Music for the Second Sunday of Easter: April 28, 2019

Pastor Sarah Locke

Pastor Daniel is on vacation this week so we welcome Pastor Sarah Locke to preach and preside. Pastor Sarah serves as the Lutheran-Episcopal Chaplain and campus pastor for Jacksonville Campus Ministry (JCM) at the University of North Florida. She also serves as the assisting priest at Redeemer Episcopal Church.

Prelude: Theme and Variations on “Now the Green Blade Rises” (Noël Nouvelet)

Wayne L. Wold (ELW 379)

The hymn bears an Easter text in our hymnal, but it actually dates from the 15^th century in France where it was a Christmas carol! Short and sweet is the order of the days for this set of variations that happily explores the organ’s palette with principals, strings, flutes, and reeds – ending with a trumpet tune.

Gathering Hymn: Christ Is Risen! Alleluia (Morgenlied) ELW 382

The first time I ever sang this hymn was March 23, 2008 when it was requested by a much-loved choir member, Margaret Walker.  I had never heard it, so I was surprised to learn that many in the choir were familiar with it.

Margaret Walker sang in the choir at St. Mark’s over 6 decades. In 2012 we celebrated the feast of her

Margaret in her usual place.

nativity with a special hymn sung to the tune Ein feste Burg. Margaret died in 2016.

We sing of Margaret on this day

and thank you that she leads us.

She sings, so we our voices raise,

led in a song most glorious.

Her natal star appears,

removing all our fears.

This be our one desire,

please set our hearts afire,

to sing like Margaret of the Choir!

Hymn of the Day: Come, You Faithful, Raise the Strain (Gaudeamus pariter) ELW 363

Musical Offering (Festival Choir): Easter Carol Alfred V. Fedak

This is another French melody even older (13^th century) than Noël Nouvelet. The arranger pairs it with a text by Charles Wesley.

Communion Hymn: O Sons and Daughters, Let Us Sing (O filii et filiae) ELW 386

Some people might freak out a little when they see we are singing all nine stanzas – but they are all critical for the day. Stanzas 5-8 retell the story in the gospel reading. Since we are singing this during communion, we should have ample time to finish! I have written about cutting stanzas from hymns in an earlier blog post which you can read here: http://smljax.blogspot.com/search?q=making+the+cut

Sending Hymn: Thine Is the Glory (Judas Maccabeus) ELW 376

The tune’s first incarnation was in an oratorio, “Judas Maccabeus,” by George Frederic Handel. “See, the Conquering Hero Comes!” includes choir, organ, and orchestra. If you wonder how a piece of music translates from oratorio into hymnody, you can hear a performance of this piece as Handel first composed it at this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eM6nw8L5YnU

Postlude: Christ Jesus Lay in Death’s Strong Bands (Christ lag in Todesbanden) J. S. Bach (ELW 370)

This is the most Lutheran piece of music we will hear today! J. S. Bach’s chorale prelude on the Christ lag in Todesbanden comes from Orgelbüchlein, his collection of preludes on 46 tunes that span the liturgical year.

Sources:

Hymnal Companion: Evangelical Lutheran Worship

Wikipedia

Music for Easter Sunday April 21, 2019

Prelude Come Christians, Join to Sing (St. Mark’s Ringers) arr. Lloyd Larson

Gathering Hymn: Jesus Christ Is Risen Today (Easter Hymn) ELW 365

Hymn of the Day At the Lamb’s High Feast We Sing (Sonne de Gerechtigkeit) ELW 362

Musical Offering (Festival Choir) This Joyful Eastertide arr. Hal H. Hopson

Music During Communion

Easter Anthem in Celtic Style (Christ Jesus Lay in Death’s Strong Bands) Bradley L. Norris

Assembly Hymn I Know that My Redeemer Lives (Duke Street) ELW 619

Sending Hymn: Now All the Vault of Heaven Sounds (Lasst uns erfreuen) ELW 367

Postlude Christ is erstanden Anton Wilhelm Leupold

Music for the Three Days February 18-20, 2019

MAUNDY THURSDAY

April 18, 2019

Prelude Prelude in G (viola and organ)   César Franck / ed. Charles Callahan

Hymn of the Day Great God, Your Love Has Called Us Here (Ryburn) ELW 358

Music During Footwashing Legende  (viola and organ) Louis Vierne, arr. Callahan

Musical Offering (Festival Choir) I Give to You a New Commandment

This musical offering has two parts. First is a text from the gospel reading with an original tune sung by the treble voices. Second is the music and Latin text from a ninth century hymn, Ubi Caritas et Amor, sung by the bass voices and found at ELW 653.

