The Conversion Of St Paul at Our Place on Sunday (no, we are not on the Damascus Road).
Three of the hymns are from The Sheet, so I'll have to wait for my Spy to report, but the entrance hymn (from the Orange Book) is God is working his purpose out (Benson).
At our 9 o'clock communion.
Praise, My Soul, the King of Heaven - LAUDA ANIMA
Blest are the Pure in Heart - FRANCONIA
Guide me, O thou great Redeemer - CWM RHONDDA
Sadly, one of our two regular volunteer organists died unexpectedly at the end of last year. We no longer have an organist every Sunday, sometimes a pianist stands in, or we have recorded organ music. It was recordings today, and I think the sound desk settings could have been better. Cwm Rhondda lacked the "oomph" needed which dampened the congregation's usual enthusiastic singing.
The trouble with singing Cwm Rhondda to a recorded accompaniment would be that the player may not have included the (obligatory!) extra length on I will ever give to thee (give to THEE ...), which Ruins the Fun!
Our offerings at St Pete's were (mostly) not too bad today:
Brightest and best of the suns of the morning - Epiphany Will you come and follow me? - Kelvingrove* Dear Lord and Father of mankind - Repton Bind us together, Lord Thou, whose almighty word - Moscow
* I only realised at choir practice yesterday that the tune Kelvingrove has virtually no dotted notes in it (except at the very start of each line); I explained this to the choir, but as I predicted, the congregation (and, in fairness, the choir as well) dotted away merrily. I had assumed it was just another aberration in the Orange Book, but I've done a bit of googling, and it looks as though the undotted version is right.
For once, I think the "mistake" is actually an improvement; it felt rather dull to have all the notes being equal. I'd be interested to hear what you think!
We are nearly at the end of our Hebrews series: looking at the second half of Chapter 12 - the unshakable Kingdom. Hence, all the references to the King this week, and the extended riff on Mt Zion in the third him. Really good choices and the congregation sang their hearts out.
Praise, My Soul, The King Of Heaven (Lauda Anima)
Blest Are The Pure In Heart (Franconia)
Glorious Things Of Thee Are Spoken (Austria)
Crown Him With Many Crowns (Diadem)
The trouble with singing Cwm Rhondda to a recorded accompaniment would be that the player may not have included the (obligatory!) extra length on I will ever give to thee (give to THEE ...), which Ruins the Fun!
I'm pretty sure these machines generate the music digitally and no actual player is involved.
And any organist worth their salt will know to slam on the brakes to give time for the men to sing the rising arpeggio at that point, and then hang on long enough for their dizziness to settle and they are well enough to continue.
We had
Gather us in
I will be with you
Oh the word of my Lord (to a gentle bossa nova 🤭)
Christ be our light.
Before Mass I asked our group of singers to "sing their chops off" to encourage the congregation to actually open their mouths. It worked, but I then had to spend time interpreting that idiom to a lovely Italian lady.
Conversion of St Paul, with particular reference to Ananias. (And a nod to St Dwynwen's Day).
“Come, let us praise the Lord” - Darwall's 148th.
“Here is love vast as the ocean” - Dom Ond Iesu.
“Master, speak! Thy servant heareth” - Magister/Ottawa.
“Saul left for Damascus” - Stowey.
“For my sake and the Gospel's, go” - Bishopsgarth.
Flashback to Covid at our place. All week we, like much of the eastern US, have been expected a big winter storm. It has turned out to be much less terrible than expected where I am (as we knew by Friday would probably be the case), though it’s still significant enough that no one needs to be out driving in it.
In anticipation of the bad weather, and in order to let people know sooner rather than later what to expect this weekend, notice came out on Thursday that all activities at church today were canceled. Instead, we held and recorded the entire service at the usual choir practice time Thursday night. The link went out this morning, as it usually does for the livestream. My wife is watching it now.
The hymns were:
“Be Thou My Vision”/SLANE
“God, be the Love to Search and Keep Me”/GREEN TYLER
“Open Your Ears, O Faithful People”/YISRAEL V’ORAITA
“Will You Let Me Be Your Servant”/THE SERVANT SONG
“Soon and Very Soon”
There’s one other bit possibly worth noting. In lieu of a regular prelude and postlude, the choir sang a very simple protest song that our music director heard in a video from Minneapolis:
Hold on, hold on,
My dear ones, here comes the dawn.
It worked nicely in that pretty much everything the choir is singing in these weeks after Epiphany relates to light. The plan had been that on the “postlude,” the congregation would be invited to join in. Obviously that wasn’t an option, but after we were done recording there was discussion of continuing to use the song at the beginning and ending of the service in the coming weeks.
