July 22, 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:

Mir nach, spricht Christus, unser Held – Johann Christoph Oley

Johann Scheffler (1624-1677) was born in Silesia. His father, Stanislaus Scheffler, was a member of the Polish nobility, but had been forced to leave his fatherland because of his adherence to Lutheranism. Johann was thus educated as a strict Lutheran. After passing through the St. Elisabeth's Gymnasium at Breslau, he attended at the University of Strassburg to study medicine. He went to Leyden and Padua, where he graduated with a Ph.D. and M.D.  Thereafter he returned to Silesia and, was appointed private physician to Duke Sylvius Nimrod of Württemberg-Oels. The Duke was a staunch Lutheran, and his court preacher, Christoph Freitag, administered the ecclesiastical affairs of the district according to the strictest Lutheran churchly orthodoxy. Scheffler had become acquainted with the writings of Jakob Böhme, and had become a personal friend of Abraham von Frankenberg, the editor of Böhme's works. He soon found that the spiritual atmosphere of Oels did not suit him. His own leanings at this time were distinctly to Mysticism and Separatism. He withdrew from public worship, from confession, and from the Holy Communion. When he wished to publish his poems, and submitted them for this purpose to Freitag, he was refused permission to print them on the grounds of their mystical tendencies. He resigned his post and went to Breslau where he became acquainted with the Jesuits, and through them was introduced to the study of the mediaeval mystics of the Roman Catholic Church.  He was formally received into the Roman Catholic communion, and at his confirmation on that day at St. Matthias's Church in Breslau, he took the name of Angelus, probably after a Spanish mystic of the 16th cent, named John ab Angelis.  The Emperor Ferdinand III conferred on him the title of Imperial Court Physician, but this was purely honorary, and Scheffler remained at Breslau. He entered the order of St. Francis, was ordained priest at Neisse in Silesia, and was appointed Rath and Hofmarschall to his friend Sebastian von Rostock, the newly created Prince Bishop of Breslau. After the Bishop's death in 1671, Scheffler retired to the monastery of St. Matthias in Breslau,

Scheffler's most important hymnological work is his Heilige Seelenlust, oder geistliche Hirten-Lieder, der in ihren Jesum verliebten Psyche, gesungen von Johann Angelo Silesio, und von Herrn Georgio Josepho mit aussbündig schönen Melodeyen geziert, &c.  These hymns are the work of a true poet, almost perfect in style and in beauty of rhythm, concise and profound; the fruits indeed it may be said of Mysticism, but of Mysticism chastened and kept in bounds by deep reverence and by a true and fervent love to the Saviour. Scheffler holds a high place among German sacred poets, and is the finest of the Post-Reformation Roman Catholic hymn-writers.

In some English books Scheffler appears as a composer of hymn-tunes. This is a mistake, for the melodies in the Heilige Seelenlust are by Georg Joseph, a musician living at that time in Breslau.

“Mir nach, spricht Christus, unser Held”, founded on Matthew 16:24, has been characterised as a masterpiece of Scriptural didactic poetry. It was published in Scheffler's Heilige Seelenlust  in 6 stanzas, titled "She [the Soul] encourages to the following of Christ."   “Come, follow me, our Lord doth call” is a good translation of four stanzas by A. T. Russell, as in the Dalston Hospital Hymn Book, 1848.

            “Come follow me,” our Lord doth call, “self and the world forsaking:

            My path pursue: O come ye all, your cross upon you talking.

            I am the Light, and I the Way, So shall you not in darkness stray.

            “My heart is all humility; My soul with love o’erfloweth,

            Sweet peace on you, peace from on high, My every word bestoweth.

            All ill to shun, - to cleanse the heart, - Such knowledge do my lips impart.

            “I am the refuge of the soul; I am the gate of heaven;

            Is danger near? I all control; To guide you, I am given.

            I go before you.  Shame to those Who fear with me to meet their foes.”

            Then let us each his cross sustain, Our Savior’s path pursuing;

            Each willingly endure the pain, With Him our strength renewing.

            For ne’er to him who fears the strife, will Jesus give the crown of life.

