THE PERSONAL CONNECTION - Music for October 30, 2022 + The Twenty-First Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

• I Sought the Lord – David Ashley White
• Good Shepherd, You Know Us – David Ashley White

Instrumental Music

• Suite Gothic Op. 25 – Léon Boëllmann (1862-1897)

1. Introduction – Chorale
2. Menuet Gothique
3. Prière à Notre Dame – Léon Boëllmann
4. Toccata – Léon Boëllmann

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

• Hymn 688  - A mighty fortress is our God (EIN FESTE BURG)
• Hymn - Blessed assurance (ASSURANCE)
• Hymn 301 - Bread of the world, in mercy broken (RENDEZ A DIEU)
• Hymn 607 - O God of every nation (LLANGLOFFAN)
• Psalm 119:137-144 – Tone VIIIa

Today we sing two pieces by the Houston composer David Ashley White with direct connections to Good Shepherd.

I Sought the Lord

25 years ago, when I first came to Good Shepherd, we had a young mother singing in our choir with a toddler. As the dad wasn't a church goer, she would bring the young boy with her to church on Sunday, and he would sit in the loft with us. People in the congregation down below began to look for his round, cherubic face pressed up against the glass which use to be in the choir loft rail. But life happened, and a divorce brought about a move from the suburb of Kingwood to the inner loop of Houston, and thus a move from Good Shepherd to Palmer Memorial. We missed young Thomas' growing up, and his subsequent battle with cancer, but we kept up through our friendship with his mother, Sarah and social media. Thomas won his battle with cancer, but lost his war with depression. He passed away in August of 2017.

Our mutual friend and church musician/composer, David Ashley White, wrote a beautiful anthem which he dedicated to Sarah Emes and her son, Thomas Oldrin. With a text by an anonymous poet, the anthem was premiered by the Palmer choir and published by Selah Publishing Co. in June 2018. Sarah gave copies of the anthem to Good Shepherd so that we, too, could sing in memory of Thomas.

Good Shepherd, You Know Us

When the congregation and choirs of Good Shepherd celebrated my 25th Anniversary at Good Shepherd on September 11, the celebration included a new hymn written for the occasion by David, which was sung by the choir. We've been practicing it to learn the harmonies, and will sing it again this Sunday during communion. 

Most people don’t realize that a hymn has two parts. One is the text. When Pam Nolting asked David about composing something, he immediately suggested a hymn text by one of his favorite writers, Christopher Idle, a priest in the Anglican Church. The text is perfect for our congregation:

Good Shepherd, you know us, you call us by name,

you lead us; we gladly acknowledge your claim.

Your voice has compelled us; we come at your call,

and none you have chosen will finally fall.

Good Shepherd, you warn us of robbers and thieves;

the hireling, the wolf, who destroys and deceives;

all praise for your promise on which we can stand,

that no-one can snatch us from out of your hand.

Good Shepherd, you lay down your life for the sheep;

your love is not fickle, your gift is not cheap.

You spend your life freely, you take it again;

you died, so we live - we are healed by your pain.

At one with the Father, you made yourself known:

'I am the Good Shepherd', at one with your own.

You loved us before we had heeded or heard;

by grace we respond to your life-giving word.

Christopher Idle b.1938, © Christopher Idle/ Jubilate Hymns

The second part of a hymn is the tune, and the tune has its own title. The tune name for this is, appropriately, Good Shepherd, Kingwood. 

Suite Gothique

In a non-liutrgical nod to All Hallows Eve, I am playing the complete Gothic Suite by French composer Léon Boëllmann. Boëllmann was born on September 25, 1862 in Ensisheim on the Upper Rhine. At the age of 9 he left his homeland and entered Louis Niedermeyer's École de Musique classique et religieuse in Paris. Among his teachers and patrons were the well-known organists Gustave Lefèvre and especially Eugène Gigout, who later even adopted him. In 1881 he graduated from the École with a diploma as an organist and another as a cantor, and became an organist at the Church of St. Vincent-de-Paul in Paris. He later got the position of first organist there. After the founding of the École d'orgue et d'improvisation by Gigout, Boëllmann worked simultaneously as an organist at St. Vincent-de-Paul, as a teacher at his adoptive father's school and as a composer. He also worked as a music critic. Léon Boëllmann died on October 11, 1897 at the age of 35.