Communion Hymns
When Twilight Comes and the Sun Sets (Dapit hapon) ELW 566

Jesus Is a Rock in a Weary Land (Weary Land) ELW 333

Stay with Me (Stay with Me) ELW 348 (This was programmed, but not sung due to time.)

Psalm During the Stripping of the Altar

Psalm 22 (Sung to ELW psalm tone 9.)

GOOD FRIDAY

April 19, 2019

Musical Offering (Festival Choir) At the Cross Her Station Keeping (13^th  century text)

                                                                                                                                          Tony Cruz

Hymn of the Day Were You There (Were You There) ELW 353

Solemn Reproaches Russian Orthodox Traditional Hymn, verses by Kevin Anderson

Concluding Hymn: In the Cross of Christ I Glory (Rathbun) ELW 324

EASTER VIGIL

April 20, 2019

Response to the First Reading (Genesis 1:1-24a) Let Us With a Gladsome Mind (Monkland)

A metrical setting of texts from Psalm 136.

Response to the Second Reading (Exodus 14:10-31, 15:20-21) I Will Sing Unto the Lord

An Israeli folk song based on the Canticle of Moses and Miriam

Response to the Third Reading (Isaiah 55:1-11) Surely It Is God Who Saves Me

                                                                                                                               Jack Noble White

Response to the Fourth Reading (Ezekiel 37:1-14) Hear My Prayer, O God  

Carl P. Daw, text/ Hal Hopson, music

A metrical setting of Psalm 143.

Response to the Fifth Reading (Zephaniah 3:14-20) New Songs of Celebration Render (Rendez á Dieu) A metrical setting of Psalm 98 by Eric Routley.

Response to the Sixth Reading (Daniel 3:1-29) Song of the Three

Refrain by Mark Sedio, Psalm tone from Augsbsurg Fortress

Gospel Acclamation This Is the Feast of Victory for Our God  ELW Holy Communion Setting 3

Musical Offering (Festival Choir) Easter Carol                                                  Alfred V. Fedak

Communion Hymn Christ Has Risen While Earth Slumbers (Suo Gan) Text by John L. Bell

Sending Hymn Come, You Faithful, Raise the Strain (Gaudeamus pariter) ELW 363

Postlude Christ lag in Todesbanden                                                                                J. S. Bach

Music for Palm Sunday/Sunday of the Passion, April 14, 2019

Prayer of the Day for the Sunday of the Passion

Everlasting God, in your endless love for the human race you sent our Lord Jesus Christ to take on our nature and to suffer death on the cross. In your mercy enable us to share in his obedience to your will and in the glorious victory of his resurrection, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.

Evangelical Lutheran Worship, page 29.

Gathering Hymn in Procession: All Glory, Laud, and Honor (Valet will ich dir geben) ELW 344

Theodulph of Orleans was born in Spain between 750 and 760 AD. Born in Spain and educated in France, he was an important bishop while Charlemagne and Louis the Pious (Charlemagne’s son) ruled in turn as King of the Franks. Theodulph’s original poem, that later became the basis for this hymn, held 38 stanzas with two lines each.

John Mason Neale (1818-1866) translated the hymn nearly as we know it today. One of the verses Neale translated didn’t make it into most hymnals:

            Be thou, O Lord, the Rider, And we the little ass;

            That to God’s Holy city Together we may pass.

It’s hard enough keep the Palm Sunday procession dignified. Can you imagine trying to look reverent while singing this text?

Hymn of the Day: Ah, Holy Jesus (Herzliebster Jesu) ELW 349

Musical Offering: Thy Will Be Done Craig Courtney

Christ at the Cross    Carl Bloch ca. 1870

Craig Courtney lives in Columbus, Ohio.  He has published more than 70 sacred choral octavos, five vocal solo collections, and four extended works for choir and orchestra. His voice is a strong one in the church’s music today.

Communion Hymns:

O Sacred Head, Now Wounded (Herzlich tut mich verlangen) ELW 351

Christ, the Life of All the Living (Jesu, meines lebens leben) ELW 339

Sending Hymn: There in God’s Garden (Shades Mountain) ELW 342

Postlude: Prelude on Prepare the Royal Highway and Chorale (Bereden väg för Herran) David Cherwien / Swedish folk tune (ELW 264)

You’ll find this hymn in the Advent section of Evangelical Lutheran Worship, but I’ve often thought it equally fitting for Palm Sunday because of the line “Palm branches strew before him! Spread garments! Shout and sing!” along with the “Hosanna” shout in the refrain.

