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; most of it is copied from other websites 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:
Herzliebster Jesu - Johannes Brahms
(c.1949, Mercury Music)
"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).
Ah, holy Jesus, how hast thou offended,
that we to judge thee have in hate pretended?
By foes derided, by thine own rejected,
O most afflicted!
Who was the guilty? Who brought this upon thee?
Alas, my treason, Jesus, hath undone thee!
'Twas I, Lord Jesus, I it was denied thee;
I crucified thee.
Lo, the Good Shepherd for the sheep is offered;
the slave hath sinned, and the Son hath suffered.
For our atonement, while we nothing heeded,
God interceded.
For me, kind Jesus, was thy incarnation,
thy mortal sorrow, and thy life's oblation;
thy death of anguish and thy bitter passion,
for my salvation.
Therefore, kind Jesus, since I cannot pay thee,
I do adore thee, and will ever pray thee,
think on thy pity and thy love unswerving,
not my deserving.
Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) was a German composer and pianist. Born in Hamburg into a Lutheran family, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria. In his lifetime, Brahms's popularity and influence were considerable; following a comment by the nineteenth-century conductor Hans von Bülow, he is sometimes grouped with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven as one of the "Three Bs".
Brahms is often considered both a traditionalist and an innovator. His music is firmly rooted in the structures and compositional techniques of the Baroque and Classical masters. He was a master of counterpoint, perfected in the Baroque period, and of thematic development, characteristic of the Classical era. Brahms aimed to honor the "purity" of these established "German" structures and advance them into a Romantic idiom, in the process creating bold new approaches to harmony and melody. While many contemporaries found his music too academic, the diligent, highly constructed nature of Brahms's works was a starting point and an inspiration for a generation of composers.
The last composition of any composer carries a certain level of mystique, and that is true of Brahms’ eleven chorale preludes for organ. They were written in the summer of 1896 after Clara Schumann’s death, and it is highly probable that Brahms was already aware of his own illness at that point. While there is evidence that Brahms intended to prepare them for publication, there is also a recorded statement that they could be seen as more private companion pieces to the Vier ernste Gesänge. Like those songs, the preludes are settings of religious texts - Lutheran hymns and their associated chorale melodies. The original autograph of all eleven was found on Brahms’s desk after his death in 1897. The eleven were eventually edited and released by Eusebius Mandyczewski in 1902. The pieces were of such obvious significance and quality that they were assigned the posthumous opus number 122, by which they are still known. As Brahms had no particular personal relationship to the organ, the fact that he turned to it again after forty years for his final opus is remarkable.
About the Handbell Music:
O Sacred Head Now Wounded - Ron Mallory
(c.2016, SoundForth, div. of Lorenz Corporation)
“O Sacred Head, Now Wounded” is one of the great hymns of the church, perhaps the greatest passion hymn. It has an equally great history. It is based on a long medieval Latin poem, Salve mundi salutare, with stanzas addressing the various parts of Christ's body hanging on the Cross. The last part of the poem, from which the hymn is taken, is addressed to Christ's head, and begins "Salve caput cruentatum." The poem is often attributed to Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153).
Bernard of Clairvaux, saint, abbot, and doctor, fills one of the most conspicuous positions in the history of the middle ages. His father, Tecelin, or Tesselin, a knight of great bravery, was the friend and vassal of the Duke of Burgundy. Bernard was born at his father's castle on the eminence of Les Fontaines, near Dijon, iu Burgundy, in 1091. He was educated at Chatillon, where he was distinguished for his studious and meditative habits. Bernard had all the advantages that high birth, great personal beauty, graceful manners, and irresistible influence could give, but, strengthened in the resolve by night visions of his mother (who died in 1105), he chose a life of asceticism, and became a monk. He entered the monastery of Citeaux, the first Cistercian foundation, in 1113. Two years later he was sent forth, at the head of twelve monks, from the overcrowded abbey, to found a daughter institution in the Valley of Wormwood, the Abbey of Clairvaux. On the death of Pope Honorius II., in 1130, the College of Cardinals split without a clear choice of Pope. Bernard was instrumental in the restoration of Pope Innocent II to Rome, which greatly increased his influence in the Church. The summer of 1146 was spent traversing France and Germany to rouse the people to engage in the second crusade. In both countries the effect of his appearance and eloquence was marvellous, almost miraculous. The population seemed to rise en masse, and take up the cross. In 1147, the expedition started, a vast army, of which probably not a tenth ever reached Palestine. It proved a complete failure, and a miserable remnant shared the flight of their leaders, the Emperor Conrad, and Louis, King of France, and returned home, defeated and disgraced. The blame was thrown upon Bernard, and he soon died, weary of the world.