His best-known work today is the Suite Gothique op. 25, especially the last movement, the Toccata. This four-movement suite opens with the Introduction in C minor, a chorale rendered in an archaic, neo-modal style. This is followed by the Menuet Gothique, a curious mixture of ecclesiatical-liturgical austerity and eighteenth-century elegance: It begins with a C major minuet, which in the running movement takes on increasingly modal traits through the use of flat sevenths in the harmonies. The contrasting middle section develops through a variety of new keys with a merrily ascending motif of broken chords, producing some brief reminiscences of the opening minute before a recapitulation of the first section rounds out the movement. 

The third movement, Prière à Notre Dame , is in A flat major. A recurring sinuous melody in the muted registers exudes a devotional atmosphere. This is answered by three passages based on a romantic progression of harmony in the unrelated keys of D flat major and E major.

The following Toccata in C minor is not without reason the most played movement from this suite. Brilliant manual figurations over a broad pedal theme create great effect. The somewhat macabre pedal theme rises in dotted rhythm to the flattened dominant, turning the harmonies to D flat major for a few bars. In contrast, a rhythmic, syncopated melody rises in the manual, accompanied by the semitone motif that can be heard at the beginning of the movement. Finally, after some repetitions of these elements in different keys, increasing in dynamism and intensity, the coda brings back the opening theme, played in pedal octaves in triple forte – the dynamic and effective climax to close the suite.

Music for November 22, 2020 + Christ the King Sunday, the last Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

• King of Glory, King of Peace – K. Lee Scott (b. 1950) 
• Jade Panares, Soprano

Instrumental Music

• Suite Gothique – Léon Boëllmann (1862-1897)
• Introduction-Choral
• Menuet gothique
• Prière à Notre-Dame
• Toccata
• At the Name of Jesus – arr. Michael Burkhardt (b. 1957)

Since the last Sunday of Pentecost (Advent begins next Sunday!) is called Christ the King Sunday, our solo and the communion voluntary are based on hymns which refers to Christ as King.

The text for the offertory solo is by George Herbert, a Welsh-born poet, orator, and priest of the Church of England who was born on April 3, 1593 at Black Hall in Montgomery, Wales. His family on his father's side was one of the oldest and most powerful in Montgomeryshire, having settled there in the early 13th century and improving and consolidating its status by shrewd marriage settlements and continuous governmental service. 

George Herbert, 1593-1633

His father died when Herbert was three and a half years old so George's mother, Magdalen, who was by all accounts an extraordinary woman, moved the family first to Shropshire, then to Oxford, and then finally to a house at Charing Cross, London to facilitate the education of her ten children. George was tutored at home and then entered Westminster School, probably in 1604, a distinguished grammar school that not only grounded him in the study of Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and music, but also introduced him to Lancelot Andrewes, one of the great churchmen and preachers of the time. From Westminster, Herbert went up to Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1609 and began one of the most important institutional affiliations of his life, one that lasted nearly 20 years.

Herbert wrote much of his poetry during his Cambridge years. He began, auspiciously enough, with a vow, made in a letter accompanying two sonnets sent to his mother as a New Year's gift in 1610, "that my poor Abilities in Poetry, shall be all, and ever consecrated to Gods glory." 

Herbert wrote poetry in English, Latin and Greek. Shortly before his death in 1633, he sent a literary manuscript to Nicholas Ferrar, the founder of a semi-monastic Anglican religious community at Little Gidding, reportedly telling him to publish the poems if he thought they might "turn to the advantage of any dejected poor soul", otherwise to burn them. Later that year all of his English poems were published in The Temple: Sacred Poems and Private Ejaculations. It was so popular that there were at least 11 editions of The Temple in the 17th century alone.

One of the poems which has become most loved is Praise, a seven stanza poem of 4 lines each, which contains the three stanzas which make up the text for today's solo. This hymn has been set to music by many composers. Today's solo, King of Glory, King of Peace,  was written by K. Lee Scott, an American composer born, raised, and still living in Alabama. Scott attended The University of Alabama School of Music, where he has since served as adjunct faculty as well as for Music departments or The University of Alabama at Birmingham and Samford University. 

I am  delighted to have former choir member and staff singer Jade Panares sing for us this day. Jade is a graduate of Atascocita High School and the University of Houston School of Music.

The hymn At the Name of Jesus has been lovingly arranged by Lutheran organist Michael Burkhardt. Listen for an accompaniment that seems to hover above the melody which I will be playing on the oboe. We've put the text in the service leaflet so that you can read the words while listening (since we can't sing in church just yet!)

