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.
Lo,
a Rose – Wilbur Held
"Es ist ein Ros entsprungen" ("A rose has
sprung up"), most commonly translated to English as "Lo, How a Rose E'er Blooming" or
"A Spotless Rose", is
a Christmas carol and Marian Hymn of German origin. The text is thought to be penned by an anonymous author, and the piece first
appeared in print in the late 16th century. The English translation "Lo, How a Rose
E'er Blooming" was written by Theodore Baker in 1894.
"Es ist ein Ros entsprungen," may date to the
fifteenth century. However, the earliest manuscript containing the text, found
in St. Alban's Carthusian monastery in Trier and preserved in the Trier
municipal library, is dated around 1580. It was first published with
twenty-three stanzas in Alte catholische geistliche Kirchengesiinge
(Cologne, 1599). Originally stanza 2 interpreted the "rose" as being
Mary, mother of Jesus, but in Musae Sionae (1609) Michael
Praetorius changed the interpretation to point to Christ as the rose in accord
with actual biblical imagery.
Lo, how a Rose e'er
blooming From tender stem hath sprung!
Of Jesse's lineage coming As men of old have sung.
It came, a flower bright, Amid the cold of winter
When half-gone was the night.
Of Jesse's lineage coming As men of old have sung.
It came, a flower bright, Amid the cold of winter
When half-gone was the night.
Isaiah 'twas foretold
it, The Rose I have in mind:
With Mary we behold it, The virgin mother kind.
To show God's love aright She bore to men a Savior
When half-gone was the night.
With Mary we behold it, The virgin mother kind.
To show God's love aright She bore to men a Savior
When half-gone was the night.
This Flower, whose
fragrance tender With sweetness fills the air,
Dispels with glorious splendor The darkness everywhere.
True man, yet very God, From sin and death He saves us
And lightens every load
Dispels with glorious splendor The darkness everywhere.
True man, yet very God, From sin and death He saves us
And lightens every load
Wilbur C. Held (1914-2015)
was born in Des Plaines, Illinois, and received his B.M. and M.M. degrees at
the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago. He then attended Union
Theological Seminary in New York City where he earned his S.M.D. A member of
the Episcopal Church, for many years Dr. Held was Professor of Organ and Church
Music at The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio. He remained in this position for over 30
years, and for most of that time was also organist-choirmaster at Trinity
Episcopal Church in Columbus, Ohio. Dr.
Held started composing little pieces for the organ because he felt there was a
lack of teaching material aimed at developing style and registration,
especially for the romantic use of the instrument. Having written
several suites primarily for pedagogical use, he turned his attention to
broadening the repertoire for church use, continuing to stress modest technical
requirements and flexibility of registration. To date he has published 325
organ works. He has served on the national councils of both the AGO and the Hymn Society of America, and has appeared as recitalist at
their national conventions.
Prelude on “The First Noel” – James F. Konkel
"The First Noel" portrays in vivid narrative style the story of the birth of Christ. All stanzas are needed to complete the entire event when the hymn is sung. The sixth stanza, which has been omitted from our current hymnal, urges us to join together to sing praises to God for the marvels of His creation and for the salvation provided through Christ's shed blood and reminds us that Christ came to redeem the whole world.
The first Noel the angel
did say was to certain poor shepherds in
fields as they lay;
in fields where they lay keeping their sheep, on a cold winter's night that was so deep.
in fields where they lay keeping their sheep, on a cold winter's night that was so deep.
They looked up and saw a
star shining in the east, beyond them
far;
and to the earth it gave great light, and so it continued both day and night.
and to the earth it gave great light, and so it continued both day and night.
Noel,
Noel, Noel, Noel, born is the King of
Israel.
Dona nobis pacem (Latin for "Grant
us peace") is a phrase in the Agnus
Dei section of the Roman
Catholic mass. The origin of the melody is unknown.
James Konkel (b. 1961)
studied at Western Michigan University and is organist at Oshterno United
Methodist Church in Kalamazoo, Michigan.
