Each week, you may find information here about the
music 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.
It is widely thought that music is forbidden in Islam.
Scholars cite hadith, or sayings of the Prophet Muhammad, to state that
certain types of music distract from worship, and that music is a source of
temptation that leads to committing other excesses and sins. Others, however,
cite hadith showing that the Prophet Muhammad did permit singing, as
long as the purpose of the song itself is beneficial, and the words used in the
song fall within the range of permitted speech.
Recitation of the
Qur’an beautifies the words through tone, rhythm, and the shaping of the words.
The living Qur’an is not only or primarily the written word. The Qur’an is
first of all the recited word of God -- sounded with perfection and beauty that
equals the most magnificent calligraphy. There are numerous styles of
recitation that trace their origin to the teaching of Muhammad, in a direct
line to the present, passed down the ages through many masters.
Music
offers an interesting example of the intersections and differences between
religious beliefs and culture in Muslim societies. Whatever religious scholars
may have said about musical expression, every cultural and ethnic group now
counted among the Muslims of the world has its musical traditions and
expressions. These traditions have been
adapted to Islamic ideals, incorporating spiritual ideas and celebrating
Islamic themes. They have become part of Islamic rites of passage and events
such as marriages, births, and festivals. Many groups have brought their native
musical instruments into the culture and retained them, as well as passing them
on to others. Drums and other rhythm instruments, plucked and bowed stringed
instruments, and horns and flutes, are found among the musical traditions and
folk arts of Muslim peoples. The common thread of the art of the human
voice runs through Arabic and other languages such as Persian, Turkish, Urdu,
and hundreds of other Asian, African, and European languages.
Instrumental
music is never used in Islamic worship, but Muslim composers have written vocal
and instrumental music inspired by the ideals and practices of Islam. The styles of these works are as varied as
their countries of origin.
The Call to Prayer
(Allah! Hu Akbar!) – Irish Traditional
The organizational history of Islam in Ireland is
complex, not least because of the immense variety of ethnic backgrounds of
Irish Muslims. The first Islamic Society in Ireland was established in 1959. It
was formed by students studying in Ireland and was called the Dublin Islamic
Society (later called the Islamic Foundation of Ireland). In 1976 the first
mosque and Islamic Centre in Ireland was opened. In 1981 the Ministry of
Endowment and Islamic Affairs of Kuwait
sponsored a full-time Imam for the Mosque. In
1992, Moosajee Bhamjee became the first (and
to date only) Muslim Teachta Dála (Member of Irish Parliament).
“The Call to
Prayer” is not an actual sung prayer call at the beginning of worship, but
rather a folk song about the importance of prayer to life in Islam.
I hear a cry in the silent
night. Here the dawn breaks cold and
grey;
It fills my soul with strange
delight, Though it sounds so far away.
Again ‘tis heard at the noontide
hour When Nature’s bright and gay
It seems that bird and tree and
flower Burst forth in roundelay.
Again I hear it as day declines And
the laborer’s task is over!
Its echoes stir the lofty pines And
above the city’s roar.
When the sun goes down ‘tis heard again
When the weary seek their rest,
When clouds fly past, and a sound of
rain Comes sobbing from the west.
By night and day, by eve and morn,
The call rings in mine ears:
It can admonish, it can warn, Can
rouse, or calm our fears.
Allah, Hu Akbar! Comes the
call. Allah, Hu Akbar, there!
Allah, Hu Akbur, one and all Ye
faithful come to prayer!
Lied und Tanze – Otto Stoll
Otto Stoll
(1889-1968) was born in Weisenbach,
Germany, of a family that had been the organists and village schoolmasters of
the area for many generations. He
studied keyboard and composition with his uncle. He attended Koniglichen Akademie der Kunste
in Berlin. He became a professer of music
in Weilbueg. His teaching and composing
was cut short by Parkinson’s disease.
In 1897, Sergei Gavrilovich Rybakov published a
collection of songs and dance of the Uralic Moslems. These melodies intrigued Stoll, who wrote choral
works, songs, chamber music, and piano pieces using motives and melodies from
these songs. This “Lied und Tanze” (song and dance) is found in “Musik und
Lieder der uralischen Muselmanen” (Music and Songs of the Muslims of the Ural
Mountains).
Andalusian Dance –
Paolo La Villa
Al-Andalus, also known as Muslim Spain or Islamic Iberia, was a medieval Muslim cultural domain and territory occupying at its
peak most of what are today Spain and Portugal. At its greatest geographical extent, in the eighth century, southern
France—Septimania—was briefly under its control. The name more
generally describes parts of the Iberian Peninsula governed by Muslims (given the generic name
of Moors) at various times between 711 and 1492. Rule under these kingdoms saw a rise in
cultural exchange and cooperation between Muslims and Christians. Under the Caliphate of Córdoba,
Al-Andalus was a beacon of learning, and the city of Córdoba became one of the leading cultural
and economic centres in Europe and throughout the Mediterranean Basin and the Islamic world.