Music for September 29, 2019

Good Shepherd School Sunday

The Children of the Good Shepherd School

Vocal Music

• Noah’s Ark – Cristi Cary Miller (contemporary)

Instrumental Music

• Trumpet Prelude in D – Johan Helmich Roman (1694 – 1758)
• Sheep May Safely Graze – Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
• Dona Nobis Pacem - Handchimes
• Processional of Joy – Hal H. Hopson (b. 1933)

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

• Hymn 380 - From all that dwells below the skies (OLD 100TH)
• Hymn R-37 - Glorify Your Name
• Hymn - Through North and South  (LAAST UNS ERFREUEN)
• Hymn 711 - Seek ye first the kingdom of God (SEEK YE FIRST)
• Hymn - The Lord is my shepherd (Good Shepherd School Song)
• Hymn 594 - God of grace and God of Glory (CWM RHONDDA)

St. Michael and All Angels

Choral High Mass, 5 p.m..

Vocal Music

• oks Fly Homeward – Arthur Baynon (1889-1954)
• Come, Let Us Join Our Cheerful Songs – Paul Ritchie (b. 1954)
• Here, O My Lord – Eleanor Daley (b. 1955)

Instrumental Music

• Suite Gothique: Prière à Notre Dame– Léon Boëllmann (1862-1897)
• Our Father, Who in Heaven Art – Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
• Suite Gothique: Toccata– Léon Boëllmann

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

• Hymn 618 - Ye watchers and ye holy ones (LAAST UNS ERFREUEN)
• Psalm 103 - Bless the Lord, My Soul (Jacques Berthier)
• Hymn 282 - Christ, the fair glory of the holy angels (CAELITES PLAUDANT)
• Hymn R 75 - Praise the Lord, ye heavens adore him (HYFRYDOL)
• Hymn 324 - Let all mortal flesh keep silence (PICARDY)
• Hymn 307 - Lord, enthroned in heavenly splendor (BRYN CALFARIA)

Guido Reni, St. Michael, c. 1636

Music for Easter - April 21, 2019

Vocal Music

• Achieved Is the Glorious Work – Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
• Magdalena – Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)
• Most Glorious Lord of Life – William H. Harris (1883-1973)

Instrumental Music

• Prelude in D Major, BWV 532 – Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
• Fifth Symphony: Toccata  – Charles-Marie Widor (1844 –1937)
• Prière à Notre-Dame – Léon Böellmann (1862 – 1897)

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

• Hymn 179 - “Welcome, happy morning” (FORTUNATUS)
• Hymn 207 - Jesus Christ is risen today (EASTER HYMN)
• Hymn - Sing with all the saints in glory (HYMN TO JOY)
• Hymn - I come to the garden alone (IN THE GARDEN)
• Hymn 174 - At the Lamb’s high feast we sing (SALZBURG)
• Hymn 193 - That Easter day with joy was bright (PUER NOBIS)
• Hymn 210 - The day of resurrection (DIADEMATA)
• Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24 - setting by Hal Hopson

Just a few notes about the music you will hear on Easter Sunday.

The first anthem is not really an Easter anthem. In fact, it is from Haydn's oratorio The Creation, found at the end of the third part, about the end of the sixth and final day of creation. It is a joyful and celebratory piece, and, as you can see from the text, not at all inappropriate for the service celebrating the Resurrection.

Achieved is the glorious work; The Lord beholds it and is pleased.
In lofty strains let us rejoice, Our song let be the praise of God.

The Offertory anthem is an English anthem by William H. Harris, who for years was organist and choirmaster at St. George's Chapel, Windsor Castle. He  was involved in the musical education of the teenage Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret, while they spent the wartime period at Windsor Castle. The story goes that every Monday he would direct madrigal practice in the Red Drawing Room at Windsor, where the two Princesses sang alongside four of the senior choristers with the lower voices augmented by Etonians, Grenadier Guards and members of the Windsor and Eton Choral Society.

The communion anthem is a four-part acapella setting of a German Folk song by the great Romantic composer Johannes Brahms. It is interesting in that it focuses on Mary Magdalena's part in the resurrection story.

My opening voluntary is the great Prelude in D Major by Johann Sebastion Bach. I like to play it on Easter because it (1) is in the bright, celebratory key of D Major, and (2) it opens with the ascending D major Scale in the pedal, symbolizing (for me) the rising of the Son of God.

I am playing an organ work during communion as a musical dedication to the indomitable spirit of the Notre-Dame de Paris, and the Paris people. Though the title refers not to the church of Notre Dame, and the composer, though French, was never on staff at the Cathedral (he worked down the street at St. Sulpice), I still wanted to do something to express my concern and relief that the fire was not as bad as it could have been.

