May 13, 2018

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:

Wär Gott nicht mit uns diese Zeit – Georg Kauffmann

Martin Luther (1483-1546)  was a German professor of theology, composer, priest, monk, and a seminal figure in the Protestant Reformation.  Luther came to reject several teachings and practices of the Roman Catholic Church. He strongly disputed the Catholic view on indulgences as he understood it to be, that freedom from God's punishment for sin could be purchased with money. Luther proposed an academic discussion of the practice and efficacy of indulgences in his Ninety-five Theses of 1517. His refusal to renounce all of his writings at the demand of Pope Leo X in 1520 and the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V at the Diet of Worms in 1521 resulted in his excommunication by the Pope and condemnation as an outlaw by the Emperor.

Luther taught that salvation and, consequently, eternal life are not earned by good deeds but are received only as the free gift of God's grace through the believer's faith in Jesus Christ as redeemer from sin. His theology challenged the authority and office of the Pope by teaching that the Bible is the only source of divinely revealed knowledge from God and opposed sacerdotalismby considering all baptized Christians to be a holy priesthood. Those who identify with these, and all of Luther's wider teachings, are called Lutherans, though Luther insisted on Christian or Evangelical as the only acceptable names for individuals who professed Christ.

His translation of the Bible into the vernacular (instead of Latin) made it more accessible to the laity, an event that had a tremendous impact on both the church and German culture. It fostered the development of a standard version of the German language, added several principles to the art of translation,^[5]and influenced the writing of an English translation, the Tyndale Bible. His hymns influenced the development of singing in Protestant churches. 

Luther was a prolific hymnodist, authoring hymns such as "Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott" ("A Mighty Fortress Is Our God"), based on Psalm 46, and "Vom Himmel hoch, da komm ich her" ("From Heaven Above to Earth I Come"), based on Luke 2:11–12. Luther connected high art and folk music, also all classes, clergy and laity, men, women and children. His tool of choice for this connection was the singing of German hymns in connection with worship, school, home, and the public arena. He often accompanied the sung hymns with a lute, later recreated as the waldzither that became a national instrument of Germany in the 20th century.

"Wär Gott nicht mit uns diese Zeit" (Were God not with us at this time) is a Lutheran hymn, with words written by Martin Luther based on the Psalm 124. The hymn in three stanzas of seven lines each was first published in Johann Walter's Eyn geystlich Gesangk Buchleyn. in 1524. It was translated to English and has appeared in 20 hymnals.

Were God not with us at this time, Let Israel now repeat it,
Were God not with us at this time, We’d surely be defeated;
For we’re a wretched lot, we find, Held in contempt by all mankind,
Who cruelly do beset us.

So wrathful toward us their intent, Had God let men o’erpow’r us,
They’d us with gnashing teeth have rent, With life and limb devoured us;
We would have been as men who drown When raging waters draw them down
And mighty floods o’erwhelm them.

Thanks be to God, who did not let Their gaping maw consume us;
As when a bird escapes the net, Grim death could not entomb us;
The snare is rent, and we are free, The Lord’s strong name with us shall be,
The God of earth and heaven.

Georg Friedrich Kauffmann (1679-1735) was a Baroque composer and organist from southern Germany who composed primarily sacred works for the organ and voice.  Late in his life, Kauffmann started to publish a complete edition of his organ chorales; however, he died of consumption before they had been completely published. His widow completed the publication of the Harmonische Seelenlust.  While they did not make a great first impression, over the next century they became one of the most significant achievements in German organ music and remained in high demand well into the 19th century.

Psalm-Prelude – Herbert Howells

Herbert Norman Howells (1892- 1983) was an English composer, organist, and teacher, most famous for his large output of Anglican church music.  Howells was born in Lydney, Gloucestershire, the youngest of the six children of Oliver Howells, a plumber, painter, decorator and builder, and his wife Elizabeth. His father played the organ at the local Baptist church, and Herbert himself showed early musical promise, first assisting his father, and then moving at the age of eleven to the local Church of England parish church as choirboy and unofficial assistant organist.   In 1912, Howells moved to London to study at the Royal College of Music.  Howells' promise seemed likely to be cut short in 1915 when he was diagnosed with Graves' disease and given six months to live. His poor health prevented him from being conscripted in World War I.  At St Thomas' Hospital he was given the previously untried treatment of radium injections in the neck, administered twice a week over a period of two years. For much of this time Howells travelled between London for treatment and Lydney where he was nursed by his mother.  In 1920, he joined the staff of the Royal College of Music, where he was to remain until 1979.

In September 1935, Howells' placid existence as teacher, adjudicator and occasional composer was abruptly shattered when his nine-year-old son Michael contracted polio during a family holiday, dying in London three days later. Howells was deeply affected and continued to commemorate the event until the end of his life.  From that point on Howells turned increasingly to choral and organ music.    In 1941, Howells became  organist of St John's College, Cambridge.   Howells continued to compose until his late 80s.   He died in 1983, and his ashes were interred in Westminster Abbey.   Howells was appointed CBE in 1953 and Companion of Honour in 1972.