Joy to the World –
Virgil Fox”Joy to the World” was written by Isaac Watts (1675-1748), who is universally acknowledged as "The Father of English Hymnody". He has earned the title, not because he was first to write English hymns, but because he gave impetus to hymnody and established its place in the worship of the English church. For over one hundred years, congregational singing had been strictly limited to the Psalms of the Old Testament in poetic form. “Joy to the World” is the "imitation" of the last half of Psalm 98. The author transformed the Psalm of praise for some historic deliverance into a song of rejoicing for the salvation of God that began to be manifested when the Babe of Bethlehem came "to make his blessing flow far as the curse is found." This is one of the most joyous hymns in all Christendom because it makes so real what Christ’s birth means to all mankind. The tune to which the hymn is sung is attributed to George Frederick Handel and bears resemblance to phrases of his great oratorio, Messiah. Notably the first four tones match the beginning of the chorus, "Lift Up Your Heads."
Virgil Fox (1912-1980) was a child prodigy. At the age of ten, he was playing the organ for church services. At fourteen, he played his first organ recital before a cheering crowd of 2,500 people in Cincinnati. At seventeen, he was the unanimous winner of the Biennial Contest of the National Federation of Music Clubs in Boston, the first organist ever chosen. He attended Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, America’s oldest music conservatory, and became the first one-year student in the history of the Peabody to graduate with the its highest honor, the Artist's Diploma. In 1936, he returned to Baltimore to head the Peabody organ department, and to serve as organist of Brown Memorial Church. In 1942, he enlisted in the ArmyAir Force and performed 600 recitals in three years to raise money for the armed services. In 1946, Fox became organist of Riverside Church, New York City. In 1952, was chosen by the State Department to represent the United States at the First International Conference of Sacred Music in Bern, Switzerland.
Fox played hundreds of concerts across the United States and Europe. He was the first non-German artist to perform the works of J. S. Bach at the Thomaskirche in Leipzig. Perhaps the most daring concert Virgil Fox ever played was at the Mecca of rock music, New York’s Fillmore East, where, in 1970, he gave an all-Bach program combined with a light show on the Rodgers Touring Organ. For nine years, "Heavy Organ" toured across the country to various cities, colleges, and festivals. Virgil Fox is credited with bringing the music of Bach to young people.
About the Choral Music:
Were
You There on that Christmas Night? – Natalie Sleeth
One of Sleeth's best-known anthems for choir is entitled "Joy in the Morning" and was written on the occasion of her husband's inauguration as the president of West Virginia Wesleyan College in 1977. Another favorite is "In the Bulb There is a Flower", which was composed as an anthem for the Pasadena Community Church, St. Petersburg FL It appears under the title "Hymn of Promise" in the United Methodist Hymnal and has been translated into German for the Gesangbuch der Evangelisch-methodistischen Kirche (2002). “Were You There on that Christmas Night?” was originally written for 2-part choir in 1976. It has since been published for mixed choir with piano and handbells and has been arranged as a congregational hymn and appears in Worship and Rejoice.
Were you there, were you
there on that Christmas night
When the world was filled
with a holy light?
Were you there to behold,
when the wonder foretold came to earth?
Did you see, did you see
how they hailed Him King
With the gifts so rare
that they chose to bring?
Did you see how they bowed
as they praised Him aloud at His birth?
Did you hear how the
choirs of Angels sang at the glory of the sight?
Did you hear how the bells
of Heaven rang all through the night?
Did you know, did you know
it was God’s own Son,
The salvation of the world
begun?
Did
you know it was love that was sent from above to the earth?
About the Vocal Solo Music:
Placide Cappeau (1808-1877) was the commissionaire of wines in Roquemaure, a small French town. He was known for his fine poetry. At the end of the year 1843, the church organ was recently renovated. To celebrate the event, the parish priest asked Cappeau to write a Christmas poem. In a dusty coach travelling to Paris, Placide Cappeau considered the priest's request. Using the gospel of Luke as his guide, Cappeau imagined witnessing the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem. Thoughts of being present on the blessed night inspired him. By the time he arrived in Paris, “Minuit, chrétiens" (Midnight, Christians) had been completed. Adolphe Adam set the poem to music in 1847 and titled it "O Holy Night" ("Cantique de Noël"). The song was premiered in Roquemaure in 1847 by the opera singer Emily Laurey.
Adolphe Charles Adam (1803-1856) was a French composer and music critic. A prolific composer of operas and ballets, he is best known today for his ballets Giselle (1841) and Le corsaire (1856, his last work), his operas Le postillon de Lonjumeau (1836), Le toréador (1849) and Si j'étais roi (1852) and his Christmas carol Minuit, chrétiens! (1844), later set to different English lyrics and widely sung as "O Holy Night" (1847). It is an international favorite and is said to have been one of the first pieces of music broadcast on radio.
