THE MUSIC OF TRINITY SUNDAY

THIS WEEKS MUSIC SELECTION 

SUNDAY, MAY 26 Trinity Sunday

 PRELUDE: Organ Concerto in G minor, op. 1, No. 4, Movement II (Allegro), G.F Handel 

     Although consisting of at least four distinct movements as indicated in the score, Handel’s Organ Concerto in G minor, Op. 4, No. 1, makes better sense as a piece in three movements. The extra movement occurs after the second and is only a brief eight-bar Adagio solo for the organist, who must improvise or at least highly embellish a sketchy passage provided by the composer. Although the Concerto is scored in G minor, it is only the first movement that is in the minor key before transitioning into the parallel major key of G.

    The three main movements take on the overall form of two outer movements in triple meter and moderate tempo, the first stately, the last a light dance, and both with an artful use of hemiola. The middle, or Allegro movement (which is what you will hear Sunday mornings prelude) in a faster duple meter ultimately displays an organist’s skill with perpetual motion with long passages of running 16th notes ***FINGER CRAMPS*** 

    There are a total of 6 Organ Concertos Handel wrote for the organ, with this being the first. The original scoring consists of a chamber orchestra (Oboe I, Oboe II, Violin I, Violin II, Viola, Cello/Bass, and Organ), but will be transcribed for solo Organ. See if you can identify the separation of the chamber orchestra parts from the organ!! 

 PROCESSIONAL HYMN: I Bind Unto Myself Today (Tune: St. Patric) 

ST. PATRIC

     If you have been a long time member of Trinity, you should be all too familiar with Sunday
mornings “Dramatic and Long”opening Hymn: I Bind Unto Myself Today. You may also refer this hymn as the St. Patric’s Breastplate. If you are unsure as to why it was given that second name, the affiliation it has with the name to the irish holiday that you might get pinched if you aren’t wearing green does in fact have a relation/connection. This hymn and poem is adapted from a work attributed to St. Patric (Indeed Laddie, the same St. Patric the very St. Patric’s Day Holiday is named from, who was one of Ireland’s patron saint’s!!). 

 Saint Patrick was a missionary to Ireland in the fifth century. He is known as the Apostle of Ireland. In The Confessio, (“Confession,” a reply to charges made by British ecclesiastics) a work by St. Patric himself, Patrick testifies to us of his conversion, trials, and tribulations in seeking, surrendering, and suffering for Christ. 

 The lyrics in this hymn were adapted by Cecil Francis Alexander (1818-1895).She was born in Ireland. Not only was she a poet and hymnwriter, she also cared for the poor and opened a school for the deaf. This poem or lyric is in iambic pentameter with four feet per line (de-um, de-um, de-um, de-dum). Often at the end of the last line there is an extra unstressed beat (de-dum-de). 

Stanza one about the trinity has four lines and a rhyme scheme of second and fourth line rhyming. Stanza two through six are eight lines each with an aba’b’cdc’d’ rhyme scheme. That is, the first and third line rhyme, the second and fourth line rhyme, the fifth and seventh line rhyme, and the sixth and eighth line rhyme. 

Stanza seven is different from the other stanzas with its poetic power from the repeated words “Christ” and “me”. Stanza seven concludes with a repetition of stanza one with four more aba’b’ rhyming lines added. Note the scope of subjects brought up and how they all fit together with each other, Christ’s work, and the Trinity in our Christian life. It can also be helpful to see what the focus of the poem is about and what each stanza is about. 

    The focus of the poem is taking on God and his good for Christian life and work, even battle. There are eight stanzas. The first and the last focus on the Trinity. In between these bookends, the stanzas cover the work of Christ, God’s creation, the power of God, two stanzas increasing an emphasis as to the threats to be resisted, and an interlude of sorts about Christ. Again, it concludes with the Trinity; this time in more detail. The best way to understand a poem is to read it and reread it with enjoyment. 

