March 23 Vespers & 25 Good Friday, 2016

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.  

Vespers 

About the Handbell Music:

When Jesus Wept – William Billings, arr. Kevin McChesney

          Jubilation Ringers

William Billings (1746-1800) is regarded as the first American choral composer.  Billings was born in Boston. At the age of 14, the death of his father stopped Billings' formal schooling. In order to help support his family, young Billings trained as a tanner. He possibly received musical instruction from John Barry, one of the choir members at the New South Church, but for the most part he was self-taught.  Billings had an unusual appearance and a strong addiction to snuff.  His contemporary wrote that Billings "was a singular man, of moderate size, short of one leg, with one eye, without any address & with an uncommon negligence of person. Still, he spake & sung & thought as a man above the common abilities."  Billings died in poverty in Boston, leaving behind a widow and six children.

Virtually all of Billings' music was written for four-part chorus, singing a cappella. His many hymns and anthems were published mostly in book-length collections, The New-England Psalm-Singer (1770), The Singing Master's Assistant (1778), Music in Miniature (1779), The Psalm-Singer's Amusement (1781), The Suffolk Harmony (1786), The Continental Harmony (1794). Sometimes Billings would revise and improve a song, including the new version in his next volume.  Most of the texts that Billings used in his works come from the poetry of Isaac Watts. Other texts were drawn from Universalist poets and local poets, whereas Billings himself wrote the text to about a dozen of his compositions.

Billings wrote long prefaces to his works in which he explained (often in an eccentric prose style) the rudiments of music and how his work should be performed. His writings reflect his extensive experience as a singing master. They also provide information on choral performance practice in Billings's day; for instance, a passage from the preface to The Continental Harmony indicates that Billings liked to have both men and women sing the treble (top) and tenor lines, an octave apart.  Billings was involved in teaching singing schools throughout his life. In 1769, when Billings was twenty-three years old, the following announcement appeared in the Boston Gazette: "John Barrey & William Billings Begs Leave to inform the Publick, that they propose to open a Singing School THIS NIGHT ... where any Person inclining to learn to Sing may be attended upon at said School with Fidelity and Dispatch." He was listed as "singing master" in the Boston city directory up until 1798. In the preface to the Singing Master's Assistant, Billings included advice for the practical running of a singing school, including topics such as logistics, expectations for manners and attentiveness in students, and the need for the supremacy of the teacher's musical decisions.

Billings' work was very popular, but his career was hampered by the primitive state of copyright law in America at the time. By the time the copyright laws had been strengthened, it was too late for Billings: the favorites among his tunes had already been widely reprinted in other people's hymnals, permanently copyright-free.  For a considerable time after his death, his music was almost completely neglected in the American musical mainstream. However, his compositions remained popular for a time in the rural areas of New England, which resisted the newer trends in sacred music. Moreover, a few of Billings' songs were carried southward and westward through America, as a result of their appearance in shape note hymnals. They ultimately resided in the rural South, as part of the Sacred Harp singing tradition.  Works by Billings are commonly sung by American choral groups today, particularly performers of early music.  William Billings was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970.

“When Jesus Wept” is probably Billings’ most familiar choral work today, featuring a brief text and simple melody sung in round, producing a haunting effect.

                 When Jesus wept, the falling tear
                  In mercy flowed beyond all bound;
                 When Jesus groaned, a trembling fear                 Seized all the guilty world around. 

Good Friday

About the Organ Music:

Charfreitag – Otto Malling

Isaac Watts (1674-1748) was the son of a schoolmaster in Southampton. He is said to have shown remarkable precocity in childhood, beginning the study of Latin, in his fourth year, and writing respectable verses at the age of seven. At the age of sixteen, he went to London to study in the Academy of the Rev. Thomas Rowe, an Independent minister. In 1698, he became assistant minister of the Independent Church, Berry St., London. In 1712, he accepted an invitation to visit Sir Thomas Abney, at his residence of Abney Park, and made it his home for the remainder of his life. It was a favorable arrangement for his health and his writing. He did not retire from ministerial duties, but preached as often as his delicate health would permit. The number of Watts' publications is very large. His collected works, first published in 1720, include sermons, treatises, poems and hymns. His Horae Lyricae was published in 1705. His Hymns appeared in 1707. The first hymn he is said to have composed for religious worship, is "Behold the glories of the Lamb," written at the age of twenty. It is as a writer of psalms and hymns that he is best known. Some of his hymns were written to be sung after his sermons, giving expression to the meaning of the text upon which he had preached. Montgomery calls Watts "the greatest name among hymn-writers". His published hymns number more than eight hundred.

