November 9, 2014

Each week, you may find information here about the organ music and hymns in the traditional worship services at First United Methodist Church in Lewisville, Texas.  Some of this information is original; much of it is "borrowed" from other sources such as Wikipedia, GBOD, and hymnary.org.  It is my hope that this information will enhance your understanding and enrich your worship experience.  

About the Organ Music:

Prelude, from Suite for Worship on “Lancaster” – Robert J. Powell

With the encouragement of his fellow graduating classmates, Ernest W. Shurtleff (1862-1917) wrote this text in 1887 for Andover Theological Seminary's commencement ceremonies. Winning immediate acclaim, the text was published in Shurtleff's Hymns of the Faith that same year. Since that publication it has appeared in many American hymnals.

Graduation is one milestone on our life's journey, a road sign that points to the future as much as it marks the end of formal education. Consequently, "Lead On, O King Eternal" is a battle call to go forward in Christian service. Initially laced with war imagery, the text moves on to biblical imagery-"deeds of love and mercy"-and concludes with a note of eschatological hope. This message is as urgent today as it was a hundred years ago.

Before studying at Andover, Shurtleff attended Harvard University. He served Congregational churches in Ventura, California; Old Plymouth, Massachusetts; and Minneapolis, Minnesota, before moving to Europe. In 1905 he established the American Church in Frankfurt, and in 1906 he moved to Paris, where he was involved in student ministry at the Academy Vitti. During World War I he and his wife were active in refugee relief work in Paris. Shurtleff wrote a number of books, including Poems (1883), Easter Gleams (1885), Song of Hope (1886), and Song on the Waters (1913).

Lead on, O King eternal,
the day of march has come;
henceforth in fields of conquest
your tents will be our home.
Through days of preparation
your grace has made us strong;
and now, O King eternal,
we lift our battle song.

Lead on, O King eternal,
till sin's fierce war shall cease,
and holiness shall whisper
the sweet amen of peace.
For not with swords' loud clashing
or roll of stirring drums
with deeds of love and mercy
the heavenly kingdom comes.

Robert Powell (b. 1932) is an American composer, organist, and choir director.  Powell earned a Bachelor of Music degree from Louisiana State University with a focus on organ and composition. He studied with Alec Wyton at Union Theological Seminary in New York, and he was also Wyton's assistant at The Episcopal Cathedral of Saint John the Divine. For three years (1965–1968), he served St. Paul's School (Concord, New Hampshire) as Director of Music. Later, Powell was Director of Music and Organist of Christ Church (Episcopal) of Greenville, South Carolina from 1968 to 2003. He has composed in nearly all genres common to church music, including anthems, service music, hymn concertatos, organ music, music for handbell choir, and large-scale oratorios. His publications appear in The Hymnal 1982 as well as in the catalogs of most of the significant American publishers of church music. According to publisher GIA, Powell is "a composer whose output bridges denominational boundaries and who is able to serve the larger Church. He has made ecumenical sharing a reality–-and always with a genteel touch."  Powell is an active member of the Association of Anglican Musicians and is a Fellow of the American Guild of Organists.

I Love to Tell the Story – Emma Lou Diemer

"I Love to Tell the Story" is one of two hymn texts derived from a long poem on the life of Christ written by A. (Annabelle) Catherine Hankey (1834-1911) in 1866. Hankey wrote the poem during a long period of convalescence following a serious illness. The first part of the poem, 'The Story Wanted," is the source of the children's gospel song "Tell Me the Old, Old Story," while the second part, "The Story Told," contains this text. Beginning in 1866, different versions of the full poem were printed in various publications. This hymn text, with the tune HANKEY and a refrain written by William G. Fischer, were published in Joyful Songs (1869).