One of the hymns by which St. Bernard is best known as a writer of sacred poetry is "Salve mundi Salutore," an address to the various limbs of Christ on the cross. It consists of 350 lines, 50 lines being addressed to each. Many other hymns and sequences are attributed to St. Bernard. Hymns, translated from, or founded on, St. Bernard's, will be found in almost every hymnal.
The poem was translated into German by the Lutheran hymnist Paul Gerhardt (1607–1676). He reworked the Latin version to suggest a more personal contemplation of the events of Christ's death on the cross. It first appeared in Johann Crüger's hymnal Praxis pietatis melica in 1656. Although Gerhardt translated the whole poem, it is the closing section which has become best known, and is sung as a hymn in its own right. The German hymn begins with "O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden".
Paulus Gerhardt studied at the University of Wittenberg, after which he was pastor at Mittenwalde, and then St. Nicholas’s Church in Berlin, then finally archdiaconus at Lübben. The outward circumstances of Gerhardt's life were for the most part gloomy. His earlier years were spent amid the horrors of the Thirty Years' War. He did not obtain a settled position in life till he was 44 years of age. He was unable to marry till four years later; and his wife, after a long illness, died during the time that he was without office in Berlin; while of the five children of the marriage only one passed the period of childhood. His latter years at Lübben as a widower with one surviving child were passed among a rough and unsympathising people.
Gerhardt ranks, next to Luther, as the most gifted and popular hymnwriter of the Lutheran Church. With a firm grasp of the objective realities of the Christian Faith, and a loyal adherence to the doctrinal standpoint of the Lutheran Church, Gerhardt is yet genuinely human; he takes a fresh, healthful view both of nature and of mankind. In his hymns we see the transition to the modern subjective tone of religious poetry. From the first publication of Gerhardt's hymns they at once came into favour among all ranks and creeds; and a large proportion are among the hymns most cherished and most widely used by German-speaking Christians at the present day.
The length of many of Gerhardt's hymns ("Ein Lämmlein" is 10 stanzas of 10 lines; "Fröhlich soil," 15 stanzas of 8 lines), and the somewhat intricate metres of others, have caused his hymns to be less used in English than otherwise might have been the case; but a considerable proportion have come in some form or other into English hymnbooks. A large selection, translated with scrupulous faithfulness but not retaining much of the lyric grace of the originals, was published by the Rev. John Kelly, in 1867, as Paul Gerhardt’s Spiritual Songs.
“O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden” is a beautiful but free translation of the "Salve caput cruentatum". Gerhardt's version appeared in Crüger's Praxis (1656), in 10 stanzas of 8 lines, entitled, "To the suffering Face of Jesus Christ." Bernard's original is powerful and searching, but Gerhardt's hymn is still more powerful and more profound, as redrawn from the deeper spring of evangelical Lutheran, Scriptural, knowledge, and fervency of faith.
The hymn was first translated into English in 1752 by John Gambold (1711–1771), an Anglican vicar in Oxfordshire. His translation begins, "O Head so full of bruises." In 1830 a new translation of the hymn was made by an American Presbyterian minister, James Waddell Alexander (1804-1859). Alexander's translation, beginning "O sacred head, now wounded," became one of the most widely used in 19th and 20th century hymnals.
