lutheranhymns | Entries tagged with composers noteworthy for other things

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This one definitely gets a northern hemisphere bias for such vivid descriptions as "snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow." Also, composers famous for other things; Gustav Holst we've seen before with "Jupiter," and Christina Georgina Rossetti was an influential poet during the 1800s, she wrote on such pleasant topics as how life is a tiring journey but then you die.

There's at least one other verse that didn't make it into this version, which rhymes "maiden bliss" with "kiss" (in the context of Mary).

This song has a lot going on. In a good way!

Melody: it has a range of an octave plus a fourth, from low B to high E as written. That's a somewhat large range. Then again, it's the same range as "Silent Night." If you can sing Silent Night, you can sing this melody. (This will be important later.) It is also one of very few hymns in this volume to use a fermata, a sign that means "hold this note extra long," not at the end, just in the middle, for "brought us."

Harmony: there are some parts in the middle where it's in unison/an octave a part. "Sing a song..." until "brought us" where it goes into the fermata (see above), and at that point, the tenors cross paths with the altos! The last couple chords split into three parts for the women instead of two. And then there are parts where the basses have moving sixteenth notes and nobody else does, lots of intricate accidentals, and so on. We get both the very simple and the very complex here in the same piece.

Composers: The lyricist, James W. Johnson was a writer, civil rights activist, diplomat, and professor. He wrote "God's Trombones," which includes "The Creation" poem about "I'm lonely--I'll make me a world." This hymn might be better known than that text, I'm not sure, but they're both great. The music composer was his brother, J. Rosamond Johnson!

Text: Also very good. "Stony the road we trod," "days when hope unborn had died," "the blood of the slaughtered," "the wine of the world," great images, excellent rhyme scheme, compelling theology of God's presence in society in hard times and good. It was not obvious at first, but then once it clicked that this was written specifically about the African American experience, it's like...oh, this makes a lot of sense, the work for liberation on a group-wide level! I think it works as a universal Christian text (and to be clear, I am pro-universalism in this setting), but once you make that connection, it's especially fitting for like Martin Luther King Day when that's observed on Sunday, etc.

Now, during the last few months in the US, there's been a lot of efforts from corporations and institutions to be seen as racially diverse and progressive. Some of these are actually good efforts, some are empty signalling. One of the things the NFL did was to have this song performed along with "The Star-Spangled Banner" for the first week. One of my acquaintances from a gaming site, who is Black, criticized this as an empty gesture and not the kind of thing anyone was actually asking for. And I didn't argue because he is probably more attuned to matters of racial justice (and football) than I am. But what I wanted to say was "even in better circumstances, this is a far better anthem than 'The Star-Spangled Banner' anyway!! For one, its text is good! For another, its range isn't an octave and a fifth like the freaking Star-Spangled Banner! At least let's appreciate having an actually good song."

Anyway.

Nice use of Shannon density, the repetition makes the text more "interconnected." The "way, truth, life" triplet is from the Gospels, referring to Jesus; in the second verse, Jesus is "light, feast, strength," which is expanded on as "such a light that shows a feast." And the last verse is "joy, love, heart," tied together with "such a heart as joys in love."

The musical composer, Ralph Vaughan Williams, is famous for other things. And the text composer, George Herbert, is also famous for other things, if by other things you mean "poems about Christianity from the 1600s." When I was taking an intro poetry course in college the professor/academy culture in general was like "don't worry, we can be secular here, it's fine if you don't know any of these religious allusions, like don't worry about it," and I was like "...I kind of have the opposite problem" but then, he made a big exception for George Herbert. "George Herbert wanted to make sure that his poem 'Love' was at the end of the collection! After stuff like 'Death' and 'Heaven' or something! That's probably significant! You could cross-reference the phrases it namedrops and see if any of them are titles of his other stuff! That would also be significant! George Herbert!" So that was kind of an amusing exception to the rule.

Well, Beethoven would definitely qualify as a composer famous for other things, except one of the things he's most famous for is this melody--the choral part of the Ninth Symphony (and used as the anthem for the European Union because it's something everyone can unite around) (even the flash mobs). The original text associated with this song is a poem by Schiller addressed to a personification of Joy (not necessarily in a Christian context, although apparently it's too Christian for some people). So this isn't a translation so much as "using the same image as a jumping-off point," I would guess.

