Church Music

Ryan’s parish sang this text by Lutheran Minister Herman G. Stuempfle Jnr recently set to ST ANNE by William Croft.

The text is here and Hymnary have the sheet music.

I’ve blogged the tune here.

Emma’s parish sing this very early Dan Schutte song that is a new one for me that is really quite lovely. The text is based on passages from Matthew’s and John’s Gospels and can be found at Schutte’s site. (No 13)

The sheet music can be purchased for download at OCP.

It’s great to see selections from other parishes around the world to see what other possibilities there are, or sometimes to see we all went for much the same thing. I keep trying to find songs from Mary’s parish in Ireland but the Gaelic selections defeat me.

I managed to restrain myself this time and made a more sensible backing from which to learn:

The original I believe:

Pretty but a little OTT (and is that the Grim Reaper in the picture?):

Via Christi Choir:

This is a Michael Joncas song for Advent that is new to me. He based it on Isaiah 40. It has the same tune for verses 1,3 &5 with a different tune for verses 2 & 4. That might make a cantor a good idea, or better yet a choir doing the harmonies.

Cantus Mundi has the text and a few You-Tube clips. The sheet music can be purchased for download at OCP.

My backing is a gypsy waltz.

This is the original with its medieval fayre arrangement:

This version starts slowly but should have picked up speed at some point:

I like the enthusiasm here:

This is another request from Frenzy Cool for a song by Moses Catan. It is for Eucharist.

The text is here and a recording can be heard here. The only sheet music I can find is an SATB arrangement by Ray Santos available here (scroll down). There is also a very odd MIDI arrangement there.

My backing is rather tame by comparison.

This song comes in Spanish, English and Bilingual versions and musically is recommended as a South American dance.

I suspect it works better in Spanish as the tune has some extra triplets to match the Spanish text.

The Spanish text is by Rosa Maria Icaza and the music is by Jaime Cortez, but I can’t see who is responsible for the English version. Spiritandsong have the texts of the refrains but you will need to check the sample at OCP where you can buy the sheet music to see the rest of the text. There are snippets of the song to listen to at both sites.

This song is a request from Frenzy Cool who seems to be looking for wedding songs.

The lyrics are by Timothy Dudley-Smith and can be found here. The setting she asked for is the tune COMFORT by Michael Joncas. The sheet music can be purchased in a collection at GIA and as a single sheet at sheetmusicplus.

I guessed the chords with the help of BIAB for the backing as I only have the choir version of Gather Comprehensive.

These are lovely:

This is another song from Emma’s parish, which was written by the wonderful team of James Phillip McAuley and Richard Connolly.

You just don’t get texts like this very often. Read it here. You can purchase the sheet music in the collection Year of Grace Music Book at AOV.

Emma has started putting up music selections and this song by Michael Mangan is a lovely choice. It is based on Micah 6:8 and I remember singing it in the year 2000 because it was in the collection Sing Jubilee, which is out of print.

It is, however, still available in the collection This Is the Time, which can be purchased at Litmus Productions. You can also purchase the sheet music for download at WLP where the text is in the sample and you can listen to a snippet.

My backing was made on an ancient version of BIAB in the year 2000.  This is a render of the MIDI file.

Entrance: Send Down the Fire (Haugen) AOV 2/164

Psalm 19 (O’Brien)

The precepts of the Lord give joy to the heart.

Gifts: Holy Spirit Come (Mangan) AOV NG 67

Communion: Seed, Scattered and Sown (Feiten) GA 195

The Beatitudes (Kearney)

Thanksgiving: Enemy of Apathy (Bell-Maule) AOV 2/75

Recessional: Lift Up Your Hearts (O’Connor) AOV 1/156

So much for my hope that this book would find missing OCP songs post AOV 1996-2006.

However, this version in OCP’s “Guitar Accompaniment Book” raises some interesting questions. They give the first two verses on the original text by Martin Luther as translated by Frederick H. Hedge and two verses of an alternative text by Arvella Schuller, I suspect the wife of Robert Schuller of Crystal Cathedral fame. They leave out the last two verses of the original which contain lines that can pretty clearly be thought of as attacks on the Catholic Church and the Pope of his day.

If you are going to include this classic Lutheran hymn, why not include all the verses. Or… if you aren’t going to include the verses because they might cause scandal in a Catholic church, why include the hymn.

The full text and sheet music for the tune, EIN FESTE BURG, are at Hymnary. If for some reason you want OCP’s version, it is available there and you can preview Schuller’s alternative text in the sample there.

More BIAB fake organ: