GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD Music for March 5, 2023 + The Second Sunday in Lent

Vocal Music

• God So Loved the World – John Stainer (1840-1901)

Instrumental Music

• Jesus, meine Zuversicht – Gerald Near (b. 1942)
• Suite for Organ: III. Aria – Philip E. Baker (b. 1934)
• Aus Tiefer Not – Gerald Near

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 (THE GIFT OF LOVE)
• Hymn 143 The glory of these forty days (ERHALT UNS, HERR)
• Hymn 691 My faith looks up to thee (OLIVET)
• Hymn R231 How blessed are you (Taizé)
• Hymn 473 Lift high the cross (CRUCIFER)
• Psalm 121 – tone IIa

God So Loved the World

The Gospel reading this week is one of the most familiar pieces of scripture in the world. It sums up the Gospel message - "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son, that whoso believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." I felt called to once again use the familiar anthem by John Stainer, from his famous oratorio, The Crucifixion, as our offertory anthem today. Stainer had been the organist-choir master at St. Paul's, London in the late 1800s and wrote a large amount of organ and choral music, as well as a popular treatise on organ playing.

The Crucifixion: A Meditation on the Sacred Passion of the Holy Redeemer. The work is dedicated "to my pupil and friend W. Hodge and the choir of Marylebone Church", who first performed it on 24 February 1887, the day after Ash Wednesday. There have been performances in Marylebone Church annually since then, and has been recorded several times.

Despite the popularity of God So Loved the World, critical opinion of the entire oratorio has not been kind. The composer Ernest Walker dismissed the work, writing in 1924 that "Musicians today have no use for The Crucifixion". Edmund Fellowes said: "It suffers primarily from the extreme poverty, not to say triviality, of the musical ideas dealing with a subject which should make the highest demand for dignity of treatment". Kenneth Long said that Stainer had a libretto "which for sheer banality and naïveté would be hard to beat". Stainer himself characterized his work as "rubbish."

Gerald Near

American composer Gerald Near is a composer with broad appeal to musicians in all liturgical denominations. With an extensive catalogue of compositions, he has added to the literature of organists, harpsichordists, and choirs. He is particularly adept at writing organ music based on hymn-tunes and chant-tunes. I play two such works today, using tunes appropriate for Lent, but not so well known to our congregation.

The first is the communion hymn, Let thy blood in mercy poured, found at hymn 313. The closing voluntary is a setting of the hymn 151, From deepest woe I cry to thee. Both tunes are German Chorale tunes. Both settings feature the melody played in the left hand using the trumpet stop, while the right hand and feet use fragments of the melody to provide the accompaniment. Of the two tunes, AUS TIEFER NOT is the most famous. Both the text and tune were written by Martin Luther in 1524 as a paraphrase of Psalm 130. Since then, the tune has been used by many musicians, most notably J. S. Bach, Felix Mendelssohn, and Max Reger. Georg Friedrich Handel quoted the characteristic intervals from the beginning of the chorale's tune several times at the end of the last aria of his oratorio Messiah, If God be for us, leading into the final chorus Worthy is the Lamb

Aria

The communion voluntary is by Philip Baker, organist and composer who was director of music at Highland Park United Methodist Church in Dallas for many years, including those I spent at Southern Methodist University working on my masters. His Suite for Organ was published just before I moved to Dallas, and it includes one of the loveliest melodies of all time, and one of my personal favorite organ pieces to play, Aria. 

Since retiring from active music making, he and his wife Tissa have moved to Houston.

LORD, HAVE MERCY Music for February 26, 2023 + The First Sunday of Lent

Vocal Music

• Wilt Thou Forgive That Sin – John Hilton (1599-1657), Peter Crisafulli, arr.

Instrumental Music

• Prelude in E Minor, Op. 28, No. 4, – Frédéric François Chopin (1810 –1849)
• Sarabande in d minor – George Frederic Handel (1685-1759)
• Ein Feste Burg Ist Unser Gott – Johann Pachelbel (1653-1706)

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

• Hymn 142 Lord, who throughout these forty days (ST. FLAVIAN)
• Hymn 143 The glory of these forty days (ERHALT UNS, HERR)
• Hymn R 172 In our lives, Lord, be glorified (LORD, BE GLORIFIED)
• Hymn R107 You are my hiding place (HIDING PLACE)
• Hymn 688 A mighty fortress is our God (EIN FESTE BURG)
• Psalm 99 – Tone IIa

Yes, it’s that time of year again, when our liturgical actions change to reflect the meaning and purpose of Lent. And the music changes, too. A time of penitence and quiet reflection cannot embrace music that jumps for joy and is all “happy-clappy!” The organ becomes quieter (or drops out all-together), the service music changes to include a Kyrie (Lord, Have Mercy) and Agnus Dei (Jesus, Lamb of God.)