Definitely a case of composer famous for other things, Desmond Tutu is a prominent South African theologian and anti-apartheid activist. He's also collaborated on poetry with his daughter Mpho, they got quoted in an outdoor-church sermon I attended recently. In the context of God's unconditional love: "do you [humans] think I [God] planted fig trees expecting roses to bloom?" Me, a human: well, yeah, kind of, but I'd better not interrupt.

This particular hymn also has an "echo-y" arrangement, I may need to come up with a tag for that but I'm not sure if I've been consistent about how I refer to those.

-There are a couple different versions of this translation. A slightly older one starts out "Thee We Adore, O Hidden Savior, Thee." Which, I think "hidden savior" is an interesting mental image, but having to stick the "thee" in there twice is a stretch. This version avoids the second person problems by going with "God most true," rhyming with "anew."

-While trying to look up when I came across the other translation, I found this note that I'd completely forgotten about from a couple years ago.

We also worked on a tricky arrangement of "Thee We Adore, O Hidden Savior," and [the director] said "this is like three times harder than I expected." And the woman next to me quietly says "That's because it's dumb."

When even the other altos are complaining, you know it's bad.

-Both the composer and translator are famous for other things, Thomas Aquinas was a prominent 1200s theologian, and Gerard Manley Hopkins was an 1800s poet who wrote sonnets and stuff about Christianity. This should be exactly up my alley, as someone who loves both formal poetry and takes Christianity seriously. It was...not. It's like: "God made the animals! The animals are so beautiful! Yay." One of my poetry professors pointed out that his stuff is also kind of humorless, so maybe that's it--I need to be wry about things on some level.

This is a composer famous for other things--Handel wrote the "Messiah," and several other oratorios, including one about Judas Maccabaeus (led the Maccabean rebellion which is where the Hanukkah story comes from). This melody was taken from that and turned into an Easter song. Since the music is in the public domain, I actually stole it myself to write a text for a hymn contest earlier this year!

Meanwhile on hymns in the wild: I came across a plaque with some of the lyrics from "God of Grace and God of Glory." Only problem is, it merged verse 1 (rhymes "power/flower/hour") with verse 2 ("ways/praise/days"), so it goes power/flower/days! I guess they didn't want to sound like they were limiting their focus to one specific hour, but still, I feel like we could have inferred the more poetic meaning from context.

The meter is not listed as "trailing alleluias," but it qualifies, and also has "alleluia"s in the middle. The original text is from the 1600s, so we get old-school compounds like 'Thus our song shall overclimb/all the bounds of space and time." (When was the last time you overclimbed something?) But the tune was written in the 1990s; the fact that the tune name is "Princeton" made me wonder if it was written for a college choir who wanted to do something sacred-ish but not too preachy or overused. I didn't really expect to find out anything about the musical composer when I looked it up, but apparently, he (Richard Hillert) wrote the primary "This Is The Feast" arrangement from the 1978 "green book," so I actually have heard his stuff a lot!

There's a lot going on here!

Verses 2, 3, and 5 are the same, music-wise. Verse 1 is just the first half of that melody.

Verse 4 is very different. It's written in harmony when the others are in unison, and it's in G major where the others are in G minor. (This is called the "parallel minor," because they're both in G, but different Gs.) In fact, it's so different that it's actually listed as a second hymn tune--"Deirdre," where the others are "St. Patrick's Breastplate." There are only a couple examples of this phenomenon, so of course it gets a special tag.

(They're both folk songs, so for the music attribution, it's "Verses 1-3 and 5: Irish melody. Verse 4: also an Irish melody, just a different one.)

