Music Notes for Sunday, June 15, 2025

Music for Trinity Sunday

As truly as God is our Father – William Mathias (1934-1992)

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The Welsh composer William Mathias was educated at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, and subsequently on an Open Scholarship in composition at the Royal Academy of Music where his teachers were Peter Katin for piano and Lennox Berkeley for composition. Mathias maintained a close affiliation to his homeland, being associated with University College, Bangor, from 1959 as a lecturer and as Professor of Music from 1969 until 1988. His reputation as a composer gained him many honours, notably a Fellowship of the Royal Academy of Music in 1965, and a CBE in the 1985 New Year’s Honours. Mathias was as popular in the United States as in Great Britain; testimony to this lies in the award of an Honorary DMus by Westminster Choir College, Princeton, in 1987.

Although this composer’s most distinguished compositions arguably lie in his orchestral music, Mathias thankfully never neglected liturgical music and received many commissions, including several for Royal occasions—most notably his anthem Let the people praise Thee, O God written for the wedding of The Prince and Princess of Wales in 1981 at St Paul’s Cathedral.

This Sunday’s communion motet in church is another work associated with a Royal visit to St Paul’s Cathedral. As truly as God is our Father was written at the request of the Friends of St Paul’s Cathedral for their festival and sung in the presence of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother, the Patron of the Friends on 30 June 1987.

This gentle anthem takes its text from the writings of Mother Julian of Norwich. The agitated rhythms normally associated with this composer’s celebratory anthems are absent here; the powerful words are reflected in the simplicity of the slowly changing harmonies.

As truly as God is our Father, so just as truly is he our Mother.
In our Father, God Almighty, we have our being;
In our merciful Mother we are remade and restored.
Our fragmented lives are knit together.
And by giving and yielding ourselves, through grace,
To the Holy Spirit we are made whole.
It is I, the strength and goodness of Fatherhood.
It is I, the wisdom of Motherhood.
It is I, the light and grace of holy love.
It is I, the Trinity.
I am the sovereign goodness in all things.
It is I who teach you to love.
It is I who teach you to desire.
It is I who am the reward of all true desiring.
All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well. Amen.

Gerald Harder

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Music Notes for Sunday, June 8, 2025

Music for Pentecost

Come, Holy Ghost, Our Souls Inspire – Text: Latin (9th century); tr. John Cosin (1594-1672) / Music: Mechlin plainsong, Mode 8

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Of all the Latin hymns, ‘Veni creator Spiritus’ (Come, Holy Ghost, Our Souls Inspire), this Sunday’s entrance hymn in church, has probably made the deepest impression on the church. Scholars believe it dates from the 9th century, and that it comes from northern France or possibly the Rhineland. It was used quite early as an office hymn to commemorate the outpouring of the Holy Spirit and for that reason it came to be associated with the ordination of bishops and priests and with the coronation of Christian emperors and kings. The original text consists of six stanzas of four lines. The most familiar translation is that of John Cosin (1594-1672), found in our Common Praise and New English Hymnal collections. Cosin translated ‘Veni creator Spiritus’ not as a hymn to be sung, but as private devotional material to be recited each morning “in commemoration of the hour when God the Holy Ghost came down upon the church.”

The Mechlin version of the plainsong melody Veni Creator is in common use with Cosin’s translation today. In this version, the ancient melody is to be found in Vesperale Romanum, which came into being at Malines, Belgium, in 1848. The purpose of that book was to restore the plainsong idiom, which at that time had largely been forgotten in the church. This melody has inspired countless musical compositions, including this Sunday’s prelude and postlude in church.

Come, Holy Ghost, our souls inspire,
and lighten with celestial fire;
thou the anointing Spirit art,
who dost thy sevenfold gifts impart.

Thy blessed unction from above
is comfort, life, and fire of love.
enable with perpetual light
the dullness of our blinded sight.

Anoint and cheer our soiled face
with the abundance of thy grace.
keep far our foes, give peace at home:
where thou art guide, no ill can come.

Teach us to know the Father, Son,
and thee, of both, to be but One,
that through the ages all along,
this may be our endless song:
Praise to thy eternal merit,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Gerald Harder

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