Adolphe Adam was born in Paris to Jean-Louis Adam (1758–1848), who was a prominent Alsatian composer, as well a professor at the Paris Conservatoire. His mother was the daughter of a physician. As a child, Adolphe Adam preferred to improvise music on his own rather than study music seriously and occasionally truanted with writer Eugène Sue who was also something of a dunce in early years. Jean-Louis Adam was a pianist and teacher but was firmly set against the idea of his son following in his footsteps. Adam was determined, however, and studied and composed secretly under the tutelage of his older friend Ferdinand Hérold, a popular composer of the day. When Adam was 17, his father relented, and he was permitted to study at the Paris Conservatoire—but only after he promised that he would learn music only as an amusement, not as a career. He entered the Paris Conservatoire in 1821, where he studied organ and harmonium under the celebrated opera composer François-Adrien Boieldieu. By age 20, he was writing songs for Paris vaudeville houses and playing in the orchestra at the Gymnasie Dramatique, where he later became chorus master. Like many other French composers, he made a living largely by playing the organ.
O holy night the stars
are brightly shining
It is the night of our dear Savior's birth
Long lay the world in sin and error pining
Till He appeared and the soul felt its worth
It is the night of our dear Savior's birth
Long lay the world in sin and error pining
Till He appeared and the soul felt its worth
A thrill of hope the
weary world rejoices
For yonder breaks a new glorious morn
Fall on your knees. O hear the angels' voices
O night when Christ was born. O night divine.
For yonder breaks a new glorious morn
Fall on your knees. O hear the angels' voices
O night when Christ was born. O night divine.
About the Hymns:
Joy to the World
Our
Christmas season would hardly seem complete without the singing of Joy to
the World, the most joyous of the carols. Yet Isaac Watts, its author,
never intended it to be a Christmas carol at all. Rather, it was a part of his Psalms
of David Imitated, published in 1719, which contained paraphrases of many
of the Psalms in New Testament language.
The story of the hymn, Joy to the World, is the
story of the author, Isaac Watts (1675-1748), who is universally acknowledged
as "The Father of English Hymnody". He has earned the title, not
because he was first to write English hymns, but because he gave impetus to
hymnody and established its place in the worship of the English church. For over one hundred years, congregational
singing had been strictly limited to the Psalms of the Old Testament in poetic
form. Many of these rhymed Psalms were so unnatural that Samuel Wesley, father
of the famous brothers Charles and John, called them "scandalous
doggerel," and his opinion was shared by many.
The birth of Isaac Watts to a dissenting deacon and the
daughter of a Huguenot refugee was followed by fourteen years of persecution
and hardships for the entire family. Perhaps this suffering was responsible for
Isaac Watts’ ill health, for he grew only to a height of just over five feet
and was weak and sickly all his life.
Though weak in body, the boy was strong in mind and spirit and early in
life showed promise of poetic capability. After one Sunday morning service,
Isaac, then fifteen years old, complained of the atrocious worship in song. One
of the deacons challenged him: "Give us something better, young man."
His answer was to write hundreds of hymns that are still sung today.
Joy to the World is the
"imitation" of the last half of Psalm 98. The author transformed the
old Jewish psalm of praise for some historic deliverance into a Christian song
of rejoicing for the salvation of God that began to be manifested when the Babe
of Bethlehem came "to make his blessing flow far as the curse is
found." This is one of the most joyous hymns in all Christendom because it
makes so real what Christ’s birth means to all mankind. The tune to which the hymn is sung is
attributed to George Frederick Handel and bears resemblance to phrases of his
great oratorio, Messiah. Notably the first four tones match the
beginning of the chorus, "Lift Up Your Heads."
O
Come, All Ye Faithful
The original text consisted of four Latin verses, and it was with these that the hymn was originally published. John Francis Wade (1711=1786) had written the hymn in Latin in 1744, and was first published in 1751. The Abbé Jean-François-Étienne Borderies wrote an additional three verses in the 18th century; these are normally printed as the third to fifth of seven verses, while another, anonymous, additional Latin verse is rarely printed. The text has been translated innumerable times, but the most used version today is the English "O Come, All Ye Faithful". This is a combination of one of Frederick Oakeley's translations of the original four verses and William Thomas Brooke's of the three additional ones, which was first published in Murray's Hymnal in 1852. Oakeley originally titled the song “Ye Faithful, approach ye” when it was sung at his Margaret Church in Marylebone before it was altered to its current form.