Johann Christoph Oley (1738-1789) was a German organist and composer. There is some evidence that he studied with J.S. Bach for a short time in 1749.  In 1755, he became organist of the church in Bernburg, but moved to the church of St Stephan in neighboring Aschersleben in January 1762, because of its superior organ. To augment his salary, he assumed the duties of assistant schoolmaster as well.  Contemporaries praised Johann Christoph Oley’s skill on the keyboard and organ, and his compositions attracted some interest. His organ writing reminded Johann Friedrich Agricola, another Bach pupil, of the glories of an earlier age.  

Tuba Tune – C. S. Lang

The Tuba is the one of most powerful organ stops. While some authorities describe this chorus reed as a large-scaled Trumpet, others characterize its tone as being more “closed” than that of the Trumpet. Indeed, Bonavia-Hunt states that some Tubas are close-toned, while others are free-toned in the French manner. The closed-toned variety was developed in England, first introduced in 1825 under the name Ophicleide by William Hill, and later perfected by Henry Willis. A minimum of 8" to 10" of wind is required (compared to 3-4” for the rest of the organ), and higher pressures are common. It is constructed in the manner of a large-scale Trumpet, though often with closed shallots. Double-length resonators are often used, even triple-length in the treble. It is most commonly found at 8' pitch.

Craig Sellar Lang 1891-1971) was a New Zealand-born British organist, composer and music teacher.  Born in Hastings, New Zealand, CS Lang (known to his friends as "Robin") was educated at Clifton College and the Royal College of Music.  He was an ARCM and received his Doctor of Music from The University of Durham. In 1929 he was appointed Director of Music at Christ's Hospital school in Horsham, West Sussex, where the choristers of Westminster Abbey were briefly evacuated to during the Second World War. Lang resigned from this post in 1945 in order to devote more time to examining and composition. His instructional works, aimed at students, were highly influential. Generations of organists were brought up on his Harmony at the Keyboard, Exercises in Score Reading, as well as his books entitled Exercises for Organists, designed to prepare organ students for the keyboard tests of the Royal College of Organists' diploma exams.  An obituary recorded his "personal magnetism" and determination to awaken "the budding musicianship of every sort of pupil".

CS Lang's choral music includes service settings (such as the Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis in B flat, Op.16), and anthems such as He shall give his angels charge over thee (1941). There are also many anthems for trebles' voices, composed for use at Christ's Hospital, as well as numerous secular choral works.  His best-known work is the Tuba Tune for organ, Opus 15, a favourite of recitalists. This dashing little piece, which owes its title to the boisterous melody sounded forth on the organ's tuba stop, begins in the style of Handel but, in its central section, has some brief key changes that could belong to no century except the 20th. Lang's numerous other works for organ include a lengthy Sonata in D minor (Op. 47, 1947), the Introduction and Passacaglia in A minor (Op.51, 1952), the Fugue-Trilogy on E.G.B. (Op. 58, 1952), and many hymn preludes and sets of preludes and fugues.

About the Piano Music:

Children’s Song Medley – Mark Hayes

The song “Jesus Loves the Little Children” has been listed as a hymn, a prayer, and a nursery rhyme. It is one of the first songs small children learn in church, perhaps second only to Jesus Loves Me.

The tune was written by George Frederick Root as an 1864 Civil War tune titled “Tramp, Tramp, Tramp, the Boys are Marching.”  Root (1820-1895) studied in Boston, New York, and Paris. He became an established music educator and composer, noted for sacred and patriotic music. Among his credits are “The Battle Cry of Freedom,” “Just Before the Battle, Mother,” “The Shining Shore,” and “The First Gun Is Fired” which was written in April 1861 after the firing on Fort Sumter.

In 1853, with William Bradbury, Root established the New York Institute for “affordable instruction and especially quality teachers of music.” The Institute was in business until 1871 when it was destroyed by fire. Named after George Frideric Handel, he was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970

Later the words of “Jesus Love the Little Children” were written for the tune by one of Root’s favorite lyricists, Clare Herbert Woolston. There is little information about Chicago-born C. Herbert Woolston (1856-1927). However, the songwriter is said to have been inspired by Matthew 19:14 where Jesus says, “Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to such as these.” In this verse, the disciples were afraid the children would bother Jesus, but Jesus wants children to come to him.

Jesus loves the little children, All the children of the world

Red, brown, yellow, black and white: They are precious in His sight.

