Church Music

This Taize chant was used yesterday at Emma’s parish.

The sheet music and text are at Hymnary. In my melody line Gather Australia there is only the refrain but Ritual Song 835 has the whole thing with three verses. The chord progression appears to be the same for the refrain and the three verses despite all of them having different tunes which usually means the cantor sings the verses over the repeated refrain.

Remembering that chant is the natural enemy of BIAB here is a backing for learning purposes.

Marty Haugen has put the sheet music of this song up temporarily on his site. The text is extremely apposite to our attitude to refugees.

I’ve made a country backing if you want to sing along with the sheet music. There is a leader part that pops up in the backing as a guitar line:

This psalm setting by Scott Soper for Psalm 16 was used as a communion hymn at RS’s parish recently. My copy is in OCP’s Guitar Accompaniment Book.

The lyrics are here and the sheet music can be purchased at OCP. It is written for the assembly to do the refrain and cantor/choir for the verses. The third verse has a different tune to the first two so that might be just as well although it is all reasonably singable.

It is a gentle piece and BIAB was a little heavy handed – the Edim7 chord came out more jarring than it needed to.

This is another of the songs from Leo Watt’s collection, “Go Where He Leads”. I note there is a copy in the ACU library in Melbourne if you’re passing!

This is an unusual tune and needs his gentle handling. This is from the original cassette:

The sheet music is out of print so Leo said I could put it up here:

My backing is a bit stodgy I’m afraid:

Leo’s last e-mail here included this paragraph:

Since I have no copies left of the sheet music album and no CD’s (it came out originally on cassette) I can’t send albums to anyone who wants them. So I’d say go ahead and put the songs on your blog with a reminder that permission to copy etc can be had by contacting Word of Life www.freelink.com.au  ; for parishes or dioceses that have left Word of Life, they can contact LicenSing www.licensingonline.org/en-au for permission.

Ryan’s parish may have jumped the gun on this Advent hymn but I’m sure it has application elsewhere, Christ the King for example. The text is by John Brownlie and is set to MORNING SONG possibly by Elkanah Kelsay Dare. I was enjoying this until Hymnary told me it sounded like “Old King Cole” and it does.

Hymnary have the text and the sheet music. An arrangement can be purchased at OCP.

This is an uplifting song used at RS’s parish that is trilingual.  The refrain can be in Latin or English and the verses Spanish or English and it also has three additional verses and two further ordination verses. It is by Christopher Walker who seems to not know when to stop writing verses.

The text is at the very end of this ordination handout (p 37) and the sheet music is available to purchase at OCP.

My backing is a little folk rock:

Christopher Walker conducting:

Very grand:

As a processional at a wedding:

Organ & piano:

A wild organ postlude:

Ryan’s parish sing this song by Andraé Crouch. I’ve found lots of arrangements with things like extra bridges on the net, but I’m following the arrangement in Ritual Song 870 that has the first two verses played through then the third and fourth verses each followed by four Hallelujahs. The fourth is the first verse repeated.

The text is at spiritandsong. This version has the text for the bridge if you wish to use that. The sheet music is available in various places on the net including musicnotes.

My backing is in F from Ritual Song with pretty simple chords.

The man himself:

This song by Keith Getty and Stuart Townend is yet another new one to me that is sung in RS’s parish. It is a vaguely Celtic style and is an attractive tune.

The text is at Getty’s site (in a very small font) as is the sheet music. It can also be purchased at Townend’s site, where the text is somewhat larger!

There has been controversy over the text, especially:

Till on the cross as Jesus died,

the wrath of God was satisfied.

I think it rather narrows the breadth of atonement theology to put it so baldly as that and I would rather the words were changed, but the authors won’t allow that.

This is another of Leo’s folk songs based on the Confessions of Augustine. I like this one a lot as well, although it is guilty of the singing in God’s voice vice, if that is a problem.

This is his fine original version released on cassette years ago:

The sheet music is out of print:

I made a backing with more country rock than folk:

Of course, a cut common folk song is quite susceptible to reframing as reggae:

Leo has given permission for his music to be put here with the reminder that his songs are used in churches under Word of Life or LicenSing licences.

This Marty Haugen song was unknown to me, but it is being used at Emma’s parish.  It could be used for gathering as well as communion. It’s not one of his hits but it has a very welcoming spirit.

The text is here and the sheet music is available from GIA.

There is a bit of guesswork in my backing so caution is advised.