CHOIR ANTHEM: God So Loved The World, Dan and Heidi Goeller

     This mornings offertory anthem comes from the compositional work “In His Own Words” written and composed by Dan and Heidi Goeller. It has been a big favorite of the Trinity Choir to offer since performing the major work in 2015. It is the first of nine chorals that make up “In His Own Words”, following the introduction of the Overture, and truly makes the words from what we all know as the most famous scripture a powerful, moving, expressive, spiritually warming experience through the sacred power and impact of music. 

 In His Own Words is an aesthetic experience in which the listener hears the message of the Word proclaimed through both singing and narration. Both the narrative and lyric texts draw exclusively from the words of Christ. The musical composition consists of nine choral pieces, each intersected by underscored narratives and interludes. The various texts within the work are tied together thematically by the use of “I am” phrases : “I am the Way, the Truth, the Life, the Resurrection, the Good Shepherd, the Bread of Life”, etc.

*** Whenever this work is offered in a concert program again by the Trinity Choir, I strongly encourage the experience to attend the powerful and moving impact it has on the listener.***

 

RECESSIONAL HYMN: Holy Holy Holy (Tune: Nicaea)

     The Recessional hymn for Sunday, Holy Holy Holy, is perhaps one of the most famous and familiar hymns in all the Christian denominations, and perhaps even one of a non-christian culture. I. Text: Origins Reginald Heber (1783–1826) was an Anglican clergyman who served in England (1807–1823) and India (1823–1826). Heber wished to create a set of hymns suitable for each Sunday of the liturgical church year. “Holy, holy, holy” was written for Trinity Sunday, the first Sunday after Pentecost, when Heber was vicar of Hodnet. It is said to have been first printed in the third edition of A Selection of Psalms and Hymns of the Parish Church of Banbury (1826), but this collection is apparently lost. 

HOLY, HOLY, HOLY

It was included in Heber’s posthumous Hymns Written and Adapted to the Weekly Church Service of the Year (London, 1827 | Fig. 1), without music, in four stanzas of four lines. II. Text: Analysis Heber’s hymn draws largely from Revelation 4:1–11, part of John’s heavenly vision of angelic worship, which relates closely to Isaiah’s vision in Isaiah 6. It contains the glorious “Holy, holy, holy,” known throughout history as the kedusha, trisagion, tersanctus (or simply Sanctus), or thrice-holy. And before the throne there was, as it were, a sea of glass, like crystal. And around the throne, on each side of the throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind: the first living creature like a lion, the second living creature like an ox, the third living creature with the face of a man, and the fourth living creature like an eagle in flight. And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and within, and day and night they never cease to say, “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!” (Rev. 4:6–8, ESV) One unique feature of Heber’s text is the persistent rhyme of the same sound (y/ee) at the end of all sixteen lines.

   

Day of Pentecost

May 19^th, 2024

10am

 

 

Prelude: I’ll Fly Away, arr. Tammy Waldrop

 

Tammy Waldrop

This week’s prelude I’ll Fly Away,  will be offered by the Trinity Ringers. In this arrangement by local composer Tammy Waldrop, you will hear a fun malleted bass line, reminiscent of an upright bass. Tammy prefaced this piece with these words, “In my other life I am a 5-string banjo picker”. You can almost hear a banjo playing along!

 Tammy is a graduate of Baylor University with both a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Music Theory with an emphasis in Composition. Tammy has been writing and arranging for handbells and vocal choirs since 1980, placing over 375 publications with 19 publishers. She has held music editor positions at Word music, Ring Out! Press, and Alfred Music Publishing and has served as a church musician in numerous churches in various denominations. She is a frequent clinician/director for workshops, music weeks and festivals across the country. She is past Musical Director for the Community Handbell Ensemble, Strikepoint of Texas in Kingwood. Trinity Ringers have worked several times with Tammy, and she is always great fun.

 

Offertory: Still I Sing Alleluia, Kyle Pederson

The offertory anthem will be sung by the Trinity Choir. Based on the traditional Scottish tune LOCH LOMOND,  the text by Kyle Pederson reminds us "With spirit before me, with spirit behind, with spirit below and beside me; with spirit all around, even where affliction’s found, I will sing, I will sound, “Alleluia”. With the Easter season drawing to a close, we remember that we will always sing “Alleluia”.