I’ve chosen a short “chorale prelude” by David Cherwien to be followed immediately by the harmonization from the hymnal. Chorale preludes are musical settings of a hymntune that go beyond the 4-part hymn setting through the use of imitation, counterpoint, ritornello, reharmonizations and a host of other compositional techniques. David Cherwien’s setting is in the style of a fanfare – so expect to hear some trumpets. After the hymn, there’ll be a tag ending that repeats a bit of the Cherwien version.

Jesus Enters Jerusalem and the Crowds Welcome Him
Pietro Lorenzetti, 1320

Sources:

Wikipedia

Evangelical Lutheran Worship (Augsburg Fortress)

Hymnal Companion to Evangelical Lutheran Worship, Paul Westermeyer (Augsburg Fortress)

By Carl Bloch - www.the-athenaeum.org, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=25990900

By Pietro lorenzetti - http://www.aiwaz.net/panopticon/lorenzetti-pietro/gc58p0, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3944840

www.lorezn.com (info on Craig Courtney)

Music for the Fifth Sunday in Lent - April 7, 2019

Prelude: Out of the Depths I Cry to You (Aus tiefer Not)  ELW 600

setting, Kevin Hildebrand

Aus tiefer Not is one of the great hymns for Lent and one of just a handful of hymns penned by Martin Luther himself that can be found in Evangelical Lutheran Worship. Hildebrand’s setting uses two composition techniques simultaneously: ostinato and canon.

An ostinato is a part that repeats over and over again throughout a piece of music. The ostinato here is just four bars long and it undulates, perhaps like heavy waves over a deep part of an ocean. It’s played on the flute stops in the organ’s middle range.

The term “canon” may be better known by its more common name - “round.” One voice begins, then a second follows in exact repetition of the first at intervals – just like “Row, Row, Row Your Boat.”

First we hear the ostinato, then the melody begins in the pedal with the organ’s clarinet stop. The second voice comes in on the top manual (the swell) using the organ’s oboe stop.  As the two voices sing the tune of the hymn, the ostinato continues in the middle.

I chose this for the prelude because we’ve been singing a piece of Aus tiefer Not during the psalm from Thomas Pavlechko’s St. Martin’s Psalter. The refrain is built on the tune, as is the tone we’ve been chanting during the psalm stanzas.

I also chose this as a prelude because it reminded me of our Wednesday night “Restless” theme. Last night one of our prayer stations focused on Jonah. (If anyone in the Bible prays “out of the depths,” it’s this character.)

Gathering Hymn: My Hope Is Built on Nothing Less (The Solid Rock) ELW 596

Many church musicians work for a more somber tone in Lent. They don’t play preludes, they avoid bright sounds on the organ, they speak (rather than sing) certain portions of the liturgy. At St. Mark’s we typically “bury” the Alleluia, but I don’t avoid the organ’s trumpets and mixtures because Sunday is still a celebration of the resurrection. Most people know that Lent is a forty day season, but some aren’t aware that we don’t count the Sundays!

The last verse of this hymn begins “When he shall come with trumpet sound. . .” Expect to hear the organ’s trumpet sound on this stanza!

 

There are trumpets in here - and we'll get a taste on Sunday.

Hymn of the Day: Lord, Thee I Love with All My Heart (Herzlich lieb) ELW 750

I never knew this hymn before coming to St. Mark’s. Now I love it so much that I have added it to the list of hymns for my own funeral. (You can read more about that here: http://smljax.blogspot.com/search?q=funeral)

The final stanza asks “that I may die unfearing.” It continues “and then from death awaken me. . .” Expect to hear the trumpet again, reminding us that “. . .the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised. . . (I Corinthians: 15:52)

Musical Offering: Bread of the World Richard Shephard (Festival Choir)

A meditative choral setting with lovely communion text by Reginald Heber.

Bread of the world, in mercy broken,

Wine of the soul, in mercy shed.

By whom the words of life were spoken,

And in Whose death our sins are dead.

Look on the heart by sorrow broken,

Look on the tears by sinners shed;

And be Thy feast to us the token,

That by Thy grace our souls are fed.

Communion Hymns:

Jesus, Keep Me Near the Cross (Near the Cross) ELW 335

The words and music are by Fanny Crosby who is one of America’s best known (and loved) gospel hymn writers.

Beneath the Cross of Jesus (St. Christopher) ELW 338

Elizabeth C. Clephane (1830-1869), author of the text, was born in Edinburgh Scotland. Frederick C. Maker (1844-1927) wrote the tune to complement Clephane’s text.

Sending Hymn: When I Survey the Wondrous Cross (Hamburg) ELW 803

Postlude: How Firm a Foundation (Foundation) ELW 796

setting, Gilbert M. Martin