Jesus loves the little children of the world.

Jesus died for all the children, All the children of the world

Red, brown, yellow, black and white: They are precious in His sight.

Jesus died for all the children of the world.

Jesus rose for all the children, All the children of the world

Red, brown, yellow, black and white: They are precious in His sight.

Jesus rose for all the children of the world.

"I'll Be a Sunbeam" (also called "Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam") is a popular children's Christian hymn composed by Nellie Talbot; it is sung to music composed in 1900 by Edwin O. Excell. Published in Chicago by Excell in his Praises in 1905, the words and music were anthologized at least three more times in other hymnals before 1923. Virtually nothing is known about lyricist Nellie Talbot; attempts to search census records suggest that she may have been born in Missouri in 1874 and was living in Chicago in 1910, but these identifications are speculative. Edwin Othello Excell (December 13, 1851 – June 10, 1921), commonly known as E. O. Excell, was a prominent American publisher, composer, song leader, and singer of music for church, Sunday school, and evangelistic meetings during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He was born in Uniontown, Stark County, Ohio and attended public schools in Ohio and Pennsylvania. After marrying in 1871 near Brady's Bend, Pennsylvania, he relocated to that state and supported his family for several years as a plasterer, bricklayer, and singing instructor.^[7] His focus was turned to sacred music through his experience leading songs at revivals and worship services of Methodist Episcopal churches, first in East Brady and then, starting in 1881, Oil City, Pennsylvania. Between 1877 and 1883 he studied music formally at the Normal Musical Institutes of George F. Root where he also received vocal training under Root's son, Frederick. He moved to Chicago, base of Root's operations, in 1883 to pursue music publishing in earnest.Excell compiled or contributed to about ninety secular and sacred song books and is estimated to have written, composed, or arranged more than two thousand of the songs he published.  The music publishing business he started in 1881 and that eventually bore his name was the highest volume producer of hymnbooks in America at the time of his death.

Jesus wants me for a sunbeam, To shine for Him each day;
In every way try to please Him, At home, at school, at play.

A sunbeam, a sunbeam, Jesus wants me for a sunbeam;
A sunbeam, a sunbeam, I’ll be a sunbeam for Him.

Jesus wants me to be loving, And kind to all I see;
Showing how pleasant and happy His little one can be.

I will ask Jesus to help me To keep my heart from sin,
Ever reflecting His goodness, And always shine for Him.

I’ll be a sunbeam for Jesus; I can if I but try;
Serving Him moment by moment, Then live with Him on high.

The author of the hymn “Praise Him, Praise Him, All Ye Little Children” is unknown.  The tune, BONNER, was written by Carey Bonner (1859-1938), who entered the Baptist ministry after studying at Rawdon College, and held pastorates at Sale, Manchester and Portland, Southampton. He was Secretary of the Sunday School Union and edited words and music of the Garland of New Sunday School Music (issued in parts, 1881 and 1882; complete edition 1886), and the S. S. Hymnary, 1905; and the music of the Christian Endeavour Hymnal, 1896, and the Junior Hymnal, 1906.

Praise him, praise him, all ye little children, God is love, God is love;
Praise him, praise him, all ye little children, God is love, God is love.

Love him, love him, all ye little children, God is love, God is love;
Love him, love him, all ye little children, God is love, God is love.

Thank him, thank him, all ye little children, God is love, God is love,
Thank him, thank him, all ye little children, God is love, God is love.

Mark Hayes is an award-winning concert pianist, composer, arranger and conductor. His personal catalog, totaling over 1,000 published works, includes work for solo voice, solo piano, multiple pianos, orchestra, jazz combo, small instrumental ensembles, and choruses of all kinds.  Mark received a Bachelor of Music degree summa cum laude in Piano Performance from Baylor University in 1975. He has conducted the SWACDA and MCDA Community and Church Honor Choir, and served as guest conductor at Carnegie Hall, featuring his Te Deum and Magnificat. In 2010, Baylor University Center for Christian Music Studies awarded Mark the Award for Exemplary Leadership in Christian Music. Mark arranged and orchestrated the music for Civil War Voices, which won six awards including "Best Musical" in the 2010 Midtown International Theatre Festival in New York. He conducted the world premiere of his work for chorus, orchestra and narrator, The American Spirit, at Lincoln Center in May 2011 and the world premiere of his Requiem in Lincoln Center in May 2013.  Whether concertizing on the other side of the globe or composing at his home in Kansas City, Missouri, Mark is blessed to live out his mission "to create beautiful music for the world".

