May 12, 2019

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:

Marche de Fete - Arthur Metzner

Arthur (Adolphe) Maurice Metzner (1854-1914) was a French organist and composer who work works for organ and harmonium.  This march was originally written for harmonium.

The harmonium is a type of pump organ that generates sound with air passing through sets of reeds from a bellows that is supplied by pumping a pair of pedals.  More portable than pipe organs, reed organs were widely used in smaller churches and in private homes in the 19th century, but their volume and tonal range are limited, and they generally had one or sometimes two manuals, with pedal-boards being rare. Harmoniums reached the height of their popularity in the West in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. They were especially popular in small churches and chapels where a pipe organ would be too large or too expensive. Harmoniums generally weigh less than similar sized pianos and are not as easily damaged in transport, thus they were also popular throughout the colonies of the European powers in this period not only because it was easier to ship the instrument out to where it was needed, but it was also easier to transport overland in areas where good-quality roads and railways may have been non-existent. An added attraction of the harmonium in tropical regions was that the instrument held its tune regardless of heat and humidity, unlike the piano.  At the peak of the instruments' Western popularity around 1900, a wide variety of styles of harmoniums were being produced. These ranged from simple models with plain cases and only four or five stops (if any at all), up to large instruments with ornate cases, up to a dozen stops and other mechanisms such as couplers. Expensive harmoniums were often built to resemble pipe organs, with ranks of fake pipes attached to the top of the instrument.

About the Piano Music:

Peace Like a River - Carol Tornquist

“I’ve Got Peace Like a River” is an African-American spiritual, but the time and place of origin are unknown. It is a song of declaration using water as a simile to describe the qualities of peace, joy, and love in three stanzas. The image of the first stanza, “peace like a river,” may have come from Isaiah 66:12, where a similar picture is used.  The first three items of the “fruit of the Spirit” (Galatians 5:22) are love, joy, and peace. This spiritual compares the peace of God to a placidly flowing river, the joy of Christ to a merrily bubbling fountain, and the love of God to a deep, wide ocean.  The tune of this African-American spiritual developed with the text.

I’ve got peace like a river, I’ve got peace like a river in my soul.

I’ve got love like the ocean, I’ve got love like the ocean in my soul.

I’ve got joy like a fountain, I’ve got joy like a fountain in my soul.

Frances Havergal (1836-1979) wrote many hymns in her short 43 years. Frances was often called "England's Consecration Poet" because of her daily walk in life. Not only was her life dedicated to God but before she wrote any line of poetry she would seek God's face first then she would also remember to give Him all the glory for her new poem.

When Frances Havergal was vacationing in the south of Wales, 1876, she caught a severe cold, accompanied by inflammation of the lungs. Hearing how ill she was, and that she might die, she replied, "If I am really going, it is too good to be true." Her friends were amazed at how peacefully she received this information. She did survive that illness, and later that year she wrote the hymn "Like a River Glorious" in which she pointed to the source of her perfect peace: "Stayed upon Jehovah, hearts are fully blessed, finding, as He promised, perfect peace and rest."

Havergal, a devout Bible scholar, echoed Isaiah in "Like a River Glorious" in which God promises "peace like a river." She also incorporated Isaiah 26:3, which states "You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in You." "Like a River Glorious" paints the picture of this peace.  Havergal wrote to another hymn writer who had also written about peace. In her letter, she quoted Romans 5:1 "We have peace with God," adding "It is yours already, purchased for you, made for you, sealed for you, pledged to you – by the word of the Father and the precious blood of Jesus.”  The hymn was first published in its present form with the name "Perfect Peace," in Hymns of Consecration and Faith, 1876.

Like a river glorious is God's perfect peace, Over all victorious in its bright increase;
Perfect, yet it floweth, Fuller everyday, Perfect, yet it groweth, Deeper all the way.

Hidden in the hollow of His blessed hand, Never foe can follow, never traitor stand;
Not a surge of worry, not a shade of care, Not a blast of hurry touch the spirit there.

Every joy or trial falleth from above, Traced upon our dial by the sun of love;
We may trust Him fully all for us to do-They who trust Him wholly find Him wholly true.

Stayed upon Jehovah, Hearts are fully blest;
Finding as He promised, Perfect peace and rest.

Carol Tornquist grew up in northwestern Pennsylvania, where she began to play the piano by ear at age four. She then studied piano at the Warren Conservatory of Music through high school and earned her B.S. in Music Education from the State University of New York at Fredonia. Following graduation, Carol taught vocal music in upstate New York while also serving as an instructor for the international Yamaha Music School.  After visiting her songwriter brother, John W. Thompson, in Nashville, she was offered a job there writing piano transcriptions, which ultimately led to a career as an arranger in Christian music. She has since written hundreds of solo piano books for various Christian publishers, including two piano method series.