Charfreitag (Good Friday) is a setting of “Alas, and Did My Savior Bleed”.  Written by Isaac Watts in six stanzas, this text was published in Watts' Hymns and Spiritual Songs in 1707. The final line in stanza 1 originally read, "for such a worm as I."  Watts' original heading for the text, "Godly sorrow arising from the suffering of Christ," fits stanzas 1-3 well. Stanza 3 contains the profound paradox of God the creator dying for the sin of human creatures: "Christ, the mighty Maker, died for his own creatures' sin." Stanza 4 moves from penitent sorrow to gratitude and tears of joy.

Alas! and did my Savior bleed, and did my Sovereign die!
Would he devote that sacred head for sinners such as I?

Was it for crimes that I have done, he groaned upon the tree?
Amazing pity! Grace unknown! And love beyond degree!

Well might the sun in darkness hide, and shut its glories in,
when God, the mighty maker, died for his own creature's sin.

Thus might I hide my blushing face while his dear cross appears;
dissolve my heart in thankfulness, and melt mine eyes to tears.

But drops of tears can ne'er repay the debt of love I owe.

Here, Lord, I give myself away; 'tis all that I can do.

Otto Valdemar Malling (1848 –1915) was a Danish composer, the cathedral organist in Copenhagen and Director of the Royal Danish Academy of Music, Copenhagen. Malling wrote the first Danish textbook in orchestration, along French conservatory lines. His scores of organ music brought him some reputation abroad, but after his death he was soon forgotten in his native country, as musical tastes changed.

About the Choral Music:

Lamb – Richard Donn

At the age of 32, Charlotte Elliott (1789-1871) suffered a serious illness that left her a semi-invalid for the rest of her life. Within a year, she went through a spiritual crisis and confessed to the Swiss evangelist Henri A. Cesar Malan that she did not know how to come to Christ. He answered, "Come to him just as you are." Thinking back on that experience twelve years later, in 1834, she wrote “Just as I Am" as a statement of her faith.  Hymn writing provided a way for Elliot to cope with her pain and depression – she wrote approximately 150 hymns, which were published in her Invalid's Hymn Book (several editions, 1834-1854), Hymns for a Week (1839), and Thoughts in Verse on Sacred Subjects (1869). Many of her hymns reflect her chronic pain and illness but also reveal that faith gave her perseverance and hope.

“Just as I Am" was first published in the 1836 edition of Invalid's Hymn Book with the subheading "Him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out" (John 6:37). She added a seventh stanza that same year, when the hymn was also published in her Hours of Sorrow Cheered and Comforted (1836). Widely translated, this hymn has brought consolation to millions.

Richard Donn is a choral composer living near Atlanta.

            Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.

            O Lamb of God, I come to you.  I come.

            Just as I am, without one plea, but that Thy blood was shed for me,

            And that Thou bidd’st me come to Thee, O Lamb of God, I come.

            O Lamb of God, I give my life to You.

            O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

The One Who Bears My Shame – Joshua Metzger

Joshua Metzger has set a beautiful text by John Parker, with a haunting cello melody by Stan Pethel.

            There stumbles through the street, unsteady on His feet,

            Derided and defamed, the One who bears my shame.

            Now struggling up the way, with not a word to say,

            Betrayed, He takes the blame, the One who bears my shame.

            Who is this man who carries every sin?

            The weight of the world is fixed upon Him!

            They mock Him as He dies ‘mid Mary’s silent cries,

            They curse the sacred name of the One who bears my shame.

This man upon the tree hangs there in place of me.

            How precious is the name of the One who bears my shame.

About the Hymns:

Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence

Let all mortal flesh keep silence (Greek: Σιγησάτω πᾶσα σάρξ βροτεία) is an ancient chant of Eucharistic devotion based on words from Habakkuk 2:20, "Let all the earth keep silence before him". The original was composed in Greek as a Cherubic Hymn for the Offertory of the Divine Liturgy of St James; it probably antedates the rest of the liturgy and goes back at least to 275 AD, with local churches adopting arrangements in Syriac.

The text expresses awe at Christ's coming and the mystery of our perception of Christ in the body and blood. With images from Isaiah 6 and Revelation 5, it portrays the glory of Christ and his victory over sin. Although it has eucharistic emphasis, the text pictures the nativity of Christ in a majestic manner and in a much larger context than just his birth in Bethlehem. We are drawn into the awe and mystery with our own alleluias.