What about the text? This is "attributed" (read: it's folklore so we don't know) to St. Patrick, hence the name. Yes, that one--snakes, Irish pride, etc. Also a writer, apparently. The original Irish text, whoever wrote it, is longer and more elaborate and calls on Christ's help in a variety of situations: see this translation by James Clarence Mangan. The verse of that one that begins "At Tara in this fateful hour..." corresponds to our verse 3, but that translation is more famous because it shows up (repeatedly) in "A Swiftly Tilting Planet," one of the sequels to "A Wrinkle in Time" by Madeleine L'Engle. I read that well before I came across this hymn (we hardly ever sing it), and then it was like "ohhhhhh."

Here's yet another loose adaptation my choir did, you can sort of hear the melody from here show up in the piano accompaniment.

Why does this section even exist.

We've discussed this before, to no clear conclusion.

Okay. Why is this song in this section?

Let's see! Or rather, let's take a look at what other sections it could plausibly be in.

Praise/Thanksgiving: This seems like an obvious pick. "Our thanks we bring in joy and praise...May every tongue be tuned for praise."
Creation: "May every mountain height, each vale and forest green..."
Community in Christ: "may...every land...send forth a glorious band." This is probably the closest we get to it being about any nation in particular! Every land will send people to praise God. Which is nice, and a decent message, but sufficiently generic to go pretty much anywhere. So again, I ask, why is it in the "national songs" section?

Well, I think I have an answer. It's because the composer is famous for another thing. And the thing he's famous for is writing the lyrics to "The Star-Spangled Banner." This is not a good song to include in a hymnal for several reasons. One, it has a large range so it's very difficult for a group to sing it in unison because they all have to get to the high and low pitches. Two, the first verse isn't particularly religious at all, it's "hey is our flag still up" "yes" "okay good." At least O Canada talks about asking God to keep their land glorious and free. Three, the other verses do have more mention of God, but they're also kind of...iffy. "Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just, And this be our motto—"In God is our Trust.""

So maybe it's a conspiracy theory, but I totally believe there was one or several meetings of the Lutheran hymnal committee that went "hey can we have the USA anthem in our hymnal" "no, for all the above reasons" "come on, that's such a feckless liberal thing to say, we want a concession in return" "in return...we will give you...another Francis Scott Key song to put in the national songs sections!" "yessssss, deal." Maybe I'm wrong. But this kind of speculation is how I've come to somewhat of an irreverent perspective on the hymnal.

Fortunately, that means we are done with this section. Praise/Thanksgiving is by some distance the longest, so from now on every "cycle" will end there. Back to Advent soon, fittingly!

Are the composers famous for other things?

Yeah. Johann Michael Haydn is the younger brother of Franz (who showed up earlier in this section) and apparently went by his middle name. Charles Wesley is...well, I guess this is the thing he's famous for, composing a lot of hymns. His brother John was the main founder of Methodism but Charles is often credited as a co-founder, at least I think he got billing in my AP Euro textbook and that's obviously a reliable and memorable source...

What about the rhyme scheme?

save/have is an eye-catching eye rhyme. As is throne/Son, although I kind of think that the fact they don't look that similar makes it less jarring, almost? Both pairs of lines are masculine rhymes, although the second pair is longer than the first syllable-count wise. As I just mentioned I feel like it's more common for longer lines to come before shorter ones. But whatever, variety is important too.

Is the alto part fairly interesting?

Yes! There are lots of moving eighth notes and not too much repetition.

Who do we have to thank for this change of pace?

Several people. But the harmonization is mostly due to Bach (yes, that one--there are several). We'll run across it again.

What about the feminine rhymes?

silent/violent is pretty good. I also like compassion/fashion (used as a verb), in that they sort of look like they're not standalone root words, but the rhyme needs all those syllables (pass/fash? no.)

This is probably the most popular hymn for All Saints' Day (November 1 or thereabouts). The music is by Ralph Vaughan Williams which is part of the fame. As we'll see, there's a lot going on here.

Are there trailing alleluias?

Oh yes!

Is this why you liked it as a little kid?

I...don't know, but maybe? It was probably that or I enjoyed the hymn number in the old hymnal for some reason, but I don't think it was particularly special. But yeah, as a little kid I liked to flip through and find this one.

Is the melody the same for all the verses?

Yes.

Why are some of them listed with a different musical part then?

That's the harmony for if you want to sing in harmony.

