Music Notes for Ninth Sunday After Pentecost — July 21, 2024

Praeludium in E minor (BuxWV 143) – Dieterich Buxtehude (c1637-1707)

Click to watch video on Youtube.

Dieterich Buxtehude was a Danish organist and composer of the Baroque period. During his long career as organist at Lubeck’s Marienkirche, 1668-1707, he came to epitomize the great North German organ school. As a composer who worked in various vocal and instrumental idioms, Buxtehude’s style greatly influenced other composers, such as Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel. The 20-year-old Bach walked over four hundred kilometers from Arnstadt to visit the great master, which says everything about how important Buxtehude’s music was to the young Bach. Buxtehude is considered one of the most important composers of the 17th century.

The Praeludium in E minor (BuxWV143), this Sunday’s organ postlude in church, begins with a pedal solo whose material generates most of the introduction’s twenty bars. The first of the fugal sections is based on one of the shortest and most unusual of Buxtehude’s subjects (eight notes, but only three pitches). The last of its pedal entries is followed by a free episode and then by a second fugue whose subject is a triple-time variant of that of the first. A free Adagio coming to rest over a long-held tonic pedal brings the work to a grand conclusion.

Gerald Harder

 

 

/by

Music Notes for Eighth Sunday After Pentecost — July 14, 2024

God of Grace and God of Glory – Text: Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878-1969) / Music: John Hughes (1873-1932)

 

Click to watch video on Youtube.

This morning’s offertory hymn, God of Grace and God of Glory, is undoubtedly one of the more significant hymns to come out of the United States in the 20th century. It was written by Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878-1969) in his home on the Maine coast in anticipation of the dedication of Riverside Church in New York City. It was sung at the opening service on October 5, 1930, and again at the dedication on February 5, 1931. Referring to the hymn in his autobiography, Fosdick writes, “That was more than a hymn to me when we sang it that day—it was a very urgent personal prayer.” Many hymnals amend the original final stanza, and several other minor alterations are to be found in the various appearances of the hymn. It is not easy to determine what is the authentic form.

The tune “Cwm Rhondda” was written by John Hughes (1873-1932) on a Sunday morning while he was worshipping in Salem chapel, a country church in Wales. It was printed in The Methodist Hymn Book and was one of the few Welsh tunes to be included in Hymns Ancient & Modern 1950. In spite of its popularity in Wales, the tune is rarely found in Welsh hymnals. However, every Welsh person knows it to ‘Guide me, O thou great Jehovah’ and sings it with gusto at football matches. The composer gave the tune its name; Rhondda is an urban district in South Wales, and Cwm means low valley.

God of grace and God of glory,
On Thy people pour Thy power.
Crown Thine ancient church’s story,
Bring her bud to glorious flower.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
For the facing of this hour,
For the facing of this hour.

Lo! the hosts of evil ’round us,
Scorn Thy Christ, assail His ways.
Fears and doubts too long have bound us,
Free our hearts to faith and praise.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
For the living of these days,
For the living of these days.

Cure Thy children’s warring madness,
Bend our pride to Thy control.
Shame our wanton selfish gladness,
Rich in things and poor in soul.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
Lest we miss Thy kingdom’s goal,
Lest we miss Thy kingdom’s goal.

Set our feet on lofty places,
Gird our lives that they may be,
Armored with all Christ-like graces,
In the fight to set men free.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
That we fail not man nor Thee,
That we fail not man nor Thee.

Save us from weak resignation,
To the evils we deplore.
Let the search for Thy salvation,
Be our glory evermore.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
Serving Thee whom we adore,
Serving Thee whom we adore.

Gerald Harder

 

 

/by