The Psalter Hymnal includes only the original stanzas 1, 3, and 4, but the entire original poem provides a fine autobiographical testimony to Hankey's evangelical fervor, which she expressed in her writings and in her support of foreign and home missions (she taught church school classes to the rich and poor of London). The text simply affirms the Christian's zeal to "tell the old, old story of Jesus and his love" to the unsaved as well as to the saved, here on earth and in glory.

Hankey was the daughter of a wealthy banker and was associated with the Clapham sect of William Wilberforce, a group of prominent evangelical Anglicans from the Clapham area. This group helped to establish the British and Foreign Bible Society, promoted the abolition of slavery, and was involved in improving the lot of England's working classes. Hankey taught Bible classes for shop girls in London, visited the sick in local hospitals, and used the proceeds of her writings to support various mission causes. Her publications include Heart to Heart (1870) and The Old, Old Story and Other Verses (1879).

I love to tell the story
Of unseen things above,
Of Jesus and His glory,
Of Jesus and his love.
I love to tell the story,
Because I know its true;
It satisfies my longings
As nothing else would do.
I love to tell the story,
'Twill be my theme in glory
To tell the old, old story
Of Jesus and His love.

Emma Lou Diemer was born in Kansas City, Missouri, on November 24, 1927. Her father, George Willis Diemer, was an educator (college president); her mother, Myrtle Casebolt Diemer, was a church worker and homemaker.  Emma Lou played the piano and composed at a very early age and became organist in her church at age 13. Her great interest in composing music continued through College High School in Warrensburg, MO, and she majored in composition at the Yale Music School (BM, 1949; MM, 1950) and at the Eastman School of Music (Ph.D, 1960). She studied in Brussels, Belgium on a Fulbright Scholarship and spent two summers of composition study at the Berkshire Music Center.

She taught in several colleges and was organist at several churches in the Kansas City area during the 1950s. From 1959-61 she was composer-in-residence in the Arlington, VA schools under the Ford Foundation Young Composers Project, and composed many choral and instrumental works for the schools, a number of which are still in publication. She was consultant for the MENC Contemporary Music Project before joining the faculty of the University of Maryland where she taught composition and theory from 1965-70. In 1971 she moved from the East Coast to teach composition and theory at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she was instrumental in founding the electronic/computer music program.

Through the years she has fulfilled many commissions (orchestral, chamber ensemble, keyboard, choral, vocal) from schools, churches, and professional organizations. Most of her works are published. She has received awards from Yale University (Certificate of Merit), The Eastman School of Music (Edward Benjamin Award), the National Endowment for the Arts (electronic music project), Mu Phi Epsilon (Certificate of Merit), the Kennedy Center Friedheim Awards (for piano concerto), the American Guild of Organists (Composer of the Year), the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers/ASCAP (annually since 1962 for performances and publications), the Santa Barbara Symphony (composer-in-residence, 1990-92), the University of Central Missouri (honorary doctorate), and many others.

Oh, For a Thousand Tongues to Sing – Paul Manz

Paul Manz (1919 – 2009), was an American composer for choir and organ. His most famous choral work is the Advent motet "E'en So, Lord Jesus, Quickly Come", which has been performed at the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols at King's College, Cambridge. His most famous organ works are his volumes of neo-Baroque chorale preludes and partitas. Paul Manz long served the church as recitalist, composer, teacher and leader in worship. He was the director of the newly established Paul Manz Institute of Church Music, and was Professor Emeritus of Church Music at Christ Seminary Seminex at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago.

Paul Manz concertized extensively in North America.  As a performer, Manz was most famous for his celebrated hymn festivals. Instead of playing traditional organ recitals, Manz would generally lead a "festival" of hymns from the organ, in which he introduced each hymn an organ improvisation based on the hymn tune in question. The congregation would then sing the hymn with his accompaniment. Many volumes of these improvisations have been written out and published and are played by church organists throughout the world.