O Little Town of Bethlehem
“O Little Town of Bethlehem” is a popular Christmas carol. The text was written by Phillips Brooks (1835–1893), an Episcopal priest, Rector of the Church of the Holy Trinity, Philadelphia. He was inspired by visiting the Palestinian city of Bethlehem in 1865. “After an early dinner, we took our horses and rode to Bethlehem,” he wrote home in Christmas week of 1865. “It was only about two hours when we came to the town, situated on an eastern ridge of a range of hills, surrounded by its terraced gardens. It is a good-looking town, better built than any other we have seen in Palestine. . . . Before dark, we rode out of town to the field where they say the shepherds saw the star. It is a fenced piece of ground with a cave in it (all the Holy Places are caves here), in which, strangely enough, they put the shepherds. The story is absurd, but somewhere in those fields we rode through the shepherds must have been. . . . As we passed, the shepherds were still “keeping watch over their flocks or leading them home to fold.” Three years later, he wrote the poem for his church and his organist, Lewis Redner, added the music.
Hark, the Herald Angels Sing
The carol we now know as "Hark! the herald angels sing" did not start life as such, and required at least four people to bring it to its current form. Wesley's original, written as a Christmas Day hymn and first published in 1739, is made up of ten four-line verses, rather than the longer eight-line verses with refrain which we have now. It is interesting to note that in the original version of Wesley's, the heavens ring with the phrase "Glory to the King of kings," echoing Luke's "Glory to God in the highest heaven." George Whitfield, who had been a student with Wesley, changed this to "Glory to the newborn King" in 1753. His fairly revolutionary Calvinist position was not compatible with Wesley's gentler reforming approach, which eventually bore fruit in the Methodist movement that he and his brother John inspired, Whitfield maintained the four-line verses of Wesley's original, but changed the angels' emphasis: "Glory to the newborn King" means something slightly but significantly different from "Glory to the King of kings." In the Gospel account, the angels praise God, whereas in "Hark! the herald angels sing," they are inaccurately described as praising Jesus. Furthermore, Luke does not say that the angels "sing," and so it may well be that this reinterpretation by Whitfield has emphasized the popular but unscriptural picture of angels singing the Gloria. ("While shepherds watched" also implies that they sang.)
Silent Night
180
years ago, the carol "Stille Nacht! Heilige Nacht" was heard for the
first time in a village church in Oberndorf, Austria. The congregation at that
Midnight Mass in St. Nicholas Church listened as the voices of the assistant
pastor, Fr. Joseph Mohr (1792-1848), and the choir director, Franz Xaver Gruber
(1787-1863), rang through the church to the accompaniment of Fr. Mohr's
guitar. On that Christmas Eve, a song
was born that would wing its way into the hearts of people throughout the
world. Now translated into hundreds of languages, it is sung by untold millions
every December from small chapels in the Andes to great cathedrals in Antwerp
and Rome.
Today books, films and Internet sites are filled with fanciful tales purporting to tell the history of "Silent Night." Some tell of mice eating the bellows of the organ creating the necessity for a hymn to be accompanied by a guitar. Others claim that Joseph Mohr was forced to write the words to a new carol in haste since the organ would not play. A recent film, created for Austrian television places Oberndorf in the Alps and includes evil railroad barons and a double-dealing priest, while a recent book by a German author places a zither in the hands of Franz Gruber and connects Joseph Mohr with a tragic fire engulfing the city of Salzburg. You can read claims that "Silent Night" was sung on Christmas Eve in 1818 and then forgotten by its creators. Of course, the latter are easily discounted by manuscript arrangements of the carol by both Mohr and Gruber which were produced at various times between 1820 and 1855.
Today books, films and Internet sites are filled with fanciful tales purporting to tell the history of "Silent Night." Some tell of mice eating the bellows of the organ creating the necessity for a hymn to be accompanied by a guitar. Others claim that Joseph Mohr was forced to write the words to a new carol in haste since the organ would not play. A recent film, created for Austrian television places Oberndorf in the Alps and includes evil railroad barons and a double-dealing priest, while a recent book by a German author places a zither in the hands of Franz Gruber and connects Joseph Mohr with a tragic fire engulfing the city of Salzburg. You can read claims that "Silent Night" was sung on Christmas Eve in 1818 and then forgotten by its creators. Of course, the latter are easily discounted by manuscript arrangements of the carol by both Mohr and Gruber which were produced at various times between 1820 and 1855.