A number of achievements that advanced Islamic and Western science came from
Al-Andalus including major advances in trigonometry (Geber), astronomy (Arzachel), surgery (Abulcasis), pharmacology (Avenzoar), and other fields. Al-Andalus became a major educational center for
Europe and the lands around the Mediterranean Sea as well as a conduit for
culture and science between the Islamic and Christian worlds.
Performance
art and music theory came together in the royal courts of Al-Andalus throughout
the period of Muslim rule. Ziryab whose real name was Abul-Hasan Alí Ibn Nafí, born in
Iraq in 789 of North African heritage was a musician who represented the
courtly arts and cultivated society. Al-Hakam, father of Abd-Al-Rahman II,
invited him to court at Córdoba. Ziryab had studied music under a famous
teacher in Baghdad, and he brought knowledge of music performance and knowledge
to the Muslim lands of the west. He established a music conservatory in Córdoba
that trained young musicians, spreading his influence to other courts. Ziryab
was probably the first to introduce the lute to Spain. He changed the way it
was played by adding a fifth string and using an eagle’s talon instead of a
wooden pick. His talent and influence included ideas about harmony, rhythm, and
composition. Scholars of music history trace many later styles of song
composition and performance to Ziryab. Certainly, his influence brought eastern
styles as well as classical Greek and Arab musical ideas to Al-Andalus, but
once there, they combined with North African and indigenous Iberian styles over
time to create a distinctive Andalusian musical tradition that continued even
after the end of Muslim rule on the Iberian Peninsula.
A large number of musical instruments were
used in Al-Andalus, whose origins lay in Asian, the Mediterranean, and African
regional traditions. The mingling of cultures and the mobility brought about by
trade, travel, and migration resulted in the transfer of many instruments and
ways of performing with them. In
addition to instrumental music and song, traditions of dance are often attributed
to the influence of Al-Andalus.
Nothing is known of Paulo La Villa other than
that he lived in Spain and was composing music in the early 1900s. He wrote vocal works, including an “Ave
Maria”, as well as instrumental dances and songs that recall the music of
Al-Andalus.
About the Choral Music:
God
of Love, We Look to Thee – Hal Hopson
In 1716, Handel wrote his second setting
of the Passion to a rhymed text by Brockes.
As part of this work, Handel arranged the chorale tune “Schmucke dich”,
which was written almost a century earlier by Johann Cruger. Hal Hopson has arranged this piece and set it
to a text by Charles Wesley as a prayer for world peace.
Georg Friederich Handel (1685-1759) became a musician and
composer despite objections from his father, who wanted him to become a lawyer.
Handel studied music with Zachau, organist at the Halle Cathedral, and became
an accomplished violinist and keyboard performer. He traveled and studied in
Italy for some time and then settled permanently in England in 1713. Although
he wrote a large number of instrumental works, he is known mainly for his
Italian operas, oratorios (including “Messiah”, 1741), various
anthems for church and royal festivities, and organ concertos, which he
interpolated into his oratorio performances. He composed only three hymn tunes,
one of which still appears in some modern hymnals. A number of hymnal editors,
including Lowell Mason, took themes from some of Handel's oratorios and turned
them into hymn tunes.
Hal H. Hopson (b. 1933) is a full-time composer and
church musician residing in Dallas, Texas. He has over 1000 published works,
which comprise almost every musical form in church music. With a special
interest in congregational song, he continues to make a significant
contribution to the new repertoire of hymn tunes and responsorial psalm
settings as evidenced by the proliferation of his settings that are included in
newly published hymnals and psalm collections.
God of love, we look to Thee, in one voice we lift our
plea,
Show Thyself the Prince of Peace; bid our warring conflicts
cease.
By Thy reconciling love, all the needless strife remove;
Each to each unite, endear. Come and spread Thy banner here.
Let us for each other care, each the other’s burden bear,
To the world the pattern give; help us in Thy truth to live.
Free from falsehood, from all pride, so may Thee in all
abide;
All
the depth of love express. In our lives
Thy truth confess.
About the Hymns:
Immortal,
Invisible, God Only Wise
"Immortal, Invisible" is a strong text of praise to God, who created and sustains the lives of all his creatures. The text focuses on the Creator of the universe, the invisible God whose visible works in nature testify to his glory and majesty. "Light" is the prevailing image in stanzas 1, 2, and 4 (see also Ps. 104:2); our inability to see God is not because of insufficient light but because the "splendor of light hides [God] from view."
Walter Chalmbers Smith (1824-1908) was educated at the University of Aberdeen and New College, Edinburgh, and became a Presbyterian pastor in the Free Church of Scotland in 1850. He served four congregations, including the Free High Church in Edinburgh (1876¬-1894). Moderator of his denomination in 1893, Smith was a man of wide interests. His poetry was published in some six volumes entitled Poetical Works (1902), and his hymn texts were published in Hymns of Christ and the Christian Life (1886).
