Church Music

I have done this one before, but never with a straight organ backing so I though I have another go at FINLANDIA.

Whether BIAB should be doing Sibelius at all is another question, but it is a glorious and moving funeral tune and a lovely text even in translation: done by Jane Borthwick from Katharina von Schegel’s original. The text varies – this is the one in the New Living Parish Hymn Book.

1. Be still, my soul: the Lord is on your side;
Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain;
Leave to your God to order and provide;
In every change he faithful will remain.
Be still, my soul: your best, your heavenly friend
Through thorny ways leads to a rightful end.

2. Be still, my soul: your God does undertake
To guide the future as he has the past,
Your hope, your confidence let nothing shake,
All now mysterious shall be clear at last.
Be still, my soul: the tempests still obey
His voice, who ruled them once on Galilee.

3. Be still, my soul: when dearest friends depart
And all is darkened in the vale of tears,
Then shall you better know his love, his heart,
Who comes to soothe your sorrow calm your fears.
Be still, my soul: for Jesus can repay
From his own fullness all he takes away.

4. Be still, my soul: the hour is hastening on
When we shall be forever with the Lord,
When disappointment, grief and fear are gone,
Sorrow forgotten, love’s pure joy restored.
Be still my soul: when change and tears are past,
All safe and blessed we shall meet at last.

This isn’t exactly the same as the arrangement in the NLPHB.

This Easter hymn is a bit much I think, I can’t imagine it being sung these days due to the militaristic overtones – let me know if you still use it.

The text is a C17 Latin hymn with a translation by Ronald Knox, but I can only imagine that with all the internal rhymes he employed it would have to be a somewhat loose approximation. My favourite is rhyming “never-tiring” with “choiring”. There is a slightly less alarming version called “The Strife is O’er the Battle Done”, which I blogged to a different setting here.

Here, though, it is set to SURREXIT by Anthony Gregory Murray, mainly known for having three of the original Wiggles in his name.

More organ BIAB – it appears I had to make up the chords:

Knox’s text is:

1 Battle is o’ver, hell’s armies flee;
Raise we the cry of victory
With abounding joy resounding,
Alleluia, alleluia.

2 Christ who endured the shameful tree,
O’er death triumphant welcome we,
Our adoring praise outpouring,
Alleluia, alleluia.

3 On the third morn from death rose he,
Clothed with what light in heaven shall be,
Our unswerving faith deserving,
Alleluia, alleluia.

4 Hell’s gloomy gates yield up their key,
Paradise door thrown wide we see;
Never-tiring be our choiring,
Alleluia, alleluia.

5 Lord, by the stripes they laid on thee,
Grant us to live from death set free,
This our greeting still repeating,
Alleluia, alleluia.

For comparison purposes, yet another translation, with the same setting this time translated by John Mason Neale, with five different internal rhymes, which makes me suspect the Latin original must have had internal rhymes that somehow had to be in the translation:

1 Finished is the battle now,
Gloriously crowned the victor’s brow!
Hence with sadness, sing with gladness:
Alleluya, alleluya!

2 After the death that him befell,
Jesus Christ has harrowed hell!
Songs of praising we are raising:
Alleluya, alleluya!

3 On the third morning he arose,
Shining with victory o’er his foes;
Earth is singing, heaven is ringing:
Alleluya, alleluya!

4 Jesus has closed hell’s brazen door,
Heaven is open evermore!
Our adoring praise outpouring:
Alleluya, alleluya!

5 Lord, by thy wounds we call on thee
So from ill death to set us free,
That our living be thanksgiving:
Alleluya, alleluya!

I can’t find the sheet music anywhere, so here it is:

Speaking of militaristic overtones, how about this dreadful ditty I sang as a child at Sunday school in the 1960s:

Those following along will have noticed I’ve been at this hymnal for about a month and I’m still in the “A”s.

I didn’t blog this Christmas song until it came up in the OCP’s Guitar Accompaniment Book, where it was given very simple chords. There are more adventurous arrangements of the CRADLE SONG out there, including this one by John de Luca where he found more interesting chords.