James Waddell Alexander, D.D., (1804-1859) was an American Presbyterian minister and theologian who followed in the footsteps of his father, Rev. Archibald Alexander. He studied at Princeton, and was Professor of Rhetoric at Princeton, 1833; Pastor of Duane Street Presbyterian Church, New York, 1844; Professor of Church History, Princeton, 1849; and Pastor of 5th Avenue Presbyterian Church, New York, 1851. His works include Gift to the Afflicted, Thoughts on Family Worship, and others. His hymn translations were collected and published at New York in 1861, under the title, The Breaking Crucible and other Translations.
The music for the German and English versions of the hymn is by Hans Leo Hassler, written around 1600 for a secular love song, "Mein G'müt ist mir verwirret", which first appeared in print in the 1601 Lustgarten Neuer Teutscher Gesäng. The tune was appropriated and rhythmically simplified for Gerhardt's German hymn in 1656 by Johann Crüger. Johann Sebastian Bach arranged the melody and used five stanzas of the hymn in the St Matthew Passion. He also used the hymn's text and melody in the second movement of the cantata Sehet, wir gehn hinauf gen Jerusalem, BWV 159. The harmonization found in our hymnal is from Bach’s St. Matthew Passion.
Alexander’s complete text follows:
O sacred Head, now wounded, with grief and shame weighed down,
Now scornfully surrounded with thorns, Thine only crown;
O sacred Head, what glory, what bliss till now was Thine!
Yet, though despised and gory, I joy to call Thee mine.
What Thou, my Lord, hast suffered, was all for sinners’ gain;
Mine, mine was the transgression, but Thine the deadly pain.
Lo, here I fall, my Savior! ’Tis I deserve Thy place;
Look on me with Thy favor, vouchsafe to me Thy grace.
Men mock and taunt and jeer Thee, Thou noble countenance,
Though mighty worlds shall fear Thee and flee before Thy glance.
How art thou pale with anguish, with sore abuse and scorn!
How doth Thy visage languish that once was bright as morn!
Now from Thy cheeks has vanished their color once so fair;
From Thy red lips is banished the splendor that was there.
Grim death, with cruel rigor, hath robbed Thee of Thy life;
Thus Thou hast lost Thy vigor, Thy strength in this sad strife.
My burden in Thy Passion, Lord, Thou hast borne for me,
For it was my transgression which brought this woe on Thee.
I cast me down before Thee, wrath were my rightful lot;
Have mercy, I implore Thee; Redeemer, spurn me not!
What language shall I borrow to thank Thee, dearest friend,
For this Thy dying sorrow, Thy pity without end?
O make me Thine forever, and should I fainting be,
Lord, let me never, never outlive my love to Thee.
My Shepherd, now receive me; my Guardian, own me Thine.
Great blessings Thou didst give me, O source of gifts divine.
Thy lips have often fed me with words of truth and love;
Thy Spirit oft hath led me to heavenly joys above.
Here I will stand beside Thee, from Thee I will not part;
O Savior, do not chide me! When breaks Thy loving heart,
When soul and body languish in death’s cold, cruel grasp,
Then, in Thy deepest anguish, Thee in mine arms I’ll clasp.
The joy can never be spoken, above all joys beside,
When in Thy body broken I thus with safety hide.
O Lord of Life, desiring Thy glory now to see,
Beside Thy cross expiring, I’d breathe my soul to Thee.
My Savior, be Thou near me when death is at my door;
Then let Thy presence cheer me, forsake me nevermore!
When soul and body languish, oh, leave me not alone,
But take away mine anguish by virtue of Thine own!
Be Thou my consolation, my shield when I must die;
Remind me of Thy passion when my last hour draws nigh.
Mine eyes shall then behold Thee, upon Thy cross shall dwell,
My heart by faith enfolds Thee. Who dieth thus dies well.