About the Choral Music:

Swing Low – Dick Anthony

“Swing Low Sweet Chariot” is among the most treasured and widely recognized African American spirituals.  It was placed in the National Archives by the Library of Congress and identified as one of the “Songs of the Century” by the Recording Industry Association of America and the National Endowment for the Arts.  It was first recorded by the Fisk Jubilee Singers in 1909.  But while the spiritual’s music and lyrics are widely known, the song’s history is a bit cloudy. According to many accounts, “Swing Low Sweet Chariot” was one of the spirituals born from the experience of slaves in the first decades of the 19th century.  Composed by unknown slaves over time and passed orally from community to community, the song allegedly voiced slaves’ hopes that ultimately they would find comfort in a heavenly home. 

Yet some music historians have added another layer to this account of the song’s origins.  They have argued that “Swing Low Sweet Chariot” was one of the spirituals that conveyed a secret meaning to slaves.  Slave spirituals did a lot more than offer a promise of eventual redemption; they also offered specific strategies needed to escape.  For example, “Wade in the Water” taught runaway slaves how to throw off the bloodhounds sent to track them down.  “Follow the Drinking Gourd” provided slaves with an elaborate coded map that would lead them to the North and freedom: the refrain told them to keep their eye on the Big Dipper (the drinking gourd) as the stars marking the edge of its cup pointed to Polaris, the North Star.   According to these historians, “Swing Low Sweet Chariot” was another in this collection of coded spirituals.  In fact, according to some, it was one of Harriet Tubman’s favorites.  The heroic conductor on the Underground Railroad made her own escape to freedom in 1849.  She returned south the next year to lead her sister and her two children north.  Over the next ten years, she made another 18 trips into slave states and escorted an estimated 300 slaves to freedom.  Legend has it that slaves sang “Swing low sweet chariot, comin’ for to carry me home” to announce that Tubman or another “conductor” would be arriving soon to lead them to freedom.

Yet while Tubman’s heroics were real, not everyone is convinced that the spiritual played a part in her adventures.  In fact, most music historians now believe that the song’s writer is not even unknown.  The composer, “Uncle Wallis” Willis, was a slave in Mississippi before the Civil War.  But his owner was not your typical Southern planter—Britt Willis was a Choctaw Indian.  Britt Willis was among the Choctaws forced to move west, and he took his slaves, including Wallis, with him.  In the Oklahoma Territory, Britt succeeded in rebuilding his life on a large plantation near Doaksville, and it is quite possible that Wallis wrote “Swing Low Sweet Chariot” while living as a slave there.  Ironically, though, the song circulated first among young Choctaw boys, not among slaves.  Britt hired Wallis out to the Spencer Academy, a Choctaw boys’ school, and this song was one of several that that Wallis sang to entertain the students.  In fact, according to some accounts, the song was not widely circulated among African Americans until after the Civil War, when the superintendent of the Spencer Academy, Alexander Reid, shared the song with the Fisk Jubilee Singers.

The song’s power may lie in that it was born in the convergence of two great tragedies within American history: the horrors of African slavery and the injustice of Native American removal. Its prayer that someday the singers would find a resting place could as easily speak to one mistreated people as the other.

Dick Anthony (b. 1932) born into a Baptist family which was very involved with religious music.  His aunt was the organist for the Waukegan church his family attended and both of his parents were members of the church choir.  He began studying music at age seven; his parents hoped he would be able to play for church services. He graduated in 1949 from Waukegan Township High School, attended Bethel College, St. Paul, Minnesota, and majored in vocal performance at American Conservatory of Music, Chicago. Anthony worked as a radio presenter with Jack Wyrtzen's "Word of Life" radio broadcasts and "Songtime" weekly show on the ABC television network from New York City. He worked with gospel songwriter John W. Peterson on a daily radio program called "Cheer Up.  Anthony published more than 30 collections of original compositions and arrangements for various vocal and instrumental groups.  In 1995 Anthony retired to Fort Worth, Texas where he served for 14 years as organist at Birchman Baptist Church. In 2015, Anthony was recognized for his years of work with Moody Radio with a Media Award from the National Religious Broadcasters.