This hymnal is one of those that say the text is by Anon and further that it is of American origin, rather than attributing some of the text to Martin Luther. The tune is C19 by William James Kirkpatrick.

I made a new backing, avoiding the organ this time:

This very old morning hymn is very new to me, but a metrical hymn makes like easy for me after a few chants.

The text is C17 by Thomas Ken and it is here set to MELCOMBE (C18, Samuel Webbe).

Wikipedia has fourteen verses, but here five is enough and it finishes with the doxology, which I used to sing every week in my Presbyterian church set to the OLD 100th.

1 Awake, my soul, and with the sun
Thy dai­ly stage of du­ty run;
Shake off dull sloth, and joy­ful rise,
To pay thy morn­ing sac­ri­fice.

2 Glory to thee, who safe has kept
And has re­freshed me while I slept;
Grant, Lord, when I from death shall wake
I may of end­less light par­take.

3 Lord, I my vows to thee re­new;
Disperse my sins as morn­ing dew;
Guard my first springs of thought and will,
And with thy­self my spir­it fill.

4 Direct, con­trol, sug­gest, this day
All I de­sign, or do, or say;
That all my pow­ers, with all their might,
In thy sole glo­ry may unite.

5 Praise God, from whom all bless­ings flow,
Praise him, all crea­tures here be­low,
Praise him above, ye heaven­ly host;
Praise Fa­ther, Son, and Ho­ly Ghost.

More chant.

Ave Verum Corpus is a C13 song for Eucharist and Benediction and is attributed to Pope Innocent VI (or V or IV or III).

It has umpteen settings and I have done Mozart’s here, but this is plainsong chant. Both this English translation and this arrangement are by the editor of the New Living Parish Hymn Book, John de Luca.

I had a crack at a backing, which may be less worse than usual for BIAB chant.

Still best to listen to real chant:

John de Luca thought this chant did not work in English so he devised a macaronic version of the text, combining the English with Latin, that he thought worked better.

It is his arrangement of a plainsong Ave Maria.

I did try to make a backing with the usual less than stellar result for chant:

This is the straight Latin chant:

This is an ancient chant for Lent from the New Living Parish Hymn Book, sadly out of print but very much worth getting if you find one second hand. I think the accompaniment book of this hymnal − plus Together In Song for the chords− covers much traditional hymnody with tasty extras like improvements on the songs of the folk mass era.

This song goes before even the 1960s (!) and although it sounds older is only from the 1800s, although the lyrics were later reshuffled with much older texts. This may account for the very great variability in published texts.

John de Luca made his own arrangement and his own English translation and that is a great reason for posting this.

A less good reason is another failed attempt at chant by BIAB:

Just so more people know the breadth of John de Luca’s accomplishments in this hymnal here is his arrangement and translation/paraphrase to join all the other variants of this chant.

This is how it is meant to sound, shorn of metrical baggage:

Much as I am enjoying listening to chant, I am sick of seeing posts on YouTube and elsewhere suggesting there is a cabel of old people preventing the Catholic Church returning to the glory of Latin chant as the exclusive music of the Church.

There is the usual cherry picking of SC to support this, ignoring the instruction that we need to encourage above all conscious, active participation in the liturgy.

In every suburban and rural parish I have worked as a musician there have been a few volunteers who run themselves ragged doing their best to provide music for mass that is prayful, of the people (ie enculturated to the assembly) and absolutely suitable for mass. In the unlikely event that an assembly was moved to change to Latin chant and those suggesting it were going to take over the often thankless task of providing the music week in and week out there would be no stopping it, but I have never seen it around these parts.

I now live in Tasmania, where a few years ago a young priest full of zeal decided he would change most of the masses to Latin in a small rural town. This was in a parish where, without the benefit of clergy for many years, the assembly had provided there own sacred liturgy as they were able, and where, unsuprisingly, there was no tradition of chant. The poor boy was nearly tarred and feathered and had to be rescued, and while I do not condone violence against priests, nor do I condone violence of a liturgical nature against an assembly.