About the Handbell Music:

Blessed Assurance - Kevin McChesney

Tintinnabulators

Fanny Jane Crosby (1820-1915), born in New York and died in Connecticut, wrote over 8,500 gospel hymns. In 1972, Hope Publishing Co. found over 1,000 unpublished manuscripts. Her work defined what it meant to be a successful writer of gospel hymns.  By the age of six weeks, Fanny Crosby was completely blind. She entered the New York School for the Blind at age twelve. She began writing hymns and poetry at age twelve.  Her collaborators in publishing gospel hymns included the most successful and popular composers of her day, including William Bradbury, William Doane, Robert Lowry, Ira Sankey, and William Kirkpatrick. Crosby used numerous pen names in publishing her songs, including: Ella Dale, Mrs. Kate Gringley and Miss Viola V. A.  She married blind musician Alexander Van Alstyne, and the British most often refer to her by her married name rather than Fanny Crosby.  She was a lifelong Methodist and her contributions to The United Methodist Hymnal (1989) include: “Blessed Assurance,” “Close to Thee,” “I Am Thine, O Lord,” “Jesus, Keep Me Near the Cross,” “Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior,” “Rescue the Perishing,” and “To God Be the Glory.”

Phoebe Knapp (1839-1908) was a composer of music for hymns and an organist.  Knapp was born in New York City. Her parents were Walter C. Palmer and Phoebe Worrall Palmer.  She married Joseph Fairchild Knapp, one of the founders and the second president of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, and he had a pipe organ installed in their apartment.  She and her husband were members of the John Street Methodist Episcopal Church in New York City. The hymn writer Fanny Crosby was also a member of that church and a friend of the Phoebe’s.  She wrote over 500 hymn tunes, the most familiar being the tune now called Assurance for Fanny Crosby's lyrics “Blessed Assurance”. 

Crosby was visiting her friend Phoebe Knapp as the Knapp home was having a large pipe organ installed. The organ was incomplete, so Mrs. Knapp, using the piano, played a new melody she had just composed. When Knapp asked Crosby, "What do you think the tune says?", Crosby replied, "Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine."  The hymn appeared in the July 1873 issue of Palmer's Guide to Holiness and Revival Miscellany, a magazine printed by Dr. and Mrs. W. C. Palmer.  

Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine! Oh, what a foretaste of glory divine!

Heir of salvation, purchase of God, Born of His Spirit, washed in His blood

Perfect submission, perfect delight, Visions of rapture now burst on my sight;

Angels, descending, bring from above Echoes of mercy, whispers of love.

Perfect submission, all is at rest, I in my Savior am happy and blest,

Watching and waiting, looking above, Filled with His goodness, lost in His love.

This is my story, this is my song, Praising my Savior all the day long,

Kevin McChesney (b. 1963) graduated with highest honors from the University of Colorado at Boulder with a BMus in Composition and Theory. A composer and arranger of handbell music, Kevin currently has nearly 1000 titles in print and is one of the very few musicians who makes handbells a full-time vocation. He has won numerous awards for his work, including winning American Guild of English Handbell Ringers Composition Contests and Jeffers Composer of the Year.  He is Music Director of the Pikes Peak Ringers and his work with that organization for over 20 years has brought them to national prominence, including a recording with world-renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma. Kevin is also Music Director of the Atlanta Concert Ringers.

About the Choral Music:

As the Deer - Martin Nystrom

“As the deer,” written in 1981, is one of the most popular songs in the contemporary Christian musical genre written in the latter twentieth century. Martin J. Nystrom (b. 1956) is a native of Seattle, Washington. After graduating from Oral Roberts University, Tulsa, Oklahoma, he served as musical evangelist with Christ for the Nations, Dallas, Texas, and produced five praise and worship albums for Hosanna! Music, Mobile, Alabama.

Lindsay Terry, in his book The Sacrifice of Praise: The Stories Behind the Greatest Praise and Worship Songs of All Time (2002), describes the circumstances surrounding the creation of this song:

Marty was a schoolteacher in Seattle, and since he had the summer off, he decided to go to the summer term of Christ for the Nations Institute in Dallas, Texas. Little did he know what was about to happen to him, especially with all that he would be exposed to and the worship emphasis of the school. . .

He had graduated from Oral Roberts University and, frankly, was a little overwhelmed in ministry. He had been involved in many things at the school, not the least of which was the television ministry of ORU. All of his studies combined with many other activities had caused stress to take its toll on Marty’s spiritual life. . . .