Gerard Moultrie (1829-1885) translated the text from the Greek; his English paraphrase was first published in Orby Shipley's Lyra Eucharistica (1864) and entitled "Prayer of the Cherubic Hymn." The Psalter Hymnal alters that paraphrase in part to solve Reformed sensitivities about eucharistic theology. Moultrie's great-grandfather had settled in South Carolina, but after siding with England during the American Revolution, he had moved back to Britain. Educated at Exeter College, Oxford, England, Moultrie served as a pastor and chaplain in the Church of England. In addition to writing his own hymns he prepared translations of Greek, Latin, and German hymns. He also edited several hymnals, including Hymns and Lyrics for the Seasons and Saints' Days (1867) and Cantica Sanctorum or Hymns for the Black Letter Saints' Days in the English and Scottish Calendars (1880).
The text contains much language which is unfamiliar today:  the concept of approaching God with so much awe that it causes “fear and trembling”. Seraphim are a type of celestial being in the highest rank in the Christian angelic hierarchy. A passage in the Book of Isaiah (Isaiah 6:1-8) used the term to describe six-winged beings that fly around the Throne of God crying "holy, holy, holy".  This throne scene, with its triple invocation of holiness (a formula that came to be known as the Trisagion), profoundly influenced subsequent theology, literature, and art.  Its influence is frequently seen in works depicting angels, heaven and apotheosis. Seraphs are mentioned as celestial beings in an influential Hellenistic work, the Book of Enoch, and the Book of Revelation.  Cherubim are a winged angelic beings who are represented in ancient Middle Eastern art as a lion or bull with eagles' wings and a human face, and regarded in traditional Christian angelology as an angel of the second highest order of the ninefold celestial hierarchy. Cherubim are mentioned throughout the Old Testament and once in the New Testament in reference to the mercy seat of the Ark of the Covenant (Hebrews 9:5).

What Wondrous Love is This

What Wondrous Love Is This is sometimes described as a "white spiritual", from the American South. Its text was first published in 1811, during the Second Great Awakening, and its melody derived that of from an English popular ballad. The hymn's lyrics were first published in Lynchburg, Virginia in the c. 1811 camp meeting songbook A General Selection of the Newest and Most Admired Hymns and Spiritual Songs Now in Use. The lyrics may also have been printed, in a slightly different form, in the 1811 book Hymns and Spiritual Songs, Original and Selected published in Lexington, Kentucky. In most early printings, the hymn's text was attributed to an anonymous author, though the 1848 hymnal The Hesperian Harp attributes the text to a Methodist pastor from Oxford, Georgia named Alexander Means.  Camp meeting attendees during the Second Great Awakening would sing the hymns printed in these hymnals to a variety of popular melodies, including "The Ballad of Captain Kidd", which was well known at the time; this is likely how the text and melody came to be paired.  The text and melody were first published together in The Southern Harmony, a book of shape note hymns compiled by William Walker.  In 1966, the United Methodist Hymnal became the first standard hymnal to incorporate “What Wondrous Love Is This”.  Today it is a widely known hymn included in many hymnals. 

Ah, Holy Jesus

"Herzliebster Jesu" (often translated into English as "Ah, Holy Jesus", sometimes as "O Dearest Jesus") is a German hymn written in 1630 by Johann Heermann. Heerman took his inspiration for "Ah, Holy Jesus" from a Latin text attributed to either Augustine (354-430) or Jean de Fecamp (c.1000-1079). The poetry was originally published in a fifteenth-century devotional book entitled Meditationes sanctorum patrum. Heerman's hymn version first appeared in his Devoti Musica Cordis, ca. 1630. Heerman wrote during the Thirty Years War, a time when many hymn writers became introspective. Writing during this time of uncertainty and trouble, Heerman's hymn emerged from a backdrop of his own personal suffering.

Its tune, also called "Herzliebster Jesu", was written ten years later by Johann Crüger. The hymn first appeared in Crüger's Neues vollkömmliches Gesangbuch Augsburgischer Confession (1640).

Were You There?

Were You There was likely composed by African-American slaves in the 19th century. It was first published in William Eleazar Barton's 1899 Old Plantation Hymns. In 1940, it was included in the Episcopal Church hymnal, making it the first spiritual to be included in any major American hymnal. As reported in Howard Thurman's autobiography, the song was one of Mahatma Gandhi's favorites

For a time, the slaves simply by-passed the New Testament, especially since their white taskmasters used it to justify slavery. But there was something about the man Jesus, hanging there upon the hard, wooden cross. Here was a man who was beaten like they were. He was spit upon. He was falsely accused. He was imprisoned for a crime he did not commit. Finally, he was hung on a tree, a method of execution familiar to the slaves. Through all of these indignities, Jesus prayed, "Father forgive them, for they know not what they do."  

"How was he able to forgive?" they questioned. "What was it that enabled him to love those who were unlovable?" Was he in pain? They were in pain. Did he have to drink the cup of suffering? They had to drink theirs, too. Yes, their cross was one with his cross. Jesus died for the sins of all men, of every color. He had to be who he said he was. How else could he have done what he did? In time, they embraced Jesus as their Savior, and they experienced His peace, His grace and forgiveness, and His hope for the future. From this relationship they were able to sing:

Were you there when they crucified my Lord?
Sometimes it causes me to tremble, to tremble.
Were you there when they crucified my Lord?

From the cross they felt a mighty emergence of the divine will, breaking down the barriers that separated man from man, and man from God. And so, instead of taking the destructive road to violence, many began to hum, then to sing, and sometimes to shout the spirituals - a cry to God for freedom and a declaration of faith in His ability to provide it.