A program note from Kyle Pederson:

                  “I’ve always loved the Scottish melody, Loch Lomond; it’s just achingly beautiful.  The tune rarely (ever?) is performed in a worship setting, though, since the original lyrics are all about a body of water and a soldier’s plight.  So I set to work crafting lyrics that I hope speak into the turbulence and challenges we face as individuals—and as a community.”

“When questions I spin echo answerless within, even then, still I sing 'Alleluia.'" 

 

 

Postlude: VI_ Carillon De Westminster, Vierne

How Louis Vierne was inspired by the chimes of Big Ben to write his Carillon De Westminster:

Big Ben 

Big Ben Bells

 

By the time the French musician Louis Vierne arrived in England for a short recital tour in January 1924, he was already a well-known figure. Titular organist at Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris since 1900, Vierne was also a celebrated composer, with four organ symphonies and a clutch of other pieces to his credit.

One of the recitals Vierne played in England was at Westminster Cathedral in London, where a new organ was being built in stages. Its designer, Henry Willis III, was at the concert and at one point he apparently hummed a tune to Vierne – who, severely sight-impaired since birth, would have been unable to read it on paper – and waited for the master organist to weave an imposing improvisation on it.

The tune Willis provided was that of the so-called ‘Westminster Quarters’, a four-note sequence struck in various permutations to mark the quarter hours on Big Ben, the clock in the Elizabeth Tower at the Houses of Parliament. The Quarters had actually originated not in London, but as a peal written in 1793 for St Mary the Great, the university church in Cambridge.

Exactly who composed the chime is uncertain, though it’s often attributed to William Crotch, an undergraduate at the time. Some hear in the initial four-note motif an echo of the aria ‘I know that my redeemer liveth’ from Handel’s Messiah, but the link is not conclusive.

We have no record of how Vierne expanded on the Quarters theme at his Westminster Cathedral concert. But its potential clearly interested him, as eight years earlier he had asked the owner of a clock shop in Switzerland where he heard the chime to write it down for him. And three years after the 1924 recital, Vierne returned to the Quarters again, in a swirlingly flamboyant work entitled Carillon de Westminster.

May 12, 2024 - The Seventh Sunday of Easter

The Seventh Sunday of Easter

 

The seventh Sunday of Easter continues with Jesus praying for his disciples, asking of them to remember his words and to continue to teach them when he is gone. The music selections you will hear revolve around the words of Christ in today’s Gospel, John 17:6-19, and Psalm 1, as well for all the Mothers of the world and here at Trinity for Mother’s Day.

Prelude: Prelude in E Flat “St. Anne”, BWV 552, J.S Bach

 J.S Bach Prelude and Fugue in E Flat Major, is the longest of Bach’s Preludes.  It combines the elements of a French overture (first theme), an Italian concerto (second theme) and a German fugue (third theme), although adapted to the organ. Originally possibly written in the key of D major, a more common key for a concerto or overture, Bach might have transposed it and the fugue into E♭ major because Mattheson had described the key in 1731 as a "beautiful and majestic key" avoided by organists. The piece also has three separate themes (A, B, C), sometimes overlapping, which commentators have interpreted as representing the Father, Son and Holy Ghost in the Trinity. Other references to the Trinity include the three flats in the key signature, like the accompanying fugue.

The first theme has the dotted rhythms, marked with slurs, of a French overture. It is written for five parts with complex suspended harmonies.

The second theme, representing God, the Son, the "kind Lord", has two bar phrases of staccato three-part chords in the galant style, with echo responses marked piano.

The third theme is a double fugue based on semiquavers, representing "the Holy Ghost, descending, flickering like tongues of fire." The semiquavers are not marked with slurs, according to North German conventions. In the final development (C3) the theme passes into E♭ minor, presaging the close of the movement, but also harking back to the previous minor episode and anticipating similar effects in later movements of Clavier-Übung III, such as the first duet BWV 802. The older style two- or three-part writing forms a contrast to the harmonically more complex and modern writing of the first theme.