Marty’s roommate at CFNI was a vibrant Christian who challenged Marty to go on a fast, thinking it would help him recover his joy. Marty took up the challenge, and on the nineteenth day of the fast, he found himself sitting at the piano in a room of the school, trying to write a song. He was simply playing chord progressions when he noticed a Bible on the music stand of the piano, open to Psalm 42. His eyes fell on the first verse of that chapter. After reading the verse he began to sing its message, right off the page. He wrote the first verse and the chorus of a song, practically straight through. The entire song was completed in a matter of minutes.”

Though Mr. Nystrom had not intended to perform the song publically, he shared it with a friend at Christ for the Nations before returning to Seattle. His friend introduced it to the others at the Institute, and it became a favorite. Contrary to his website, the composer appears to have written closer to 250 songs. He travels extensively in the United States and Asia, participating in conferences and retreats.

As the deer pants for the water, so my soul longs after you.
You alone are my heart’s desire, and I long to worship you.

    You’re my friend and You are my brother, even though You are a King.

     I love You more than any other, so much more than anything.

     I want You more than gold or silver, only You can satisfy.

    You alone are the real joy-giver and the apple of my eye.

    You alone are my strength, my shield; To you alone may my spirit yield.

    You alone are my heart’s desire and I long to worship You.

About the Hymns:

Christ is Alive

Brian Wren (b. 1936) is Emeritus Professor of Worship, Columbia Theological Seminary, Decatur, Georgia. He is a writer, preacher, worship and workshop leader, and internationally published hymn-poet, with entries in most recent denominational hymnals in North America, Britain and Australia. Some of his hymn-poems have been translated into Finnish, French, Japanese, Mandarin, Spanish and Korean.  Wren wrote this text in England, during April of 1968. Wren writes: 

It was written for Easter Sunday, two weeks after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I could not let Easter go by without speaking of this tragic event which was on all our minds. . . . The hymn tries to see God's love winning over tragedy and suffering in the world. . . . There is tension and tragedy in these words, not just Easter rejoicing.

First published in the British supplement New Church Praise (1975), the text was revised by Wren in 1978.  "Christ Is Alive" is a joyful celebration of Christ's resurrection and of his personal rule in a human world in which pain, war, and injustice abound. Christ’s transcendent and immanent reign is empowered by the Holy Spirit and will ultimately bring about a new creation.

God, Who Stretched the Spangled Heavens 

Hymnody has often had difficulty keeping in step with scientific thinking. Many of our hymns on themes of the natural world imply an extension of the cosmology of the ancient world in which a three-story universe provides the basis for our assumptions. In this view, the dome of the heavens with the firmament of the stars rests upon the earth, which, in turn, is supported by the underworld resting on the pillars of the earth. This view assumes that the earth is the center of the universe. Nicolas Copernicus reoriented our understanding of the universe in the 16th century with his proof that the earth revolved around the sun. This should have changed the course of hymns, but parts of the church universal did not accept his teachings for centuries. It took the space race of the 1960s to firmly establish that we no longer could restrict our understanding of the natural creation to the three-storied universe. “God, who Stretched the Spangled Heavens,” written in 1967, was among the first hymns to employ the imagery of the space age.

Catherine Arnott Cameron (b. 1927) in New Brunswick, studied at McMaster University and the University of Southern California. A naturalized U.S. citizen, Dr. Cameron was a professor of social psychology at the University of La Verne, Calif., from 1971-1992. Hymnologist Harry Eskew interviewed Dr. Cameron, whose interest in poetry goes back to hymn singing in church at a young age. “As a child and teenager with a gift for writing poetry, I was troubled by the mismatch between words and music in some of the hymns sung in our church,” she said. “I thought that one day I might write a hymn that was a harmony of poetry and music. The hymn was written over a period of several months at a time when I was experiencing a new sense of direction, growth and creativity in my life.” It appeared first inContemporary Worship 1 (1969) and has been a staple of hymnals ever since.

The most poignant aspect of Dr. Cameron’s hymn is the paradox between stanza one and stanzas two and three. In stanza one, the author celebrates humanities’ “inventive powers” that come as a result of being made “in [God’s] likeness.” Stanza two contrasts the purposeful move into space with the void of life in “modern cities” where lonely people are often “lost to purpose and meaning, scarcely caring where they go.” Stanza three, written at the height of the Cold War, contrasts “the ecstasy of winging through untraveled realms of space” with the earth-bound reality of the power of the atom, which provides us with the choice of “life’s destruction or our most triumphant hour.” The final stanza appropriately concludes with the prayer: “Great Creator, give us guidance till our goals and yours are one.”