John Donne

Wilt Thou Forgive That Sin

The choir sings an anthem that certainly supports the penitential mood. Hymn 140 in our hymnal is not known to our congregation, so it makes a perfect anthem. It's text is from the poem A Hymn to God the Father by the English Renaissance writer John Donne. If you don't have a hymnal nearby, you can read the entire poem here. You can see that Donne was convicted of his sin.

The music is by John Hilton, an English composer, who was organist and lay clerk at St Margaret's Westminster from 1628 to 1644 and was buried in the church in 1657. He was the son of John (died 1608) who was organist and composer at Trinity College in that city. John junior graduated from that college in 1626 and leased a house from the Dean and Chapter of Westminster in the Almonry, near the Abbey. He was also a lutenist to Charles I. He ceased to be organist as Parliamentary forces ordered organs to be removed from churches and psalms to be said, not chanted.

John Hilton

This hymn has been arranged for quartet in Elizabethan style by the American Composer Peter Crisafulli. Born and raised in Evanston, Illinois, in 1946, Crisafulli earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music from Northwestern University. His musical formation in the service of the church began at age seven as a chorister in the Men and Boys Choir of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Evanston. He has been serving as Minister of Music at All Saints Episcopal Church in Chevy Chase, Maryland, since 1988. Many of his compositions were written for All Saints Church. 

Prelude in E Minor

Frédéric Chopin wrote a number of preludes for piano solo. His cycle of 24 Preludes, Op. 28, covers all major and minor keys. The Prélude Op. 28, No. 4, by Frédéric Chopin, is considered by many to be one of the most famous of the Chopin preludes. By Chopin's request, the piece was played at his own funeral by Franz Liszt on a pipe organ. (I'll be using the piano, as originally planned.)

The famous German conductor and pianist Hans von Bülow called the prélude "suffocation", due to its sense of despair. In fact, Chopin's last dynamic marking in the piece is smorzando, which means "dying away". But the prelude may have once been given a title. According to George Sand's daughter Solange, who stayed with the composer at the monastery in Majorca when the preludes were written, "My mother gave a title to each of Chopin’s wonderful Preludes; these titles have been preserved on a score he gave to us." That titled score is lost. But Solange did record the names of the preludes, apparently without assigning the names to the prelude numbers. It is believed that the title "Quelles larmes au fond du cloître humide?" ("What tears (are shed) from the depths of the damp monastery?") corresponds to Prelude No. 4.

TRANSFIGURED Music for the Last Sunday after the Epiphany + February 19, 2023

Vocal Music

• Christ, Upon the Mountain Stands – Robert W. Lehman (b. 1960)

Instrumental Music

• Andante from Grand Piece Symphonique – César Franck (1822-1890)
• Beautiful Savior – Thomas Keesecker (b. 1956)
• Toccata – Theodore Dubois (1837-1924)

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

• Hymn 427 When morning gilds the skies (LAUDES DOMINI)
• Hymn 383 Fairest Lord Jesus (ST. ELIZABETH)
• Hymn 135 Songs of thankfulness and praise (SALZBURG)
• Hymn R201 Be still, for the Spirit of the Lord (BE STILL)
• Hymn R247 Lord, the light of your love is shining (SHINE, JESUS, SHINE)
• Psalm 99 – (simplified Anglican chant by Jerome Meachan)

On this last Sunday before Lent begins, we remember the Transfiguration of Christ, when Elijah and Moses appeared with Jesus on the mountain. Rob Lehman, recently retired from The Church of St. Michael & St. George in St. Louis, Missouri as Organist and Choirmaster, wrote Christ Upon the Mountain Stands for Transfiguration using a text by fellow musician Mark Schweitzer. 