The esteem and respect with which Paul Manz is regarded can be seen in the many honors he received. He was twice named one of the “Ten Most Influential Lutherans,” served as National Councilor of the American Guild of Organists and is listed as one of the “101 Most Notable Organists of the 20th Century.”  The Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago presented him with the distinguished "Confessor of Christ Award"; The Chicago Bible Society presented him with the “Gutenberg Award; and the Lutheran Institute of Washington, DC honored him with the first “Wittenberg Arts Award.”

About the Choral Music:

We are Called to Proclaim – John Purifoy

John Purifoy (b. 1952) is a composer and arranger with numerous published choral cantatas, anthems and keyboard collections. His stage musical "Lambarene," based on the life of Dr. Albert Schweitzer, received workshop productions at the state theatre of New Jersey and the North Shore Musical Theater near Boston.  Mr. Purifoy served as editor and director of music publishing for Word, Inc. from 1975-1982. He is the recipient of the Freedom’s Foundation Award and five-time recipient of the ASCAP Standard Award. 

“We are Called to Proclaim” was written for the 25^th anniversary of St. John’s Lutheran Church in Waukesha, Wisconsin, and is based on Luke 4: 18-19.

            The spirit of the Lord is upon me,

            He has called me to preach good news to the poor.

            He has called me to proclaim now the freedom

            For all who are captive, For all broken hearted,

            Recovery of sight for the blind, release for those oppressed,

            To proclaim now the favor of the Lord!

            We are called to proclaim now the favor of the Lord.

            We are called in His name to help the sick and poor,

            To tell now of the freedom that has come to all the earth.

            With His Spirit now upon us we are called to proclaim!

            We are called to proclaim and to set the captive free

            By the power of One who came to make our blind eyes see.

            His kingdom lies within us.  Let peace and justice reign.

            By the truth of God within us we are called to proclaim!

About the Hymns:

O For a Thousand Tongues to Sing

Charles Wesley was suffering a bout of pleurisy in May, 1738, while he and his brother John were studying under the Moravian scholar Peter Böhler in London. At the time, Wesley was plagued by extreme doubts about his faith. Taken to bed with the sickness on May 21 Wesley was attended by a group of Christians who offered him testimony and basic care, and he was deeply affected by this. He read from his Bible and found himself deeply affected by the words, and at peace with God. Shortly his strength began to return. He wrote of this experience in his journal and counted it as a renewal of his faith; when his brother John had a similar experience on the 24th, the two men met and sang a hymn Wesley had written in praise of his renewal.

One year from the experience, Wesley was taken with the urge to write another hymn, this one in commemoration of his renewal of faith. This hymn took the form of an 18-stanza poem, beginning with the opening lines 'Glory to God, and praise, and love,/Be ever, ever given' and was published in 1740 and entitled 'For the anniversary day of one's conversion'. The seventh verse, which begins, 'O for a thousand tongues to sing', and which now is invariably the first verse of a shorter hymn, recalls the words of Peter Böhler who said, 'Had I a thousand tongues I would praise Him with them all.' The hymn was placed first in John Wesley's A Collection of Hymns for the People Called Methodists published in 1780. It appeared first in every (Wesleyan) Methodist hymnal from that time until the publication of Hymns and Psalms in 1983.

We Will Follow

“We Will Follow” has been arranged and translated from the traditional Zulu, “Somlandela, somlandel’ uJesu” by Dean McIntyre.

Go Make of All Disciples

Leon McKinley Adkins (1896-1986) was a Methodist pastor, serving congregations between 1921-1955, and an administrator, serving at the Board of Education of the Methodist Church in Nashville from 1955-1966.  His hymn, “Go Make of All Disciples” was first sung at the commissioning of teachers and church school officials during Christian Education Week, 1955, at University Methodist Church, Syracuse, where the author was pastor.  The hymn was printed in the February 1956 issue of Church School and first appeared in a hymnal in the 1966 Book of Hymns.  This hymn begins with the Great Commission: “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, unto the end of the world. Amen.”