Ron Mallory (b.1973)is a versatile musician with a wide variety of skills and experiences. As a composer, he has more than 100 pieces in print and has won a number of composition contests. As a church musician, he has led worship and directed musical ensembles in congregations ranging in size from over a thousand to fewer than a dozen. As a music educator, he has taught in a variety of school settings, as well as at numerous seminars and conferences. Ron also has professional experience as a studio musician, jazz pianist, video producer, and graphic artist. Mallory has a master's degree in choral conducting from the University of Washington and a bachelor's degree in music composition from California State University, Long Beach. He is active as a full-time musician in the Seattle/Tacoma area where he teaches music classes at Forest Ridge School of the Sacred Heart and serves as worship director at Resurrection Lutheran Church.
About the Choral Music:
God Weeps - David Haas
(c.2005, GIA Publications)
“God Weeps” is a setting of an incredibly powerful text by hymn writer Shirley Erena Murray. A true and authentic lament, this piece digs deep in expressing the pain and suffering that can be found everywhere around the world. It focuses on themes of social justice, the poor, and our ongoing need for compassion for those who suffer. The text of "God Weeps" recognizes that tragedies are a part of human existence. It is only through human action that these evils will be corrected. Until we change the way we love, win, and care for one another, God continues to weep, bleed, and cry. God waits for us to understand the Christ, to understand the message of Jesus. That understanding will change human hearts, minds, and actions.
Shirley Erena Murray (b.1931) studied music as an undergraduate but received a master’s degree (with honors) in classics and French from Otago University, New Zealand. Her upbringing was Methodist, but she became a Presbyterian when she married the Reverend John Stewart Murray, who was a moderator of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand. Shirley began her career as a teacher of languages, but she became more active in Amnesty International, and for eight years she served the Labor Party Research Unit of Parliament. Her involvement in these organizations has enriched her writing of hymns, which address human rights, women’s concerns, justice, peace, the integrity of creation, and the unity of the church. In recognition for her service as a writer of hymns, the New Zealand government honored her as a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit on the Queen’s birthday on 3 June 2001. Murray has published three collections of her hymns: In Every Corner Sing (1992), Everyday in Your Spirit (1996), and Faith Makes the Song (2002). The New Zealand Hymnbook Trust, for which she worked for a long time, has also published many of her texts. In 2009, Otaga University conferred on her an honorary doctorate in literature for her contribution to the art of hymn writing.
David Robert Haas (b.1957) is an American author and composer of contemporary Catholic liturgical music. Haas studied vocal music performance at Central Michigan University. He was a seminarian for the Diocese of Saginaw, studying at St. John Vianney Seminary and the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota. Haas served as a pastoral musician at Church of the Blessed Sacrament in St. Paul, Minnesota, Our Lady's Immaculate Heart Church in Ankeny, Iowa, and St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church in St. Paul Park, MN. Haas was Composer-in-Residence/Adjunct Instructor at Saint Paul Seminary School of Divinity in St. Paul, Minnesota. In 1991, Haas completed his B.A. in Theology and Vocal Music Performance from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota. He served as Composer-in-Residence / Pastoral Musician at St. Thomas the Apostle Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Haas served as Director of The Emmaus Center for Music, Prayer and Ministry in his hometown of Eagan, Minnesota. Haas worked at the preparatory school Benilde-St. Margaret's in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, where he was Campus Minister and Artist-in-Residence and served as Campus Minister at Cretin-Derham Hall High School in St. Paul, Minnesota.
He has produced over 45 original collections and recordings of liturgical music and is the author of several books on the topics of prayer and liturgical music. Haas directed the program Music Ministry Alive!, a five-day liturgical program for youth and adult leaders that met on the campus of St. Catherine University in St. Paul, Minnesota. Haas served as a Faculty/Team Member for Institutes with the North American Forum on the Catechumenate, helping develop liturgical and musical aspects of the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA).
Haas has set the text “God Weeps” to an original tune, SORROW.
God weeps at love withheld, at strength misused, at children's innocence abused,
and till we change the way we love, God weeps.
God bleeds at anger's fist, at trust betrayed, at women battered and afraid,
and till we change the way we win, God bleeds.
