Church Music

This Advent song from Michael Joncas is a bit of an oddity. It’s not sure what key it is in. BIAB suggested D but it certainly isn’t in G nor Em as notated. Verses one. three and five have roughly the same tune with variations. Verses two and four also have a similar tune. So it is either a choir piece or the assembly is left with the refrain and the cantor does the verses and descant line in the chorus.

The text is based on Isaiah 40:1-11. You can find the words here. OCP sell the sheet music, which means it must be popular to be in GIA collection. Interestingly the guitar versions from GIA and OCP differ in that OCP crunched it two pages and lost clarity and GIA spread it over 3 pages to add a page turn. Take your pick.

I initially confused the melody and descant lines and wondered why it went so high. It is meant to be pretty fast in a faux medieval style but I didn’t take it all the way to 168 as suggested. Some of the You Tube versions slow it right down, which gives it a very different feel.

This is another of the Advent songs from Gather 3rd ed. and is based on the “O” Antiphons. It is by Francis Patrick O’Brien. The guitar version plays it capo 3 but since it goes to an E in the verses I’d play it without a capo. It changes key for the verse after the last phrase of the chorus goes into odd territory tunewise. It still works.

GIA sell the sheet music and the text is in their preview.

My backing is in the original key.

I’ve already blogged this Michael Joncas song here but I thought I’d do a less bonkers backing for it.

You can purchase the sheet music at GIA , where the text is in their preview.

This is an Advent gathering song with a text by Delores Dufner and here set by Michael Joncas.

GIA sell the sheet music and provide the text in their preview. The tune has more than a nod to THAXTED. I like the text but think it deserves a better setting.

Despite me using Gather 3rd ed. for Guitar there are no chords provided. I suspect Joncas did not think this was a guitar song as the preview at GIA has no chords either. Undaunted I used the music in the preview to look for chords. Usually this works but this time it sounded lousy. So I smoothed it out using chords from the key of A and improvised for my backing.

This You Tube clip gets around to the song if you wait.

CWB II set this Charles Wesley Advent text to STUTTGART, which I blogged here, but Gather 3rd ed. uses JEFFERSON. The tune is from William Walker’s Southern Harmony.

There is an arrangement, which you can purchase at GIA, that goes back to using “Thou”if you like that sort of thing.

Here, because I am working from a guitar book, I usually have to crib the bass notes of an organ arrangement from elsewhere. In this case I used some of the chords as well to make a hybrid of two arrangements for my fake organ BIAB backing.

1. Come, O long expected Jesus,
   born to set your people free;
   from our fears and sins release us,
   Christ in you our rest shall be.
   Israel’s strength and consolation,
   hope to all the earth impart;
   dear desire of every nation,
   enter every longing heart.
2. Born your people to deliver,
   born a child and yet a King,
   born to reign in us forever,
   now your gracious kingdom bring.
   By thine own eternal spirit
   rule in all our hearts alone;
   by your all sufficient merit,
   raise us to your glorious throne.

This is a TAIZE chant for Advent by Jacques Berthier. The song is a four part canon. There is also a secondary canon of Alleluia’s to add if you head isn’t spinning already.

The text is here (bottom of page). GIA sell the sheet music.

In case you want the Irish version here is my BIAB backing:

This uplifting Stephen Pishner hymn for Advent needs an assembly that can syncopate and a cantor with Gospel skills. If you have that in your church go for it. Otherwise it is ideal for a choir.

GIA will sell you the sheet music and the text is there in their preview.

My backing puts the two vocal lines at opposite ends of the stereo spectrum for clarity.

Entrance: O Emmanuel (Mangan)

Gifts: O Come, O Come Emmanuel (Neale) AOV 1/174

Communion:  Gift of Finest Wheat  (Westendorf/Kreutz) CWB II 651

Recessional: Sing of the Lord’s Goodness   (Sands) AOV 1/131

Entrance: Emmanuel (Angisano)

Gifts: Prepare the Way of the Lord (Boniwell) CWB II 250

Communion:  Table of Plenty (Schutte) AOV 2/20

Recessional: The Magnificat (Kearney) AOV 1/52

Entrance: O Emmanuel (Mangan)

Gifts: Come to Set Us Free (Farrell) AOV 1/39

Communion:  Praise To You O Christ (Farrell) AOV 1/28

Recessional: A Voice in the Wilderness  (Robinson) AOV 1/60