Music for November 20, 2016 + Christ the King Sunday

Vocal Music

• Christus Factus Est – Felice Anerio (c.1560-1614)
• The Crucifixion – Samuel Barber (1910-1981) Jade Panares, soprano

Instrumental Music

• Organ Concerto in A Minor BWV 593 after Vivaldi RV 522 – J. S. Bach (1685-1750)
• I. Allegro
• II. Adagio
• Menuet Gothique from Suite Gothique, Op.25 – Léon Boëllmann (1862 – 1897)

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

• Hymn 494 - Crown him with many crowns (Diademata)
• Hymn R128 - Blest be the God of Israel (Forest Green)
• Hymn R238 - We will glorify the King of kings (We Will Glorify)
• Hymn 707 - Take my life, and let it be consecrated (Hollingside)
• Hymn R227 - Jesus, remember me (Taizé)
• Hymn 544 - Jesus shall reign where’er the sun (Duke Street)

This week it's Christ the King Sunday! And while you would think that the music would be all about Jesus seated on the throne, or Jesus in the clouds, or even Jesus riding triumphantly into Jerusalem, the vocal music has Jesus on the cross. What gives?

You can blame (?) it on the Lectionary; it chooses the passage from Luke, chapter 23, as the Gospel, where Christ is crucified, and the soldiers mock him, saying, "If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!" There was also an inscription over him, "This is the King of the Jews." One of the thieves also being crucified asks Jesus to remember him, and Jesus tells him that they will be together in paradise. It certainly is a different way to begin one's reign.

So the choir's anthem is a setting in Latin of the verse from the second chapter of Philippians.

Christ was made for us obedient to death—
even death on a cross.
Therefore God exalted Him to the highest place,
and gave Him the name above all names.

It is by the Italian composer Felice Anerio, a composer who came from a family of musicians. His father, Maurizio, was a trombonist at the Oratory of Santa Maria in Vallicella (Rome), and his younger brother, Giovanni Francesco, was a choirmaster and composer. The two brothers sang in the Papal Chapel choir under Giovanni de Pierlugi Palestrina, and when Palestrina died in 1594, Felice was appointed as composer to the Papal Chapel, the only other person to have been so named.

Christus factus est is notable for the striking dissonance of its opening, and for its effective use of suspensions as the main expressive device. This motet, for which Anerio is now most widely known, was not published in his lifetime along with his other sacred works.

The Gospel lesson is also the reason that we are hearing "The Crucifixion" from Samuel Barber's Hermit Songs. (well, that, and the reality that our soprano section leader, Jade Panares, (who is a sophomore voice major at the Moores School of Music at UH) learned it this semester!)

Samuel Barber

Barber was the American composer of whom music critic Donal Henahan said, "Probably no other American composer has ever enjoyed such early, such persistent and such long-lasting acclaim." He wrote a song cycle called Hermit Songs on a grant from the Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge Foundation, using 10 anonymous Irish monastic poems. Soprano Leontyne Price, with the composer at the piano, premiered the cycle on October 30, 1953, at the Library of Congress. They have become a staple of the soprano repertoire ever since.

Here is the text of "The Crucifixion."

At the cry of the first bird
They began to crucify Thee, O Swan!
Never shall lament cease because of that.
It was like the parting of day from night.
Ah, sore was the suffering borne
By the body of Mary's Son,
But sorer still to Him was the grief
Which for His sake
Came upon His Mother.

Music for June 12, 2016

Vocal Music

• Ride On, King Jesus! – Hall Johnson

Instrumental Music

• Suite Gothique III. Prière à Notre-Dame – Léon Boëllmann (1862-1897)
• Suite Gothique IV. Toccata – Léon Boëllmann
• Farewell to Stromness– Peter Maxwell Davies (1934-2016)

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

• Hymn 610 - Lord, whose love through humble service (Blaenafren)
• Hymn 470 - There’s a wideness in God’s mercy (Beecher)
• Hymn 691 - My faith looks up to thee (Olivet)
• Hymn 178 - Alleluia, alleluia! give thanks to the risen Lord (Alleluia No. 1)
• Hymn 410 - Praise, my soul, the King of heaven (Lauda Anima)

We welcome home one of our former staff singers, Allison Gosney, to our worship this morning. She is back in Kingwood after her first year in the graduate program of the Crane School of Music at SUNY Potsdam, studying vocal performance. You will be delighted to hear her singing the spiritual, Ride On, King Jesus, as arranged by Hall Johnson.