The nickname “St Anne” for this Prelude, is because the Fugue  is strikingly similar to William Croft's English hymn of the same name. 

This prelude was chosen this morning for the appreciation of Mother’s Day. St. Anne is the patron saint of unmarried women, housewives, women in labor, grandmothers, childless people, equestrians, lace makers, miners, the poor, and seamstresses.  The most well-known patronage of St. Anne is that of grandmothers.  Certainly as the mother of the Virgin Mary and the grandmother of Jesus Christ, St. Anne was a woman of great virtue and love, as for all the mothers here at Trinity.

 

Opening Hymn: #483,  The Head That Once Was Crowned With Thorns

 "The head that once was crowned" fills in the gaps of the scriptural account by describing Christ's presence in heaven and the glory of those who "dwell above" (stanza three) with him in "heaven's eternal light" (stanza two).

Dan Forrest

Anthem: Shalom, Dan Forrest

Todays Choral anthem, Shalom, written by Dan Forrest, was written as choral prayer for peace and wholeness during the events of 2020, Shalom alternates between sections of very simple melody floating over gentle accompaniment with polyphonic refrains featuring whispers of the word "peace." No matter how complex the texture gets, it always returns to a single unison note, picturing the meaning of shalom: not merely a surface-level peace, but wholeness in every aspect of one's being (physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually) and in all our relationships with each other.

Recessional Hymn: #477,  All Praise To Thee, For Thou, O King Divine

The Recessional Hymn, All Praise To Thee, written by Episcopalian priest F. Bland Tucker (1895-1984) is based off one of the great biblical hymns, Philippians 2:5-11, the Kenosis Hymn, or hymn of self-emptying.  The King James Version is cited here since it was the basis of Tucker’s hymn:

“Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: but made himself of no reputation, and took upon himself the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God hath also highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:5-11).

Tucker’s paraphrase draws directly from this central passage of the incarnation for its language in several places. Stanza three begins, “Let this mind be in us which was in thee,” a rewording very similar to the beginning of the passage.

Stanza four is strongly reminiscent of the final section, “and given the name to which all knees shall bow.” Stanza five begins, “Let every tongue confess with one accord/in heaven and earth that Jesus Christ is Lord,” capturing the essence of the final phrases of the passage beautifully.

This text was written to accompany the famous hymn tune SINE NOMINE by British composer Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958). Tucker wanted to provide a text for this stirring tune in addition to “For all the saints” by Anglican Bishop William Walsham How (1823-1897). At the time of the writing of his new text (1938), the hymnal committee for the Hymnal 1940 discovered that SINE NOMINE, then under copyright, could only be used with How’s text. The committee instead substituted the tune ENGLEBERG by Charles Villiers Stanford. Not knowing this restriction, the 1966 Methodist Hymnal committee honored the original intent of the author and matched his text with SINE NOMINE. By the time of the publication of The UM Hymnal in 1989, SINE NOMINE was public domain in the United States and the text/tune pairing could be maintained unchallenged.

 

Postlude: Fanfare, Jaques-Nicolas Lemmons

            Jacques-Nicholas Lemmens (1823-1881) was an eminent Belgian organist, recitalist, composer, and educator. His first organ training was with his father, then he studied at the Royal Brussels Conservatoire, where he was appointed organ professor at age 26. His distinguished students included Alexander Guilmant and Charles-Marie Widor. During 1852 he presented numerous stunning organ recitals in Paris. His astonishing pedal technique was mostly due to his studies of Bach’s organ works, which were not well-known in France at the time. Fanfare is Lemmens’ most famous composition, which was very popular when he performed it in recitals, and is probably his most famous work today. 

From start to end, this Fanfare is nothing but excitement, showing off the organ at its most full. It is one of the first French Organ works our organist, Jack Balog, has learned and is also one of his most favorite pieces to play.