God cries at hungry mouths, at running sores, at creatures dying without cause,
and till we change the way we care, God cries.
God waits for stones to melt, for peace to seed, for hearts to hold each other's need,
and till we understand the Christ, God waits.
About the Hymns:
Where Cross the Crowded Ways of Life
Caleb T. Winchester, an editor of the 1905 Methodist Hymnal, challenged Frank M. North (1850-1935) to write a hymn text on city missions. North had intimate knowledge of urban life because of his work for the Methodist Church in New York City. Inspired by Jesus' words "Go to the street corners and invite to the banquet anyone you find" (Matt. 22:9), North wrote "Where Cross the Crowded Ways." After making various revisions and adding a title ("A Prayer for the Multitudes"), he published the text in The Christian City (1903), a missions journal he edited. The text was also published in the 1905 Methodist Hymnal and in many other twentieth-century hymnbooks. One of the earliest and finest modern "city hymns," this text focuses on the ills of our great urban centers with the insight and compassion of a Christian worker in the city slums. North's descriptive phrases may have been startling at the turn of the century, but they are even more accurate descriptions of the massive cities in our world today. His prescription to follow in the footsteps of Christ and bring the gospel in word and deed is relevant as long as the Lord delays in bringing the New Jerusalem.
North devoted himself to loyal service in the Methodist denomination and to various ecumenical ventures. He was educated at Wesleyan University, and ordained in the Methodist Church in 1872. A minister in several churches in Florida, New York, and Connecticut, he also held administrative positions-secretary of the New York Church Extension and Missionary Society (1892-1912) and secretary of the Board of Foreign Missions of the Methodist Church (1912-1924). He was involved with the Federal Council of Churches of Christ in America (forerunner of the National Council of Churches) and was the council's president from 1916-1920. Editor of the periodical Christian City, North was active in many organizations that promoted and carried out Christian ministries in urban life. North contributed hymns to Sursum Corda (1898) and the Methodist Hymnal (1905) and was a charter member of the Hymn Society, which republished his eight hymns in a booklet in 1970.
Where cross the crowded ways of life, where sound the cries of race and clan,
above the noise of selfish strife, we hear your voice, O Son of Man.
In haunts of wretchedness and need, on shadowed thresholds fraught with fears,
from paths where hide the lures of greed, we catch the vision of your tears.
From tender childhood's helplessness, from human grief and burdened toil,
from famished souls, from sorrow's stress, your heart has never known recoil.
The cup of water given for you still holds the freshness of your grace;
yet long these multitudes to view the sweet compassion of your face.
O Master, from the mountainside, make haste to heal these hearts of pain;
among these restless throngs abide; O tread the city's streets again;
Till all the world shall learn your love, and follow where your feet have trod;
till glorious from your heaven above shall come the city of our God.
To Mock Your Reign, O Dearest Lord
(c.1973, Hope Publishing)
Fred Pratt Green (1903-2000) served as a Methodist minister in and around London from 1928 until his retirement in 1969. In 1969, he served on the planning committee for Hymns and Songs, a supplement to the hymnal of the British Methodist Church. His fellow committee members urged him to write hymns to “fill gaps” in subject matter. Thus began his long and fruitful career as a hymn writer.
Pratt Green wrote this haunting and beautiful text in 1972 in response to a letter from Francis Westbrook. Pratt Green and Westbrook, a composer, often worked together and wrote frequently to each other. Their correspondence is preserved in Pratt Green’s scrapbooks, which are held at Emory University in Atlanta, Ga. In his letter, Westbrook asked Pratt Green to provide a new text for THIRD MODE MELODY by Thomas Tallis (1505-1585). Westbrook noted that the text used in the English Hymnal (1906) was “impossible”; he wanted to compose an anthem from the “unearthly beauty” of this melody with a text that was “virile yet wistful.” The result was Pratt Green’s response to Westbrook’s request.