Johnson was born in Athens, Georgia, taught himself to play the violin by reading a book about it, moved to New York City where he played in the orchestra of Broadway musicals, and set out to preserve the heritage of the Negro Spiritual. He arranged spirituals for his own ensemble, the Hall Johnson Singers as well as soloists such as the famed Marion Anderson. He also provided the scores for several films, his last being “Cabin in the Sky” in 1943 with Ethel Waters and Lena Horne.

Peter Maxwell Davies

I first heard Farewell to Stromness this Spring when it was played on the radio in honor of the life of Peter Maxwell Davies, the famed conductor and composer who died in March at age 81. The piano piece is one that is not explicitly religious, but when I heard it, all I could imagine were people quietly coming forward to communion. Stromness is a town on the largest island in Orkney, Scotland, which was threatened in the early 1970s when it was discovered that vast uranium deposits were underground. the South of Scotland Electricity Board wanted to mine the uranium to fuel a nuclear power plant. Once the islanders understood the ramifications of mining the island, they (and the Orkney Islands Council) opposed the initiative unilaterally. Davies, who is English, was moved to write The Yellow Cake Revue after a public examiner's report advised the Secretary of State for Scotland to deny the SSEB's request to mine. The first interlude, "Farewell to Stromness", has become one of Davies' most popular pieces, and has been arranged for various instruments.

Music for November 22, 2015 + Christ the King Sunday + The Last Sunday after Pentecost

Vocal Music

• Sing We Merrily Unto God Our Strength – Sidney Campbell (1909-1974)
• O Bone Jesu – attr. Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (16th C.)/probably by Marc'Antonio Ingegneri (1547-1592)

Instrumental Music

• Come, Ye Thankful People, Come – Ron Boud/Don Hustad (20th C.)
• Prelude on Picardy – Sondra Tucker (21st C.)
• Suite Gothique: IV. Tocatta – Léon Boëllmann (19th C.)

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

• Hymn 494    Crown him with many crowns (Diademata)
• Hymn 488    Be thou my vision (Slane)
• Hymn 544    Jesus shall reign where’er the sun (Duke Street)
• Hymn 324    Let all mortal flesh keep silence (Picardy)
• Hymn 598    Lord Christ, when first thou cam’st to earth (Mit Freuden zart)

Today we have two widely different anthems for the last Sunday of the Christian year, Christ the King Sunday, officially known as the last Sunday after Pentecost. The offertory anthem is a mid-century piece by the British composer Sidney Campbell. Campbell was organist and master of the choristers at Canterbury Cathedral when he wrote this piece in 1960 just before going to St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle, where he remained until his death. This anthem features an independent organ accompaniment with much syncopation and a driving rhythm which supports the rather athletic choral part. Several words are set to long melismas (several notes to one syllable), such as God, noise, and merrily.

The second anthem is an Italian renaissance motet O Bone Jesus. This hauntingly simple setting  has often been attributed to Palestrina but is now generally recognized to have been the work of Marc'Antonio Ingegneri, an Italian composer of the late Renaissance. He was close friends with Pope Gregory XIV, who was intimately involved with the reforms of the Counter-Reformation and the Council of Trent, and this influence is present in his music, which usually shows the simplification and clarity of the Palestrina style. His masses are simple, short, and relatively homophonic, often outdoing Palestrina for clarity and simplicity.

The opening voluntary is out of the ordinary for us Anglicans. One of our church members, Jill Kirkonis, retired this past year as organist from First Baptist Church of Porter after a long association with the church. She's since played for us here at Good Shepherd, and she brought an arrangement of the hymn Come, Ye Thankful People, Come to my attention. It was arranged for organ and piano by Don Hustad and Ron Boud. Don Hustad was the long-time organist for the Billy Graham Evangelistic Team, and Ron joined him at the piano in later years. In the small-world category, Ron Boud ended his full-time career as organ professor at Union University in Jackson, Tennessee, the Baptist School in the same town as Lambuth College, where I got my undergraduate degree. His last church job before retirement was at First Presbyterian Church in Jackson, where I had my first church job after leaving SMU.

To further the small world/West Tennessee connection, the Communion Voluntary is a setting of the familiar hymn, Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence for organ and handbells by my friend Sondra Tucker, who now serves as organist at Holy Apostles Episcopal Church in Collierville, TN. Holy Apostles is the church I served before moving to Kingwood.