The trouble with singing Cwm Rhondda to a recorded accompaniment would be that the player may not have included the (obligatory!) extra length on I will ever give to thee (give to THEE ...), which Ruins the Fun!
Our offerings at St Pete's were (mostly) not too bad today:
Brightest and best of the suns of the morning - Epiphany Will you come and follow me? - Kelvingrove* Dear Lord and Father of mankind - Repton Bind us together, Lord Thou, whose almighty word - Moscow
* I only realised at choir practice yesterday that the tune Kelvingrove has virtually no dotted notes in it (except at the very start of each line); I explained this to the choir, but as I predicted, the congregation (and, in fairness, the choir as well) dotted away merrily. I had assumed it was just another aberration in the Orange Book, but I've done a bit of googling, and it looks as though the undotted version is right.
For once, I think the "mistake" is actually an improvement; it felt rather dull to have all the notes being equal. I'd be interested to hear what you think!
@Piglet I agree that the dotted version is more fun to sing. However Mr Cats who is above all things an organ and musical Purist (note the capital P) Does Not Agree, and Will Not Play it in this manner. By the way, all organists playing in the regular recitals at the Kelvingrove Gallery in Glasgow are required to begin with Kelvingrove. Mr Cats once arranged for a visiting American to give the recital, then had to slide hurriedly onto the organ bench when he realised our transatlantic friend did not know it.
Judge eternal, throned in splendour- Rhuddlan
O thou who camest from above- Hereford
Longing for light - Christ be our light.
Bread of heaven, on thee we feed- Bread of heaven
O for a thousand tongues to sing - Lyngham
A good selection, though our one bass failed to do justice to Lyngham.
@Piglet and @Cathscats, what is the “dotted version” of KELVINGROVE? In our hymnal, it’s in 3/4 time, and the only dotted notes are dotted half notes/minims at the ends of lines, which also seems to be how CH4 has it, and I can’t imagine what else would be dotted.
And any organist worth their salt will know to slam on the brakes to give time for the men to sing the rising arpeggio at that point, and then hang on long enough for their dizziness to settle and they are well enough to continue.
I have to agree with the Vicar of Dibley that it's OK to shout on the "bread of heaven" bit.
And any organist worth their salt will know to slam on the brakes to give time for the men to sing the rising arpeggio at that point, and then hang on long enough for their dizziness to settle and they are well enough to continue.
I have to agree with the Vicar of Dibley that it's OK to shout on the "bread of heaven" bit.
GMOTGJ is absolutely written to be sung molto con welly!
One of my favourite memories is a friend's wedding in a tiny church in Wales packed to the rafters with people who could really sing and I could give it as much welly as I could *and no-one noticed because I was drowned out by everyone else*!
OK, maybe the person in front of me got my tune-free rendering in the lug but apart from them...
@Piglet and @Cathscats, what is the “dotted version” of KELVINGROVE? In our hymnal, it’s in 3/4 time, and the only dotted notes are dotted half notes/minims at the ends of lines, which also seems to be how CH4 has it, and I can’t imagine what else would be dotted.
In the Orange Book (upon which be curses) it's in 2/4, with equal quavers on every single note (even at the start of each line), which is about as dull as you can get! Even 3/4, with minim/crotchet timing would be an improvement!
With all due respect to Mr Cats, we (and the congregation) ignored what was written and sang it con jiggissimo.
@Piglet and @Cathscats, what is the “dotted version” of KELVINGROVE? In our hymnal, it’s in 3/4 time, and the only dotted notes are dotted half notes/minims at the ends of lines, which also seems to be how CH4 has it, and I can’t imagine what else would be dotted.
In the Orange Book (upon which be curses) it's in 2/4, with equal quavers on every single note (even at the start of each line), which is about as dull as you can get! Even 3/4, with minim/crotchet timing would be an improvement!
With all due respect to Mr Cats, we (and the congregation) ignored what was written and sang it con jiggissimo.
Thanks, @Piglet. I did a bit of digging and found versions of the traditional tune (as opposed to the hymn tune) in 4/4 and written as you described. Sort of a Scotch Snap, I suppose.
Comments
Three of the hymns are from The Sheet, so I'll have to wait for my Spy to report, but the entrance hymn (from the Orange Book) is God is working his purpose out (Benson).
Not one of my personal favourites, but YMMV.
Only two of tomorrow's hymns are from The Sheet - they are singing Abide with me (Eventide) as the Communion hymn...
