gifts around us are sent from heaven above." Thus praise bursts from our "humble, thankful hearts." It is a perfect hymn for Rogation Sunday.

This arrangement, by the American composer Thomas Keesecker, combines the tune in our hymnal with a Scottish Air. I am unaware if this folk tune is used as an alternate tune for the text, but it's still beautiful. So, there you have it!

Toccata

The closing voluntary is a toccata by the New York organist John Weaver, another giant among the organ world. For 35 years he was organist and director of music at Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York City, while simultaneously serving on as Head of the Organ Department at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia (1972-2003), and Chair of the Organ Department at The Juilliard School (1987-2004). His students perform and teach all over the world. Ken Cowan, organist at Rice University (and Palmer Memorial Episcopal) is a former student of his.

This Toccata was written by him in 1954, when he was 17. 

SWINGING SAINTS! Music for November 6, 2022 + All Saints (Observed)

Vocal Music

• By All Your Saints – Joel Martinson, arr. (b. 1960)

Instrumental Music

• Morning Canticle – Sondra Tucker (b. 1957)
• How Can I Keep from Singing – Sondra Tucker, arr.
• Sine Nomine – John Weaver (1937-2021)

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 labors rest (SINE NOMINE)
• Hymn 286 Who are these like stars appearing? (ZEUCH MICH, ZEUCH MICH)
• Hymn 618 Ye watchers and ye holy ones (LAAST UNS ERFREUEN)
• Hymn R127 Blessed are they, the poor in spirit (BLEST ARE THEY)
• Hymn 625 Ye holy angels bright (DARWALL’S 148TH)

It's not your usual Sunday  (musically) at Good Shepherd. First, its the Sunday we observe All Saints Day (which is on November 1st).  We remember those who have died and have "gone before," as they say. We usually use music by the "saints" of church music, (read "dead, white men") but today we also offer choral and instrumental music by a living white man AND a woman. We can feel the earth shake even as we write this. Read on.

By All Your Saints

For the offering, the choir will sing an setting of hymn 231, a poem by Horatio Nelson (a British politician and relative of the famous Naval hero Lord Nelson) set to a Finnish folk tune, NYLAND. It is arranged by Joel Martinson, director of Music Ministries and Organist at The Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration in Dallas, Texas.

Morning Canticle and How Can I Keep From Singing    

These two handbell pieces, played by our Good Shepherd Bell Choir, are by the Houston composer Sondra Tucker. Sondra and I have known each other since our days together in Memphis, over 25 years ago. She has served Presbyterian and Episcopal Congregations in both Memphis and Houston, and is currently the director of the Houston Bronze Ensemble, a professional handbell group in Houston (of which I am a member.) She is also acting as organist and choir director at First Congregational Church of Houston.

The prelude, Morning Canticle, is a bright, original tune which sparks an interesting match with the melody of "Holy Holy Holy", which is played by handchimes in the middle of the piece.

The communion piece is a lovely arrangement of the American Gospel hymn, How Can I Keep From Singing. The text and tune were both written by Robert Lowry, a Baptist minister who became a popular writer of gospel music in the mid- to late-19th century. His best-known hymns include "Shall We Gather at the River", "Christ Arose!", and "Nothing But The Blood Of Jesus". Despite his protestations that preaching was his main vocation and that music was merely a sideline, it is as a hymnwriter that Lowry is chiefly remembered. 

I think it's funny that I first heard this hymn not in church but on a CD of music by the New-Age singer/musician Enya, who changed some more overtly Christian lines.

In this arrangement we will also hear the handchimes playing the melody on the middle verse of the hymn.

Sine Nomine

Of all the music we are presenting this Sunday, the one I am most excited about is the closing voluntary, Sine Nomine. "SINE NOMINE is the tune name of the opening hymn this morning, the wonderful All Saints hymn, For all the saints, who from their labors rest. But did you know that SINE NOMINE is not the first, much less the only tune for that hymn? When the hymn was first published, it was sung to the melody SARUM, by the Victorian composer Joseph Barnby, until the publication of the English Hymnal in 1906 when Ralph Vaughan Williams, the editor of that hymnal, wrote a new tune which he called SINE NOMINE.  The tune's title means "without name" and follows the Renaissance tradition of naming certain compositions "Sine Nomine" if they were not settings for preexisting tunes.

What excited me about this organ piece is that it combines both the original tune SARUM with the later tune SINE NOMINE. But wait! THERE'S MORE! It also combines the Black spiritual, When the Saints Go Marching In with SINE NOMINE. And, if that is not enough, the whole piece is played in a Dixieland Jazz style! Yes, folks, you read that right. The hymn tune many consider to be the epitome of Anglican hymn tunes is given the Dixieland treatment. 