Music for February 12, 2023 + The Sixth Sunday after the Epiphany

Vocal Music

Teach Me, O Lord – Thomas Attwood

Instrumental Music

Liebster Jesu, wir sind hier  – Johann Sebastian Bach, BWV 731 (1685-1750)

Partita "Wer nur den lieben Gott lässt walten" – Georg Böhm (1661-1733):

Prelude in D Major, BWV 925 – Johann Sebastian Bach

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

Hymn 440 Blessed Jesus, at thy word (LIESTER JESU)

Hymn 635 If thou but suffer God to guide thee (WER NUR DEN LIEBEN GOTT)

Hymn R 115 God’s Holy ways are true and just (LAAST UNS ERFREUEN)

Hymn I will trust in the Lord (NEGRO SPIRITUAL)

Hymn R291 Go forth for God; go to the world in peace (GENEVA 124)

Psalm 119:1-8– (simplified Anglican chant by Jerome Meachan)

Teach Me, O Lord

Today's lesson from the Old Testament we hear this promise from God: If you obey my commandments and statutes, I will bless you with life. In today's Gospel reading, Jesus talks about a few of these commandments, and sheds new light on them.  

It is fitting that the psalm appointed for today is Psalm 119, the longest Psalm, which focuses on our love for the commandments (laws) of God. Psalm 119 begins "Happy are they whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord!"

It's because of this thought that I chose today’s anthem with text from Psalm 119, a simple, direct rendering of the words "Teach me, O Lord, the way of thy statutes." It was written by English composer and musician Thomas Attwood, who was very active in the musical life of England, holding posts as chamber musician to the Prince of Wales, organist of St. Paul’s Cathedral, composer to the Chapel Royal and professor at the Royal Academy of Music.  His choral works, now mostly forgotten and seldom performed, reveal the influence of his teacher Mozart.

Liebster Jesu, wir sind hier

This elegant little piece by Bach is one of his miscellaneous chorales, meaning it is not found in any collection of his, and some scholars (i.e. Hermann Keller) even cast doubt on its authenticity. Regardless, I find it a charming setting of today's opening hymn, a beautiful little three-stanza poem which asks for guidance and light to lead us out of obscurity. Such a request arises out of humility and calls for a meditative setting is an apt vehicle for the petition. If it is indeed by Bach, it is probably from his early Arnstadt period.

 Does this piece sound familiar, but not on the organ? That’s very possible. This early chorale arrangement is on the Bach Album by The Swingle Singers, who had a smash hit in 1963 with their LP of jazzed up instrumental music by Bach, sung a capella. Here is a link to a recording: 

https://youtu.be/V_3rBUXAph8

Prelude in D Major

This is another spurious composition by J. S. Bach. It is found in Klavierbüchlein für Wilhelm Friedemann Bach (Bach's original spelling: Clavier-Büchlein vor Wilhelm Friedemann Bach) is a collection of keyboard music compiled by the German Baroque composer Johann Sebastian Bach for his eldest son and second child, Wilhelm Friedemann. 

Although numbers 1, 2, 4 and 5 in the notebook were undoubtedly composed by J S Bach himself, it is possible that this prelude was actually written by W F Bach sometime in the 1720s, under the guidance of his father.

The music would originally have been played on harpsichord or on clavichord.

Music for February 5, 2023 + The Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany

Vocal Music

• The Mind of Christ – K. Lee Scott (b. 1950)

Instrumental Music

• Dialogue en trio du Cornet et de la Tierce – François Couperin (1668-1733)
• Sonata 51: Cantabile – Domenico Scarlatti (1685-1757)
• Dialogue sur les Grands jeux – François Couperin

Congregational Music (all hymns from The Hymnal 1982 with the exception of "This Little Light" which is from Lift Every Voice and Sing II.)

• Hymn 7 Christ, whose glory fills the skies (RATISBON)
• Hymn 488 Be thou my vision (SLANE)
• Hymn 380 From all that dwell below the skies (OLD HUNDREDTH)
• Hymn This little light of mine (African-American Spiritual)
• Hymn 381 Thy strong word did cleave the darkness (TONY-Y-BOTEL)
• Psalm 112 Beatus vir - (simplified Anglican chant by Jerome Meachan)

The Mind of Christ

Birmingham, Alabama composer Lee Scott has taken the hymn "May the mind of Christ, my Savior" and set it to the tune BATTY for a lovely anthem.  The text is called a "catalog" hymn, which list different things the believer asks: "May the mind of Christ," the "word of God," the "peace of God," and the "love of Jesus." The hymn was first published in the London children's hymnbook Golden Bells (1925) and has gained popularity in recent hymnals.