I hear the accusation that styles other than chant are for entertainment value and distracting and that there is an idolatry in using a musical style that is liked by the musicians who are only interested in drawing attention to themselves. I would contend that that sin is equally committed by those who make an idol of Latin or chant or any style of music for that matter. To serve a community in music liturgy, it has to involve music that has been sacred to that community and imposition of something that has become as unfamilar as Latin chant on an assembly that has no background in that mode of music is surely as distracting as a polka.

Certainly in Australia, all attempts to regulate what music is used in parishes has failed. It is shaped by what is available, by the volunteers who are available, and by the absence of funding and will from the heirarchy. This leads to a patchy, congregational picture but that is what we have…

… here endeth the rant.

This is an Easter hymn based on a C7 Latin hymn translated by Robert Campbell (C19) and set to SALZBURG by Jacob Hintze (C17).

The sheet music is here in the same arrangement as in this Hymn book. Godsongs has some useful background and Liturgy Share much useful material.

When I blogged this years ago it was in an odd style, so this time I have gone very normal with a BIAB organ. The text has many variations but this is the version used here.

1 At the Lamb’s high feast we sing
Praise to our victorious King,
Who has washed us in the tide
Flowing from His pierced side.
Praise we him whose love divine,
Gives the guests his blood for wine,
Gives his body for the feast,
Love the victim, love the priest.

2 Where the paschal blood is poured,
Death’s dark angel sheathes his sword;
Israel’s hosts triumphant go
Through the wave that downs the foe.
Christ the lamb, whose blood was shed,
Paschal victim, paschal bread;
With sincerity and love
Eat we manna from above.

3 Mighty victim from the sky,
Powers of hell beneath thee lie;
Death is conquered in the fight;
Thou hast brought us life and light.
Now thy banner thou dost wave;
Vanquished Satan and the grave;
Angels join his praise to tell −
See o’er-thrown the prince of hell.

4 Paschal triumph, paschal joy,
Only sin can this destroy;
From the death of sin set free,
Souls reborn, dear Lord, in thee.
Hymns of glory, songs of praise,
Father, unto thee we raise;
Risen Lord, all praise to thee,
Ever with the Spirit be.

This is interesting.

The Antiphon is the Proper for Compline set by the editor of the New Living Parish Hymn book, John de Luca. It is a lovely little song that would be useful on it’s own in other circumstances.

The verses are based on the Canticle of Simeon from Luke 2:29-32, the Nunc Dimmitis and set to Plainsong: Mode viii.

This is just the antiphon:

This is an Epiphany hymn with a text by William Chatterton Dix set to DIX by Conrad Kochner. There are variations in the text and I have posted the version in the New Living Parish Hymn Book.

By the way, Liturgy Share is great for traditional hymnody like this. For this song, for example, there is music for organ, the choir and even the chords for people who need them (like me). It is a vast resource of scholarship and hard work that is most useful.

I blogged this song many years ago with a frankly bizarre backing – this one is much more normal:

1. As with gladness men of old
   Did the guiding star behold,
   As with joy they hailed its light,
   Leading onward, beaming bright,
   So, most gracious Lord, may we
   Ever more be led to thee.
2. As with joyful steps they sped,
   To that lowly manger bed,
   There to bend the knee before
   Him whom Heav’n and Earth adore;
   So may we with willing feet
   Ever seek thy mercy seat.
3. As they offered gifts most rare
   At that manger rude and bare;
   So may we with holy joy,
   Pure and free from sin’s alloy,
   All our costliest treasures bring,
   Christ, to thee, our heav’nly King.
4. Holy Jesus, ev’ry day
   Keep us in the narrow way;
   And when earthly things are past,
   Bring our ransomed souls at last
   Where they need no star to guide,
   Where no clouds thy glory hide.
5. In the heav’nly country bright,
   Need they no created light;
   Thou its light, its joy, its crown,
   Thou its sun, which goes not down;
   There for ever may we sing
   Alleluias to our King.

This is the William Henry Monk arrangement, also used in this hymnal:

I am finding Youtube clips that say they have lyrics for congregations, the intent being to project them playing and have the assembly sing along. Not ideal as it discourages participation, but understandable.

These clips vary from slow to breakneck, but I don’t think you want to drag this one.