This genius "mash-up" was the brain child of American organist John Weaver. Weaver served as Organist and Director of Music at the Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church from 1970-2005. He also headed the Organ Department of the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia from 1972-2003 AND chaired the Juilliard School's Organ Department from 1987-2004.

Originally, this was the closing movement of a Hymn Sonata, commissioned by the Reuter Organ Company for the dedication recital at Shadyside Presbyterian Church in 1995. The style of a New Orleans Dixieland band infuses the entire piece, and Sine Nomine sounds unexpectedly right with dotted rhythms and jazz harmonies! The juxtaposition with Oh, When the Saints also draws attention to the fact that the opening of one tune is the inversion of the other.

A lyrical statement of SARUM, with its repeated notes and foursquare feel, essentially acts as a contrasting second subject. Following this there is another statement of SINE NOMINE as a jazz trumpet solo, after which SARUM and SINE NOMINE are combined. Finally, SINE NOMINE and Oh, When the Saints Go Marching In are grandly combined.

Music for September 21, 2014 + The Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

• Behold Now, Praise the Lord – Everett Titcomb (1884-1968)

Instrumental Music

• Prelude on “Slane” – Gerre Hancock (1934-2012)
• Kanon/Seek Ye First – Johann Pachelbel/Karen Lafferty (1653-1706/b. 1948)
• Toccata for Organ – John Weaver (b. 1937)

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

• Hymn 414 – God, my King, thy might confessing (STUTTGART)
• Psalm 145:1-8 – Tone Ig
• Hymn 660 - O Master, let me walk with thee (MARYTON)
• Hymn 711 – Seek ye first the kingdom of God (SEEK YE FIRST)
• Hymn 482 – Lord of all hopefulness (SLANE)
• Hymn 551 – Rise up, ye saints of God! (FESTAL SONG)

The anthem this morning is by another giant of Anglican music of the 20^th century, Everett Titcomb. A life-long New Englander, he never strayed far from the Boston, Massachusetts area. He was born in Amesbury, Massachusetts, and studied with Samuel Whitney, the organist at Boston’s Church of the Advent. He never attended college, nor music school, but nevertheless, he taught classes in sacred music and chant at New England Conservatory and Boston University where he briefly held the chair in the 50's. 

His interest in Gregorian chant and High Church liturgies met a happy match when he was appointed organist-choir master at Boston’s Church of St. John the Evangelist in 1910. The church was a mission of the Society of St. John the Evangelist, also known as the "Cowley Fathers" and "Anglican Jesuits", an Anglican monastic order which established a house in Boston in 1870. As an outgrowth of the Oxford movement, the Cowleys were Anglo-Catholics ("High Church") and deeply devoted to social justice setting up their house on the base of Beacon Hill to serve the tenements of the West End. He was one of the earliest proponents of early music (before 1650), and, as a result, his Choir at St. John's was singing plainchant and Renaissance polyphony while the majority of church choirs (and even Cathedral choirs in this country) were still mired in the kind of  late-Victorian preciousness which Titcomb so disdained in choral music. Today, however, Titcomb tends to be known for a handful of works which are popular with volunteer church choirs. One of those is today’s anthem, which has a strong Houston connection.

In 1939, for the centennial of Christ Church, Houston, Titcomb wrote the anthem Behold now, praise the Lord, which he dedicated to Edward B. Gammons, the organist-choirmaster of Christ Church at the time. The text, taken from the first two verses of Psalm 134, was chosen by the rector, Dr. James DeWolfe. This well-known anthem is still frequently performed at the Cathedral.

Behold now, praise the Lord, all ye servants of the Lord.Ye that by night stand in the house of the Lord,even in the courts of the house of our God.Lift up your hands in the sanctuary, and praise the Lord.

Text: Psalm 134:1-2

The Opening voluntary is an improvisation of the familiar hymn-tune, Slane (Be thou my vision), by the organist Gerre Hancock. Hancock was a master of improvisation, and he treats the tune here in a meandering way, relying more on a suggestion of the Irish tune than actually quoting the tune itself. I think it is perfect for an opening voluntary, as it gives the impression of one of the hymns that will be coming up later in the service.

John Weaver in 2005

John Weaver in 1959, age 22

 The closing voluntary is a toccata by the New York organist John Weaver, another giant among the organ world. For 35 years he was organist and director of music at Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York City, while simultaneously serving on as Head of the Organ Department at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia (1972-2003), and Chair of the Organ Department at The Juilliard School (1987-2004). His students perform and teach all over the world. Ken Cowan, organist at Rice University (and Palmer Memorial Episcopal) is a former student of his.
This Toccata was written by him in 1954, when he was 17.