The
German words for the original six stanzas of the carol we know as "Silent
Night" were written by Joseph Mohr in 1816, when he was a young priest
assigned to a pilgrimage church in Mariapfarr, Austria. His grandfather lived
nearby, and it is easy to imagine that he could have come up with the words
while walking thorough the countryside on a visit to his elderly relative. The
fact is, we have no idea if any particular event inspired Joseph Mohr to pen
his poetic version of the birth of the Christchild. The world is fortunate,
however, that he didn't leave it behind when he was transferred to Oberndorf
the following year (1817). On December
24, 1818 Joseph Mohr journeyed to the home of musician-schoolteacher Franz
Gruber who lived in an apartment over the schoolhouse in nearby Arnsdorf. He
showed his friend the poem and asked him to add a melody and guitar
accompaniment so that it could be sung at Midnight Mass. His reason for wanting
the new carol is unknown. Some speculate that the organ would not work; others
feel that the assistant pastor, who dearly loved guitar music, merely wanted a
new carol for Christmas. Later that
evening, as the two men, backed by the choir, stood in front of the main altar
in St. Nicholas Church and sang "Stille Nacht! Heilige Nacht!" for
the first time, they could hardly imagine the impact their composition would
have on the world.
Karl
Mauracher, a master organ builder and repairman from the Ziller Valley,
traveled to Oberndorf to work on the organ, several times in subsequent years.
While doing his work in St. Nicholas, he obtained a copy of the composition and
took it home with him. Thus, the simple carol, began its journey around the
world as a "Tyrolean Folk Song."
Two traveling families of folk singers from the Ziller Valley, similar to the Trapp Family Singers of "The Sound of Music" fame, incorporated the song into their repertoire. According to the Leipziger Tageblatt, the Strassers sang the song in a concert in Leipzig in December 1832. It was during this period, several musical notes were changed, and the carol evolved into the melody we know today. On another occasion, according to an historical plaque, the Rainer Family sang the Christmas carol before an audience which included Emperor Franz I and Tsar Alexander I. In the year 1839, the Rainers performed "Stille Nacht" for the first time in America, at the Alexander Hamilton Monument outside Trinity Church in New York City.
Joseph Bletzacher, the Court Opera singer from Hannover, reported that by the 1840s, the carol was already well known in Lower Saxony. "In Berlin," he says, "the Royal Cathedral Choir popularized it especially. It became in fact the favorite Christmas carol of the artistically appreciative King Frederick William IV of Prussia, who used to have the Cathedral Choir sing it for him during the Christmas season each year." During his lifetime, Franz Xaver Gruber produced a number of orchestral arrangements of his composition. The original guitar arrangement is missing, but five other Gruber manuscripts of the carol exist. The manuscript by Joseph Mohr (ca. 1820) is for guitar accompaniment and is probably the closest to the arrangement and melody sung at Midnight Mass in 1818.
Two traveling families of folk singers from the Ziller Valley, similar to the Trapp Family Singers of "The Sound of Music" fame, incorporated the song into their repertoire. According to the Leipziger Tageblatt, the Strassers sang the song in a concert in Leipzig in December 1832. It was during this period, several musical notes were changed, and the carol evolved into the melody we know today. On another occasion, according to an historical plaque, the Rainer Family sang the Christmas carol before an audience which included Emperor Franz I and Tsar Alexander I. In the year 1839, the Rainers performed "Stille Nacht" for the first time in America, at the Alexander Hamilton Monument outside Trinity Church in New York City.
Joseph Bletzacher, the Court Opera singer from Hannover, reported that by the 1840s, the carol was already well known in Lower Saxony. "In Berlin," he says, "the Royal Cathedral Choir popularized it especially. It became in fact the favorite Christmas carol of the artistically appreciative King Frederick William IV of Prussia, who used to have the Cathedral Choir sing it for him during the Christmas season each year." During his lifetime, Franz Xaver Gruber produced a number of orchestral arrangements of his composition. The original guitar arrangement is missing, but five other Gruber manuscripts of the carol exist. The manuscript by Joseph Mohr (ca. 1820) is for guitar accompaniment and is probably the closest to the arrangement and melody sung at Midnight Mass in 1818.
Perhaps this is part
of the miracle of "Silent Night." The words flowed from the
imagination of a modest curate. The music was composed by a musician who was
not known outside his village. There was no celebrity to sing at its world
premiere. Yet its powerful message of heavenly peace has crossed all borders
and language barriers, conquering the hearts of people everywhere.
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