April 9, 2017

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.  

About the Organ Music:

All Glory, Laud, and Honor – Walter Anderson

Theodulf of Orleans (760-821) was originally from Spain. Muslim conquests of Iberia drove him to leave, and he was brought to France by Charlemagne. In addition to serving as a kind of poet laureate, he was a scholar, church reformer, secretary of education, theological advisor to the king.  His writings included sermons and theological treatises on baptism and the Holy Spirit. He opposed the use of icons and revised the text of the Bible. He became Bishop of Orleans about 785, and soon afterwards also Abbot of Fleury. After Charlemagne died, Louis the Pious accused Theodulf of joining Bernard of Italy (a royal nephew) in a conspiracy against the throne. Theodulf protested his innocence, but in 818, he was deposed from his influential posts and imprisoned at Angers, where he died in 821.  While imprisoned, he wrote the words to the Latin hymn "Gloria, laus et honor tibi sit Rex Christe, Redemptor " or "All Glory, Laud and Honor To thee Redeemer King."  More than a thousand years later, an English translation of his hymn remains a favorite for Palm Sunday.

Refrain:

All glory, laud, and honor, to thee, Redeemer, King, 
to whom the lips of children made sweet hosannas ring. 

Thou art the King of Israel, thou David's royal Son, 
who in the Lord's name comest, the King and Blessed One. 

The company of angels are praising thee on high, 
and we with all creation in chorus make reply. 

The people of the Hebrews with psalms before thee went; 
our prayer and praise and anthems before thee we present. 

To thee, before thy passion, they sang their hymns of praise; 
to thee, now high exalted, our melody we raise. 

Thou didst accept their praises; accept the prayers we bring, 
who in all good delightest, thou good and gracious King. 

Walter Anderson (b. 1989) was a young teen-aged organist in Minneapolis when he wrote this setting.   

Hosanna, Loud Hosanna – Theodore Ripper

Like "All Glory, Laud, and Honor" (375/376), this text is based on Christ's triumphal entry on Palm Sunday. However, "Hosanna, Loud Hosanna" focuses more on the children's role in that event. The text was written by Jeannette Threlfall (1821-1880) in an "idle moment" (as she says she wrote all of her hymns, all others of which have been forgotten). Undoubtedly, Threlfall had Mark 11 in mind when she wrote this text, but she also alludes to Jesus' welcoming of the children in Mark 10:13-16.   Threlfall's life was extremely difficult: she was orphaned at an early age, and two serious accidents caused her to be an invalid for life. But she bore her misfortune with grace and fortitude and maintained a ministry to many people who came in contact with her. Threlfall wrote devotional verse, which was published anonymously in various periodicals and later collected in Woodsorrel, or Leaves from a Retired Home (1856) and Sunshine and Shadow (1873), which included "Hosanna, Loud Hosanna."

            Hosanna, loud hosanna, the little children sang;                                                                                             through pillared court and temple the lovely anthem rang         .                                                                     To Jesus, who had blessed them, close folded to his breast,                                                                           the children sang their praises, the simplest and the best.   

From Olivet they followed mid an exultant crowd, 
the victor palm branch waving, and chanting clear and loud. 
The Lord of earth and heaven rode on in lowly state, 
nor scorned that little children should on his bidding wait. 

"Hosanna in the highest!" that ancient song we sing, 
for Christ is our Redeemer, the Lord of heaven our King. 
O may we ever praise him with heart and life and voice, 
and in his blissful presence eternally rejoice! 

Theodore W. Ripper (1925-2009) studied at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh where he earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts and later a Master of Fine Arts degree. Ripper was University Organist at the University of South Dakota and taught at Carnegie Mellon University from 1949 to 1955. In 1955, he because Minister of Music at Peachtree Christian church in Atlanta.  He later taught at Millikin University and was organist at First United Methodist Church in Decatur, Ill.  He retired to Carlsbad, NM, where he continued to be organist and music director at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Roswell.  He published works for both organ and choir.