Praise, My Soul, the King of Heaven - LAUDA ANIMA
Blest are the Pure in Heart - FRANCONIA
Guide me, O thou great Redeemer - CWM RHONDDA
Sadly, one of our two regular volunteer organists died unexpectedly at the end of last year. We no longer have an organist every Sunday, sometimes a pianist stands in, or we have recorded organ music. It was recordings today, and I think the sound desk settings could have been better. Cwm Rhondda lacked the "oomph" needed which dampened the congregation's usual enthusiastic singing.
Our offerings at St Pete's were (mostly) not too bad today:
Brightest and best of the suns of the morning - Epiphany
Will you come and follow me? - Kelvingrove*
Dear Lord and Father of mankind - Repton
Bind us together, Lord
Thou, whose almighty word - Moscow
* I only realised at choir practice yesterday that the tune Kelvingrove has virtually no dotted notes in it (except at the very start of each line); I explained this to the choir, but as I predicted, the congregation (and, in fairness, the choir as well) dotted away merrily. I had assumed it was just another aberration in the Orange Book, but I've done a bit of googling, and it looks as though the undotted version is right.
For once, I think the "mistake" is actually an improvement; it felt rather dull to have all the notes being equal. I'd be interested to hear what you think!
Praise, My Soul, The King Of Heaven (Lauda Anima)
Blest Are The Pure In Heart (Franconia)
Glorious Things Of Thee Are Spoken (Austria)
Crown Him With Many Crowns (Diadem)
I'm pretty sure these machines generate the music digitally and no actual player is involved.
We had
Gather us in
I will be with you
Oh the word of my Lord (to a gentle bossa nova 🤭)
Christ be our light.
Before Mass I asked our group of singers to "sing their chops off" to encourage the congregation to actually open their mouths. It worked, but I then had to spend time interpreting that idiom to a lovely Italian lady.
“Come, let us praise the Lord” - Darwall's 148th.
“Here is love vast as the ocean” - Dom Ond Iesu.
“Master, speak! Thy servant heareth” - Magister/Ottawa.
“Saul left for Damascus” - Stowey.
“For my sake and the Gospel's, go” - Bishopsgarth.
In anticipation of the bad weather, and in order to let people know sooner rather than later what to expect this weekend, notice came out on Thursday that all activities at church today were canceled. Instead, we held and recorded the entire service at the usual choir practice time Thursday night. The link went out this morning, as it usually does for the livestream. My wife is watching it now.
The hymns were:
“Be Thou My Vision”/SLANE
“God, be the Love to Search and Keep Me”/GREEN TYLER
“Open Your Ears, O Faithful People”/YISRAEL V’ORAITA
“Will You Let Me Be Your Servant”/THE SERVANT SONG
“Soon and Very Soon”
There’s one other bit possibly worth noting. In lieu of a regular prelude and postlude, the choir sang a very simple protest song that our music director heard in a video from Minneapolis:
Hold on, hold on,
My dear ones, here comes the dawn.
It worked nicely in that pretty much everything the choir is singing in these weeks after Epiphany relates to light. The plan had been that on the “postlude,” the congregation would be invited to join in. Obviously that wasn’t an option, but after we were done recording there was discussion of continuing to use the song at the beginning and ending of the service in the coming weeks.
@Piglet I agree that the dotted version is more fun to sing. However Mr Cats who is above all things an organ and musical Purist (note the capital P) Does Not Agree, and Will Not Play it in this manner. By the way, all organists playing in the regular recitals at the Kelvingrove Gallery in Glasgow are required to begin with Kelvingrove. Mr Cats once arranged for a visiting American to give the recital, then had to slide hurriedly onto the organ bench when he realised our transatlantic friend did not know it.
Mass of St Thomas
Judge eternal, throned in splendour- Rhuddlan
O thou who camest from above- Hereford
Longing for light - Christ be our light.
Bread of heaven, on thee we feed- Bread of heaven
O for a thousand tongues to sing - Lyngham
A good selection, though our one bass failed to do justice to Lyngham.
I have to agree with the Vicar of Dibley that it's OK to shout on the "bread of heaven" bit.
GMOTGJ is absolutely written to be sung molto con welly!
One of my favourite memories is a friend's wedding in a tiny church in Wales packed to the rafters with people who could really sing and I could give it as much welly as I could *and no-one noticed because I was drowned out by everyone else*!
OK, maybe the person in front of me got my tune-free rendering in the lug but apart from them...
In the Orange Book (upon which be curses) it's in 2/4, with equal quavers on every single note (even at the start of each line), which is about as dull as you can get! Even 3/4, with minim/crotchet timing would be an improvement!
With all due respect to Mr Cats, we (and the congregation) ignored what was written and sang it con jiggissimo.