            Swing low, sweet chariot, Comin’ for to carry me home!

            I looked over Jordan, and what did I see? A band of angels comin’ after me.

            If you get to heaven before I do, Tell all my friends that I’m a-comin’ too.

About the Hymns:

Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee

"The Hymn of Joy" (often called "Joyful, Joyful We Adore Thee" after the first line) is a poem written by Henry van Dyke in 1907 with the intention of musically setting it to the famous "Ode to Joy" melody of the final movement of Ludwig van Beethoven's final symphony, Symphony No. 9.   Van Dyke wrote this poem in 1907 while staying at the home of Williams College president Harry Augustus Garfield. He was serving as a guest preacher at Williams at the time. He told his host that the local Berkshire Mountains had been his inspiration. The lyrics were first published in 1911 in Van Dyke's Book of Poems. 

Van Dyke wrote of this hymn: “These verses are simple expressions of common Christian feelings and desires in this present time—hymns of today that may be sung together by people who know the thought of the age, and are not afraid that any truth of science will destroy religion, or any revolution on earth overthrow the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, this is a hymn of trust and joy and hope.”  This hymn is generally considered by hymnologists to be one of the most joyous expressions of hymn lyrics in the English language.

Henry Van Dyke (1852-1933) chaired the committee that wrote the first Presbyterian printed liturgy, The Book of Common Worship of 1906. In 1908–09 Dr. van Dyke was an American lecturer at the University of Paris. By appointment of President Wilson, a friend and former classmate of van Dyke, he became Minister to the Netherlands and Luxembourg in 1913. He was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters and received many other honors.  Among his popular writings are the two Christmas stories, The Other Wise Man (1896) and The First Christmas Tree (1897). Various religious themes of his work are also expressed in his poetry, hymns and the essays collected in Little Rivers (1895) and Fisherman’s Luck (1899).

You Are Mine

David Robert Haas (b. 1957) is an American author and composer of contemporary Catholic liturgical music.  Haas studied vocal music performance and conducting at Central Michigan University, and has his degree in theology and music from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota. In addition to serving in parish liturgical ministry in Michigan, Iowa and Minnesota over the years, he also served as composer-in-residence at the St. Paul Seminary School of Divinity in St. Paul, Minnesota; and was also campus minister and artist-in-residence at Benilde-St. Margaret's in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, where he taught in the music and theology departments. In 1999, Haas began the program MUSIC MINISTRY ALIVE!, a five-day liturgical program for youth and adult leaders that takes place on the campus of St. Catherine University in St. Paul, Minnesota.

He has produced over forty-five original collections and recordings of liturgical music.  He is also the author of over 20 books on the topics of liturgy, music ministry, spirituality, religious education, and youth ministry.  Haas lives in Eagan, Minnesota, where he is the director of the Emmaus Center for Music, Prayer and Ministry. In the fall of 2011, Haas began work at Cretin-Derham Hall High School in St. Paul, Minnesota. He is a member of the Campus Ministry team there and is leader of the liturgical choir that sings at prayer gatherings throughout the school year. Haas is active as a cantor at St. Cecilia's Parish in St. Paul.

Haas has drawn the text for “You are Mine” from Isaiah 43.  An oracle of salvation, God gives his people a word of assurance and hope. Do not be afraid, “I will lift you from fear”. But perhaps even more than that, He not only declares that He created and formed us, but He also “summoned you by name, you are mine” says the Lord.  This salvation story discussed in Isaiah is no doubt a recollection of the Exodus and God’s saving act to bring the people through the rivers, but the rivers would not sweep over them. God’s saving act, which brings His people from the bondage to freedom, ultimately in the promised land.  God will bring us, whom he created, and formed, and has summoned by name, from the bondage of this earth to the promised land. And the first reminder is that “when we pass through the waters (the Jordan), He will be with us. And through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you. And when we walk through the fire, we shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you.”  God makes a decisive statement of fact for those who belong to the House of God, “You are mine!”