Howells wrote six psalm-preludes, which are freely composed pieces inspired by verses from the Psalms.  This prelude is based on Psalm 139:11-12

            If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me,

and the light around me become night,”

            Even the darkness is not dark to you;

            The night is as bright as the day,

            For darkness is as light to you.

Postludium super "Benedictus Es, Domine" - Leo Sowerby

Canticle based on the Apocryphal Song of the Three Young Men, verses 29-34. The canticle offers glory and praise to God and concludes with a doxology. It is also known as "A Song of Praise."  This canticle is the first part of the song that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego sang in the burning fiery furnace. The benedicite is the main part of that song and is sung as a separate canticle, and like the rest of the song, is found in the bible either as an addition to the book of Daniel, in chapter 3, or as a separate book in the apocrypha

Blessed art thou, O Lord God of our fathers;
praised and exalted above all forever.

Blessed art thou for the name of thy Majesty;
praised and exalted above all forever.

Blessed art thou in the temple of thy holiness;
praised and exalted above all forever.

Blessed art thou that beholdest the depths, and dwellest between the Cherubim;
praised and exalted above all forever.

Blessed art thou on the glorious throne of thy kingdom;
praised and exalted above all forever.

Blessed art thou in the firmament of heaven;
praised and exalted above all forever.

Blessed art thou, O Father, Son, and Holy Spirit;
praised and exalted above all forever.

Leo Sowerby (1895-1968) was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where he began to compose at the age of ten. His interest in the organ began at the age of 15.  Early recognition came when his violin concerto was premiered in 1913 by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra  In 192, he was awarded the Rome Prize (from the American Academy in Rome).  He joined the American Conservatory of Music faculty in 1924. In 1946, he received the Pulitzer Prize for Music for his cantata, the Canticle of the Sun.  In 1927, he became organist-choirmaster at St James’s Episcopal Church, Chicago.  In 1962, after his retirement from St James’s, he was called to Washington National Cathedral to become the founding director of the College of Church Musicians, a position he held until his death.  His substantial output includes over 500 works in every genre but opera and ballet.

Leo Sowerby came of age at the same time as did American music. With a few isolated exceptions, American composers before the 1920s had merely tried to imitate the voices of their Central European teachers, but Sowerby's generation, led by such men as George Gershwin, Virgil Thomson, Aaron Copland, Roy Harris, and Walter Piston, took the old European forms and poured into them music which sounded distinctly American in its melody, harmony, and rhythm. They did so at a time when the organ not only fulfilled its traditional role as an instrument of worship but was a central part of the secular musical life of America as well. Big pipe organs in the symphonic style from the shops of Skinner, Austin, and others represented the cutting edge of style and technology and were everywhere in the 20s and 30s: in movie theaters and hotel ballrooms, in concert halls and high school auditoriums, in the mansions and even the yachts of the well-to-do. Great organists drew audiences that regularly numbered in the thousands and occasionally in the tens of thousands. Even the organ's role as a liturgical instrument was much more prominent in the general consciousness: a major New York newspaper then had a regular column called The Choir Loft which chronicled the news and repertoire of the city's leading church choirs, a situation unimaginable today. These two trends, of a distinctly American musical style and of the symphonic organ as an instrument that was central to the American listening experience, came together in the music of Leo Sowerby. In the school of American symphonic composers, only Sowerby, Paul Creston, and Virgil Thomson were organists (and Thomson for only a short time early in his career). Sowerby was the one who extended the reach of the American symphonists into the mainstream repertoire of his instrument.

About the Choral Music:

The Storm is Passing Over – Barbara Baker

Along with Thomas Dorsey, Rev. Charles Tindley (1851-1933) is considered one of the fathers of modern Black gospel music.  He wrote more than sixty hymns and gospel songs, including “I’ll Overcome Someday”, which later became the significant Civil Rights anthem “We Shall Overcome”.  “The Storm is Passing Over” was published in a collection of Tindley’s songs in 1905.  

The son of slaves, Tindley was born free in Maryland but worked as a hired plantation worker alongside slaves and other “hired on’s” for much of his youth.  After the Civil War, he moved to Philadelphia, one of many who left rural life for the hope and promise of urban centers.  In the evenings, he enlisted the help of tutors to learn to read not only English, but also Greek and Hebrew.  Eventually, he became the pastor of the Methodist church where he was first a janitor.  It is now known as the Tindley Temple United Methodist Church.  Tindley is equally known as a tremendous preacher and an activist for racial equality and social injustice.

One overriding characteristic of Black gospel is the critical importance of the message that needs to be transmitted.  As Marvin Curtis writes, “It is not so much about the performance medium, as it is about the meaning of the performance. This is music that tells a story about what it means to be free, to be redeemed.”
 

Have courage my soul and let us journey on.

Though the night is dark and I am far from home.

Thanks be to God the morning light appears.

The storm is passing over, The storm is passing over.

The storm is passing over, Hallelu.

Dr. Barbara Baker is an active teacher, arranger, and clinician with a nationally recognized reputation.  She currently directs choral ensembles at Eleanor Roosevelt High School in Greenbelt, Maryland, as well as the Gospel Choir at the Colesville United Methodist Church in Silver Spring, Maryland. She is the recipient of the Maryland Award for Excellence.