About the Choral Music:

Hosanna, Loud Hosanna – Joel Raney

Joel Raney’s (b. 1956) taste for gospel music began in a rural Baptist church in Alabama, an influence that shows strongly in his work to this day. Joel's interest in music of all kinds has led to everything from classical and jazz performance to pop vocal arranging. He has conducted Broadway productions, and has been honored for outstanding musical direction of theater in both Chicago and Los Angeles. Since 1988 he has worked as a composer and producer of commercial music in Chicago and has written soundtracks for more than 2000 television and radio commercials, plus numerous scores for short films.  Joel is a choral and keyboard clinician, and performs throughout North America as a piano soloist and in duo-concert with organist Jane Holstein.  He has over 200 titles in print, including choral anthems, musicals and cantatas, handbell compositions, piano solos, and instrumental works. 

Jesus Walked This Lonesome Valley – Larry Shackley

“Jesus Walked This Lonesome Valley." first appeared in the 1816 shape-note hymnal, Kentucky Harmony.  It encourages us to bear our own burdens by reminding us that Jesus did so in His earthly life and death. This sensitive African-American spiritual addresses the earthly ministry of Christ, leading up to the crucifixion. Its first known recording was in 1927 by old-time musician David Miller. Through the years, this famous song was sung by many other gospel and country artists such as the Monroe Brothers, the Carter Family, and The Statler Brothers.

Larry Shackley (b. 1956) is a full-time composer and editor from Columbia, SC. From 1995-2007, he taught and directed the music program at Columbia International University in Columbia, SC. Prior to that, he worked for several years at the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago, creating original music and producing radio programs for the Moody Broadcasting Network. He has been active in church music since his teens, and served as staff keyboardist for ten years at Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, IL. He studied composition at the Eastman School of Music and earned his Master in Music and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees in composition from the University of South Carolina. His master's thesis, a concerto for English Horn, received its premiere performance in 2006 at the annual convention of the International Double Reed Society. Composer of over thirty scores for films, videotapes, and radio dramas, Shackley is also an active studio musician, arranger, and orchestrator. Over the past several years, he has devoted most of his composing to music for the church, producing over twenty books of keyboard arrangements and more than one hundred choral anthems.

             Jesus walked this lonesome valley.  He had to walk it by himself.

Nobody else could walk it for him.  He had to walk it by himself

  

See him walk with his disciples, teaching them how to watch and pray, watch and pray.

Yet, in a while, one of their number will the Savior Christ betray.

Hear him weeping for the city, for hardened hearts, for hearts he came to save.

He offered all the Father's mercy, but they refused the love he gave.

Jesus walked this lonesome valley.  He had to walk it by himself.

Oh, nobody else could walk it for him.  He had to walk it by himself.

           He had to walk it by himself.

About the Hymns:

Tell Me the Stories of Jesus

William Henry Parker (1845-1929) was an English businessman who taught Sunday school at Chelsea Street Baptist Church in Nottingham.  Early in life, he had written verses and this led him to compose hymns for use in Sunday School.  Thinking of the children in his classes who were always asking him to “tell us another story”, he wrote this text in 1885.  The melody was added when a publisher ran a contest to find an appropriate tune for it. 

God of Grace and God of Glory

“God of grace and God of glory” was written in 1930 by Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878-1969) for the dedication of the famous Riverside Church in New York City.   Fosdick was granted degrees from Colgate University and Union Theological Seminary. He was ordained in 1903 to ministry in the Baptist Church and became pastor of First Baptist Church, Montclair, N.J.   Fosdick served as a chaplain during World War I and then was pastor of First Presbyterian Church in New York City. From this congregation he was called to pastor Park Avenue Baptist Church, which was renamed Riverside Church.

“God of grace and God of glory” was written while the United States was in the throes of the Great Depression between the two World Wars. Fosdick was a champion of the social gospel, a movement that recognized the plight of the poor, especially in the urban Northeast during the Industrial Revolution.   UM Hymnal editor Carlton Young has noted: “Fosdick’s stirring radio sermons, books, and public pronouncements established Riverside as a forum for the critique of the same wealth and privilege whose gifts had made possible the building of the church.  Under his leadership Riverside Church was interdenominational, interracial, without a creed, and, astonishingly for Baptists, required no specific mode of baptism. At the center of Fosdick’s ministry was urban social ministry.”   Fosdick was perhaps the most vocal proponent of the social gospel of his time—a position that brought both wide acclaim and broad disdain.