I Surrender All
"I Surrender
All" is a Christian hymn, with words written by American art teacher and musician
Judson W. Van DeVenter (1855–1939), who subsequently became a music minister
and evangelist. It was put to music by Winfield S. Weeden (1847–1908), and
published in 1896.Van DeVenter said of the inspiration for the text:
For some time, I had
struggled between developing my talents in the field of art and going into
full-time evangelistic work. At last the pivotal hour of my life came, and I
surrendered all. A new day was ushered into my life. I became an evangelist and
discovered down deep in my soul a talent hitherto unknown to me. God had hidden
a song in my heart, and touching a tender chord, He caused me to sing.
I Need Thee Every Hour
Annie S. Hawks’ (1836-1918) poems first began appearing
in newspapers when she was 14 years old. She married Charles H. Hawks in 1857.
They lived in Brooklyn, New York, and attended the Hanson Place Baptist Church,
where Robert Lowry was pastor. She wrote 400 hymns in her life, mostly for use
in Sunday schools.
“I Need Thee Every Hour” was written by Hawks in 1872.
She showed Lowry her poem, and he wrote the lyrics of the refrain and the tune.
The song was first sung publicly at the 1872 meeting of the National Baptist
Sunday School Association in Cincinnati, Ohio. Its first publication was in
1873 in a Sunday School hymnbook compiled by Lowry and William H. Doane, Royal
Diadem for the Sunday School.
This is of the most stirring tunes in the United Methodist Hymnal.
The melody comes from a symphonic tone poem by Jean Sibelius (1865-1957) by the
name of “Finlandia”,
Op. 26. It was adapted for the 1933 hymnal of the Presbyterian Church in the
United States to be sung to the text “Be Still, My Soul”. Not only is the spirit of the music
appropriate for “This Is My Song,” but the history of Sibelius’ composition
also adds meaning. He wrote “Finlandia” as a patriotic offering in 1899. The composition
was performed as the last of seven musical pieces that accompanied a series of
tableaus, each reflecting portions of Finnish history. Out of agitated and
tumultuous opening music symbolizing the struggles of the Finnish people, the
serenity of the hymn-like melody emerges, symbolizing hope and resolution. In February 1899, a manifesto from Tsar
Nicholas II declared Russia’s right to rule Finland without the consent of
local legislators. Sibelius’ choice of “Finlandia” as a title for the
composition served as a subtle form of protest against Russian censorship;
however, that censorship was so intense that it couldn’t be performed
publically as “Finlandia”,
so other titles were devised including “Happy Feelings at the Awakening of
Finnish Spring.”
Lloyd Stone (1912-1993), an American public school teacher who
lived in Hawaii, authored 10 books of poetry and two children’s books. He wrote
the first two stanzas of “This Is My Song” for its inclusion in the collection,
Sing a Tune
(1934). During the brief time of peace between two world wars, it was a song of
hope for all nations—“for lands afar and mine.” The poet acknowledges love for
his own country, but balances that with the love that others feel around the
world for their nations. The second
stanza begins by alluding to the blue skies, the ocean, sunlight, “cloverleaf
and pine” of Stone’s own country, but then acknowledges that in other
countries, “skies are everywhere as blue as mine.” The stanza concludes: “O
hear my song, O God of all the nations, a song of peace for their land and for
mine.”
Methodist theologian Georgia Harkness (1881-1974) added a
third stanza at the request of Marion Norris, then executive secretary of the
Wesleyan Service Guild of the Methodist Church. Harkness related: “[Marion
Norris] wrote me that they had been using the first two verses but wanted
something with a more distinctly religious note as a supplement to them. I
cannot tell you exactly how long ago this was, but since I can recall writing the
stanza at my desk when I was teaching at Mount Holyoke 1937-39, it was within
this period.” The hymn was adopted as
the official hymn of the Wesleyan Service Guild and was widely sung throughout
the former Methodist Church.
Harkness, one of the first women ordained in the Methodist
Church and a leading ecumenical theologian of her day, added two additional
stanzas, the second of which appears in our hymnal as the final stanza of the
hymn. It is a prayer to the “Lord of all earth’s kingdoms.” Harkness skillfully
ties the reference to “earth’s kingdoms” to a petition found in the Lord’s
Prayer, “Thy kingdom come; on earth thy will be done.” Christ becomes the
central figure in Harkness’ stanza, as one who will unite us in service to each
other and help us to “learn to live as one.” Her stanza ends with a personal
dedication: “Myself I give thee; let thy will be done.” In this stanza, Harkness transforms a hymn of
peace with vague religious overtones into a prayer for peace that comes from
the author of peace, Jesus Christ.
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