About the Hymns:

And Are We Yet Alive

Charles Wesley (1707-1788) first wrote this hymn for his 1749 collection, Hymns and Sacred Poems. John Wesley included it in A Collection of Hymns for the Use of the People Called Methodist (1780) at the beginning of the section titled, "For the Society... at meeting." Sometime around its appearance in the 1780 collection, Wesley began using this hymn at the opening of annual society meetings, a practice that has remained largely in use since. Every year around the world, Methodists gathered together in "holy conference" stand and sing the nostalgic strains of Wesley's text, recalling the journey of the last 12 months.   For many of us who have served as delegates to annual conference, it may be the face of a longtime friend who has been absent from our sight for an entire year. And although there have been many troubles and conflicts "since we assembled last" (stanza 3), we are able to embrace each other in the fellowship we share in Christ and pick up right where we left off.

While John Wesley's decision to appropriate his brother's hymn text for holy conferencing assured it near immortality in the Methodist psyche, his editing significantly altered the theology of Charles' text. Charles originally conceived his text in four eight-line stanzas instead of the six four-line stanzas we have today. Even the casual mathematician will already have noted that one of the original stanzas has been dropped. The original four stanzas represent a progression through the Wesleyan "way of salvation." The first stanza reminds us that God's prevenient grace has been present with us, preserving and protecting us even in our absence from one another; the second that God's justifying grace has saved us from sin and imputed to us his righteousness. In the third stanza, we see that God's redeeming grace has saved us and starts the work of regeneration in us. The final (omitted) stanza reminds us that God's sanctifying grace continues to work in us until the day we finally meet Christ, moving us from our imperfect state to entire sanctification. 

Lowell Mason arranged DENNIS and first published it in The Psaltery (1845), a hymnal he compiled with George. Webb.  Mason attributed the tune to Johann G. Nageli (1773-1836) but included no source reference. Nageli presumably published the original melody as the setting for "0 selig, selig, wervor dir" in his Christliches Gesangbuch (1828). Nageli was an influential music educator who lectured throughout Germany and France. Influenced by Johann Pestalozzi, he published his theories of music education in Gangbildungslehre (1810), a book that made a strong impact on Lowell Mason. Nageli composed mainly" choral works, including settings of Goethe's poetry. He received his early instruction from his father, then in Zurich, where he concentrated on the music of J. S. Bach. In Zurich, he also established a lending library and a publishing house, which published first editions of Beethoven’s piano sonatas and music by Bach, Handel, and Frescobaldi. The tune name DENNIS is thought to refer to a town in Massachusetts.

Where Charity and Love Prevail

Omer Westendorf (1916-1997) was one of the leading composers following the liturgical reforms of the Second Vatican Council.  Beginning at age 20, he received his master’s degree in music at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, and for most of his professional musical career served as organist and choirmaster at St. Bonaventure Church in Cincinnati. Under his direction the Bonaventure Choir sang concerts and recorded sacred music for several decades.  One of his greatest achievements was the founding of the World Library of Sacred Music in 1950 and World Library Publications in 1957. These organizations have been primary distributors of music for the Mass in the United States and beyond.

Westendorf was also known for his lectures and seminars on sacred music, consultations on liturgical music and as a hymn writer.  Westendorf’s People’s Mass Book, 1964, was the first vernacular hymn and service book to implement the Catholic liturgies decreed by Vatican Council II. He wrote Music Lessons for the Man in the Pew to teach the art of sight reading choral music.

“Where charity and love prevail” (1961) provides an English hymn version of a 9th-century Latin hymn, “Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est” (Where there is charity and love, God is there) based on 1 John 4:16. Traditionally, this is the final hymn on Maundy Thursday, called in the Latin tradition Mandatum novum (New Commandment), referring to the act of washing of the disciples’ feet initiated by Jesus.

Scholar H. Myron Braun comments on this ancient ritual: “[The Latin chant] is said to date from the ninth century . . . with its emphasis on community within the faith, on Christians holding one another in love and concern . . . It is appropriate for . . . [Maundy Thursday] when we note the “new commandment” that we love one another, and also several times in Eastertide when the lectionary leads us to reading on love from the Gospel and the epistles of John.”

The text draws directly on John 13:34, “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.” This version appeared first in Westendorf’s People’s Mass Book (1976). 

Composed by Alexander R. Reinagle (1799-1877), ST. PETER was published as a setting for Psalm 118 in Reinagle's Psalm Tunes for the Voice and Pianoforte (c. 1836). The tune first appeared with Newton's text in Hymns Ancient and Modern (1861); it is now usually associated with this text, for which it is a better match than for Psalm 118. The tune was named after St. Peter-in-the-East, the church in Oxford, England, where Reinagle was organist from 1822-1853.  Little is known ofReinagle's early life. Of Austrian descent, he came from a family of musicians and became a well-known organ teacher. A writer of teaching manuals for string instruments, Reinagle also compiled two books of hymn tunes, the 1836 collection and A Collection of Psalm and Hymn Tunes (1840).He also composed a piano sonata and some church music.