Couldn't you put all the verses in harmony and just leave it up to the individual churches to decide which to sing the parts for? Or just put the extra text at the bottom if it didn't fit?

Yes.

Why did they do it this way then?

I'm...not sure.

Is it a culture wars thing?

I don't think so? I mean, the original text is kind of old-fashioned (thee and thine and militaristic imagery), and some of that got edited in previous hymnals, and now appears to have been rolled back to a more archaic version, which was probably a compromise about something, but...I still don't understand what that would have to do with the harmony?

Anything else of note?

In a sermon on All Saints' Day some years ago, one of my college pastors pointed out that the hymn tune name means "without a name," so it's a good way to indicate all of the saints who don't have their own feast days but who are important even if we don't know them. Also, even though it's regarded as a very impressive text and tune, the lines don't always scan in perfect iambic pentameter--there are parts where some notes are rushed together or held long to make the stress fit the music. Which means...nothing's perfect so we shouldn't be overwhelmed by its majesty? I don't know, it was interesting at the time.

Is the composer more famous for other things?

Yes, Haydn; was Mozart's teacher, wrote a lot of symphonies, some melodies have become familiar.

Is this particular melody more famous for other things?

Yes, it's the national anthem of Germany.

Then why is the tune name "Austria"?

Because...Haydn was from Austria? I guess? It's complicated.

What's up with the harmonization?

There are some huge intervals in the bass clef. At a couple points, the tenors and basses (higher and lower mens' parts) are singing an octave plus a fifth apart, which is big. But during the start of the third line ("Joyful, all"), the basses, tenors, and altos (lower women's part) are all together on middle C, while the sopranos are an octave higher! Cool unison effect.

What about the lyrics?

It's a classic for a reason! I love "join the triumph of the skies," as if the stars have just won the big game, but the next couple verses are great too. Even my dad, who isn't really the music-reader in our family, listed this as one of his favorite Christmas hymns once.

Any translation issues?

No and yes. It's by Charles Wesley, who was a native English speaker, so there aren't too many divergent versions of the lyrics. But there have been a couple different arrangements/rearrangements, and I'm sometimes thrown for a loop when I hear it on the radio during Christmas song season. One because it's better than a lot of pop Christmas music, but two because it's often a more "masculine" text--"pleased as man with men to dwell," "born to raise the sons of Earth"--then this arrangement. This is one of those times where I'm very used to the way ours flows, including the PC adjustments.

What about the music composer?

That's Felix Mendelssohn, of general classical music fame. (Just me? Fine.)

Is this still the hymns section?

Not really. It's set apart from the hymns in the same way the psalms are, but this is labeled "National Songs" as a top-level header (the size of "Hymns," not just "Easter.")

So why is it here?

Not clear. Carryover from older editions, maybe? For those times when you want to celebrate a civic holiday but be antidisestablishmentarian about it? (Yes, that's just an excuse to throw in that word.)

Is the melody famous?

Yeah, it's from "Finlandia," which is about "Finland is great even though those Russians try to keep it down."

Is the song about Finland?

No, it's just "my country is great but all the other countries are great too, let's not get too nationalistic about this now."

About those blue skies...

Yeah. So several years ago I went to this math camp over the summer, and on the Sunday close to July 4th the nearby church sang this hymn (which was the first time I'd learned it). It goes "My country's skies are bluer than the oceans...but...skies are everywhere as blue as mine." Well, it was an extremely gray day. And I was just like "well, I'm sorry for those other countries."

So that's what I think of whenever I hear this song.

This is the last category in the book! Tomorrow we loop back to Advent. I know I have very little to say about some of these but it's an excuse to get to the fun ones, so I'll stick with it (for now), with the caveat that many of the entries will continue to be very brief.

Who is the arranger?

Arthur Sullivan.

As in Gilbert and?

Yep, that guy.

So the harmonization must be pretty interesting huh?

I would think so? This isn't one I've sung very often/maybe at all, but from a quick glance, the alto part at least doesn't look too boring and repetitive. Actually it gets down fairly low (to the G below middle C, which doesn't seem to be too common in these arrangements). But I'll keep you posted, I guess.