This text is attributed to Kate Barclay Wilkinson, an English woman from the turn of the 20th century. Little is known about Wilkinson's life: a member of the Church of England, she was involved in a ministry to girls in London and a participant in the Keswick Convention Movement. She was married to Frederick Barclay Wilkinson.

The tune is a Moravian melody by the German composer Johann Christoph Kühnau

Organ Voluntaries

All the organ music for the morning comes from Messe pour les paroisses by the French Baroque composer François Couperin. This music was written to be performed during the Mass, alternating with the choir. In this so-called alternatim practice,  the organist plays when texts would otherwise have been sung. a term which indicates a type of liturgy where alternate sections of the Mass were performed by different forces. 

Today's movements all come from the second part of the mass, the Gloria. The titles have nothing to do with text, but with musical form; the Dialogue en trio du Cornet et de la Tierce is a three-part piece with the Cornet (Kor-nay) playing against the tierce, a mutation stop of 1-3/5' on the manuals, supporting the fifth harmonic, sounding approximately an E when played from a C key, seventeen scale steps higher. It is always played with a flute of the 8' pitch. The Dialogue sur les Grands jeux features each division of the organ (each different keyboard) in their full glory playing in dialogue with each other.

François Couperin, the most important member of the renowned Couperin dynasty, is the foremost composer of the French Baroque. A prodigiously talented keyboard player, he inherited the post of organist at the church of St Gervais in Paris when he was just eleven years old, subsequently dividing his time between the capital and Versailles upon becoming organiste du Roi in 1693. 

MID CENTURY MODERNS Music for January 29, 2023 + The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany

Vocal Music

• Servants of Peace – K. Lee Scott (b. 1950)

Instrumental Music

• Suite Liturgique Entrée: – Denis Bédard (b. 1950)
• Suite Liturgique:Communion – Denis Bédard
• Suite Liturgique: Sortie – Denis Bédard

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

• Hymn 47 – On this day, the first of days (GOTT SEI DANK)
• Hymn 441 - In the cross of Christ I glory (RATHBUN)
• Hymn 135 - Songs of thankfulness and praise (SALZBURG)
• Hymn R127 – Blest are they (BLEST ARE THEY)
• Hymn R258 – To God be the glory (TO GOD BE THE GLORY)
• Psalm 15 - Domine, quis habitabit? (simplified Anglican Chant)

Today I feature music by two North American composers both born in 1950

Servants of Peace

A contemporary setting of the traditional prayer attributed to St. Francis of Assisi is the text of the anthem this Sunday, which is a perfect match for the readings this week. (Micah 6:1-8 and the Beatitudes.) The  Prayer of St. Francis is a famous prayer which first appeared around the year 1915 A.D., and which embodies the spirit of St. Francis of Assisi's simplicity and poverty.

According to Father Kajetan Esser, OFM, the author of the critical edition of St. Francis's Writings, the Peace Prayer of St. Francis is most certainly not one of the writings of St. Francis. According to Father Schulz, this prayer first appeared during the First World War. It was found written on the back of a holy card of St. Francis. The prayer bore no name; but in the English speaking world, on account of this holy card, it came to be called the Peace Prayer of St. Francis.

The music is by Alabama native K. Lee Scott. He is widely known throughout the United States as a conductor and composer of choral music. His more than 250 published compositions, arrangements, and editions are represented in the catalogues of 15 publishing companies. In addition to many choral works, he has written an opera and has published works for organ, solo voice, and brass.

A graduate of the University of Alabama School of Music with two degrees in choral music under the tutelage of Frederick Prentice, Scott has served as an adjunct faculty member at both the University of Alabama School of Music and the University of Alabama at Birmingham Department of Music. His appearances as guest conductor and clinician have taken him throughout the United States, to Canada, and Africa. 

Suite Liturgique 

All of today's organ music is from a Suite by the Canadian composer Denis Bédard. He has composed more than 170 works, including chamber music, orchestral and vocal music and many organ works. He has received commissions from Radio-Canada, the CBC, the Québec Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Canadian College of Organists and various professional musicians in Canada, England, France, Switzerland and the U.S. 

He studied first at the Conservatoire de musique du Québec in his hometown of Québec, before going to Europe to pursue studies in Paris with André Isoir (organ) and Laurence Boulay (harpsichord) and in the Netherlands to study piano, harpsichord, and organ with Gustav Leonhardt.

For 20 years he was organist and music director of Holy Rosary Cathedral in Vancouver, B.C. until his retirement in 2021.