The text was paired first with THIRD MODE MELODY and published in Sixteen Hymns of Today (1978) by the Royal School of Church Music. In More Hymns for Today (1982), published by Hymns Ancient and Modern Ltd., the hymn was given a new tune which combined the first four lines of ST. MARY with the second half of WIGTOWN to highlight the juxtaposition found in the text. In the UM Hymnal, it is set to KINGSFOLD, which suits the second half of each stanza better than the first. The two halves of each stanza are set in sharp contrast: a first half filled with images of Christ’s crucifixion, and a second half that expresses the hope of resurrection.
The opening lines of each stanza echo Matthew 27:27-32. The first stanza focuses on the crown of thorns, fashioned by the Roman soldiers to mock Christ. Pratt Green highlights the paradox in each stanza with the line, “They could not know, as we do now.” The crown becomes glorious as Christ’s “sorrows heal our own.” In the second stanza, Pratt Green turns to the purple cloak used by the soldiers, again to mock Christ. The paradox of this stanza is that “you will your robe of mercy throw, around our naked shame.” In the final stanza, the “sceptered reed” and mock adoration of the soldiers is set in paradox with the Kingdom which knows no end; “though empires rise and fall, your Kingdom shall not cease to grow till love embraces all.”
Pratt Green also highlights characteristics of Christ in each stanza with an oxymoron. In the first, Jesus is called “dearest,” even as he is being taunted on the road. In the second stanza, he is called “gracious,” though the soldiers are turning him into the punch line of a joke. In the third stanza, Jesus is called “patient,” as the soldiers pretend to bow to him.
The poetic device of hypotyposis—or lifelike description—is used as Pratt Green conveys the scene through vivid, yet simple words. In the first half of each stanza, it is easy to feel we are witnesses to the crucifixion; then we are reminded that this is not the end of the story. We examine the suffering of Christ; then we turn to the full narrative of the Bible and the hope of the resurrection. In this way we remember Christ’s healing sacrifice. We remember the unmerited mercy Christ gives. We remember that God’s Kingdom will not fall and will not cease to grow. We remember God’s love that embraces everyone.
To mock your reign, O dearest Lord, they made a crown of thorns;
set you with taunts along that road from which no one returns.
They did not know, as we do now, that glorious is your crown;
that thorns would flower upon your brow, your sorrows heal our own.
In mock acclaim, O gracious Lord, they snatched a purple cloak,
your passion turned, for all they cared, into a soldier's joke.
They did not know, as we do now, that though we merit blame
you will your robe of mercy throw around our naked shame.
A sceptered reed, O patient Lord, they thrust into your hand,
and acted out their grim charade to its appointed end.
They did not know, as we do now, though empires rise and fall,
your Kingdom shall not cease to grow till love embraces all.
Come and Fill Our Hearts
(c.1991, Les Presses de Taize, admin. GIA Publications)
The hymn “Come and Fill Our Hearts” was written in 1982 by the Taizé community in France. The tune CONFITEMINI DOMINO was composed by Jacques Berthier. The hymn is a prayer of healing and centering.
Jacques Berthier (1923-1994) studied music at the Ecole Cesar Franck in Paris. From 1961 until his death he served as organist at St. Ignace Church, Paris. Although his published works include numerous compositions for organ, voice, and instruments, Berthier is best known as the composer of service music for the Taizé community near Cluny, Burgundy. Influenced by the French liturgist and church musician Joseph Gelineau, Berthier began writing songs for equal voices in 1955 for the services of the then nascent community of twenty brothers at Taizé. As the Taizé community grew, Berthier continued to compose most of the mini-hymns, canons, and various associated instrumental arrangements, which are now universally known as the Taizé repertoire. In the past two decades this repertoire has become widely used in North American church music in both Roman Catholic and Protestant traditions.
Come and fill our hearts with your peace.
You alone, O Lord are holy.
Come and fill our hearts with your peace.
Have mercy on us.
First United Methodist Church, Lewisville, Texas
A Community of Everyday People Learning to Love Like Jesus
No comments:
Post a Comment