The three movements I have chosen from the suite include the opening (Entrée), the commion voluntary (Communion) and the closing piece (Sortie)

CONFIRMED: Music for January 22, 2023 + The Third Sunday after the Epiphany

Vocal Music

• Dear Lord and Father of Mankind – Charles Hubert Hastings Parry (1848 – 1918)

Instrumental Music

• Andante Moderato in C Minor – Frank Bridge (1879-1941)
• Prelude on “Kelvingrove” – Charles Callahan (b. 1951)
• Allegro con spirito in B-flat Major – Frank Bridge

Congregational Music (all hymns from The Hymnal 1982 with the exception of Will You Come and Follow Me which is from other sources.)

• Hymn 390 - Praise to the Lord, the Almighty (LOBE DEN HERRN)
• Hymn 381 - Thy strong word did cleave the darkness (TONY-Y-BOTEL)
• Hymn 513 - Like the murmur of the dove’s song (BRIDEGROOM)
• Hymn 135 - Songs of thankfulness and praise (SALZBURG)
• Hymn – Will you come and follow me? (KELVINGROVE)
• Hymn 530 - Spread, O spread, thou mighty word (GOTT SEI DANK)
• Psalm 27:1, 5-13 - Dominus illuminatio (simplified Anglican Chant)

Dear Lord and Father of Mankind

The choir sings one of our favorite anthems this Sunday, the beautiful Dear Lord and Father of Mankind by the British composer Charles Hubert Hastings Parry. This hymn, now one of England’s favorites, began life as the ballad of Meshullemeth (‘Long since in Egypt’s plenteous land’) in Act I of Judith, Parry's oratorio of 1888. It was only after Parry’s death that permission was granted by Novello and Parry’s estate to allow George Gilbert Stocks, the head of music at Repton School, to adapt the music to this text for the school’s hymn book, at which time the melody became known as REPTON.  It was also published in 1941 as the hymn-anthem (which we are singing today) in which much of the original music of the aria was restored.

Ironically, the author of this beautiful and much-loved hymn deeply disapproved of singing in church. John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-92) was an American Quaker who firmly believed that God was best worshipped in silent meditation and who deplored the histrionics associated with both the High Church and the Evangelical movement.

He did, however, allow these verses to be used in a hymn book published in 1884. They are drawn from an interlude in his long and eccentric poem called The Brewing of Soma, which describes in shocked terms the Vedic Hindu habit of drinking hallucinogenic concoctions as a way of whipping up religious enthusiasm. Michael Hawn, professor of sacred music at Perkins School of Theology at SMU, tell's of the hymn's origins here.

Whittier advocated waiting instead for "the still small voice of calm" – an injunction beautifully suggested in the climax to this tune composed by Parry.

Parry was head of the Royal College of Music from 1895 until his death at age 70 in 1918. His 1916 composition, Jerusalem (And did those feet in ancient times), is belted out at sports events and is often called the unofficial English national anthem. 

Prelude on "Kelvingrove"

If you read my blog last week, you might remember that I played an organ setting of this same tune. Even though we weren't singing the hymn, I chose it to go along with the Gospel story of Jesus calling his first disciples. Imagine my surprise (and delight) when Father Bill used the text of that hymn in his sermon, recalling how this hymn was popular with young people in the days when he was working with youth. 

Since the Gospel this week continues the story of Jesus calling his disciples, I decided to include that hymn as a piano voluntary as well as a congregational hymn during communion. The piano voluntary is by Charles Callahan, a native of Cambridge, Massachusetts who is well-known as an award-winning composer, organist, choral conductor, pianist, and teacher. He is a graduate of The Curtis Institute of Music, Philadelphia, Pa., and The Catholic University of America, Washington, DC.

Frank Bridge

The opening and closing voluntaries are organ works by Frank Bridge, an English composer, violist and conductor of the first half of the twentieth century. Underappreciated, underplayed, and still little known even in his native England, Bridge is most frequently recognized today as the teacher of the young Benjamin Britten, who acknowledged his teacher's influence in a popular early work, Variations on a Theme by Frank Bridge.

Although he was not an organist, nor personally associated with music of the English Church, his short pieces for organ have been among the most performed of all his output. This Sunday I will play two of them,  the Andante Moderato in C Minor and Allegro con spirito in B-flat Major. I have to say that I was surprised to learn he had no training as an organist, for his organ works are highly idiomatic for the instrument, and fit under the hands (and feet!) very comfortably.