Pentecost 25 - Sunday 18 November 2012

• Organ Prelude: 1. Prélude à l’Introït - 3. Élévation - 4. Communion - Charles Tournemire (1870-1939) (played by Peter Dunphy) 
• Opening Hymn 434 “The love of Jesus calls us” Service Music: John Merbecke 
• Solo: TBA (Virginia Wright, mezzo-soprano) 
• Offertory Hymn 529 “God, my hope on you is founded” 
• Communion Hymn 49 “Draw nigh and take” 
• Final Hymn 491 “The head that once was crowned with thorns” 
• Organ Postlude: The Prince of Denmark’s March – Jeremiah Clarke

Music Notes

Born at Bordeaux, France, Charles Tournemire served as the organiste titulaire at the Basilique Ste-Clotilde, Paris from 1898 to 1939. Gregorian chant exerted a substantial influence on Tournemire’s compositional output, most notably L’Orgue Mystique, a collection of 51 five-movement Offices or suites. Each of these Offices contains five pieces to be used for the five moments at which, before Vatican II, the liturgical organist intervened in the mass: namely, Introit, Offertory, Elevation, Communion, and Recessional. The first four pieces are untitled and brief so they can be inserted during the mass without hindering its progress. L’Orgue Mystique, composed between 1927 and 1932, is arranged by liturgical seasons: Christmas, Easter and Pentecost including principal feast days.

Pentecost 24 – Remembrance Day - Sunday 11 November, 2012

• Organ Prelude: Sursum corda – John Ireland 
• Opening Hymn 528 “O God, our help in ages past” 
• O Canada God Save the Queen 
• Service Music: David Hurd 
• Psalm 127 (Tone II.1) 
• Anthem: “Greater Love hath no man” – John Ireland

Many waters cannot quench love,
neither can the floods drown it. Love is strong as death.
Greater love hath no man than this,
that a man lay down his life for his friends.
Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree,
That we,being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness.
Ye are washed, ye are sanctified,
ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus.
Ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation;
That ye should show forth the praises of him
who hath call'd you out of darkness into his marvellous light.
I beseech you brethren, by the mercies of God,
that you present your bodies, a living sacrifice, holy,
acceptable unto to God, which is your reasonable service.

• Offertory Hymn 335 “How shall I sing that majesty” 
• Communion Hymn 171 “What does the Lord require” 
• Final Hymn “And can it be that I should gain” 
• Organ Postlude: Alla Marcia – John Ireland

Music Notes

John Ireland was born near Manchester, England in 1879. He entered the newly-established Royal College of Music in London at the age of fourteen, lost both his parents shortly after, and had to make his own way as an orphaned teenager, studying piano, organ and composition. The last was under Sir Charles Stanford, who taught many of the English composers who emerged at the end of the 19th century, including Ralph Vaughan Williams, Gustav Holst, Herbert Howells and a host of others. Ireland emerged as a celebrated composer towards the end of World War I when his Violin Sonata No.2 brought him overnight fame. From then until his death in 1962 he led an outwardly uneventful life combining composition, composition teaching at the Royal College (where his pupils included Benjamin Britten and E.J. Moeran), and his position as organist and choirmaster at St. Luke's Church, Chelsea, in London. He composed a great deal of music, although not a lot for the church. Ireland is known throughout the English-speaking world for his music to the hymn “My song is love unknown”, and is justly famous for “Greater love”, this morning’s anthem, which he wrote in 1912. Both “Sursum corda” (the prelude) and “Alla marcia” (the postlude) were composed a year earlier.

All Saints - November 4, 2012

• Organ Prelude: “Jerusalem, My Happy Home” and “There Is a Happy Land” – George Shearing 
• Opening Hymn 276 “For all the saints” 
• Service Music: David Hurd 
• Psalm 24: 1-6 (Tone VIII.1)
• Anthem: O sing joyfully – Adrian Batten
  

  O sing joyfully unto God our strength; make a cheerful noise unto the God of Jacob. Take the song, bring hither the tabret, the merry harp with the lute. Blow up the trumpet in the new moon, even in the time appointed, and upon our solemn feast-day. For this was made a statute for Israel, and a law of the God of Jacob. (Psalm 81:1-4)

• Offertory Hymn 275 “O what their joy and their glory must be” 
• Communion Hymn 282 “Let saints on earth in concert sing” 
• Final Hymn 278 “Jerusalem the golden” 
• Organ Postlude: “Menuet Gothique” (from Suite Gothique) – Leon Boellman 

Music Notes:

In 1977 the American composer Dale Wood and jazz pianist George Shearing created a volume of organ settings of early American folk hymns entitled Sacred Sounds from George Shearing. Over a period of 11 weeks Shearing had recorded a series of improvisations at the piano. After the tapes were transcribed to paper, Shearing visited Dale in his studio. Dale spent hours at the organ making suggestions of registrations and textures, while Shearing with his critical ear listened for accuracy. This morning’s organ preludes are from this set of pieces.

Léon Boëllmann (1862-1897) moved in the best circles of the French musical world, and as a pleasing personality, he made friends of many artists and was able to give concerts both in Paris and the provinces. Boëllmann became known as "a dedicated [organ] teacher, trenchant critic, gifted composer and successful performer ... who coaxed pleasing sounds out of recalcitrant instruments". His best-known composition is Suite Gothique in four sections, of which the Menuet is the third. Boellman composed it in 1895, two years before his premature death at age 35.

Pentecost 22 - October 28, 2012

• Organ Prelude: Elegy – C.H. Lloyd 
• Opening Hymn 343 “When all thy mercies, O my God” 
• Service Music: David Hurd 
• Psalm 34: 1-8 
• Anthem: Expectans, expectavi – Sir Charles Wood
  

  This sanctuary of my soul, Unwitting I keep white and whole,
  Unlatch'd and lit, if Thou should'st care To enter or to tarry there.
  With parted lips and outstretch'd hands, And list'ning ears
  Thy servant stands. Call Thou early, call Thou late,
  to Thy great service dedicate. My soul, keep white, and whole.

• Offertory Hymn 508 “I heard the voice of Jesus say” 
• Communion Hymn 620 “How sweet the name of Jesus sounds” 
• Final Hymn 306 “O for a thousand tongues to sing” 
• Organ Postlude: Prelude in C major BWV 545 – J.S. Bach

Music Notes:

Charles Hamilton Sorley (1895 – 1915) was a British World War I poet who was shot during the Battle of Loos, and whose life and work are commemorated on a stone in Poet’s Corner, Westminster Abbey. The text of today’s anthem is taken from the final two verses of Sorley’s “Expectans, expectavi” (translated as ‘I waited patiently’) ..... here are the opening verses:

FROM morn to midnight, all day through,
I laugh and play as others do,
I sin and chatter, just the same
As others with a different name.
And all year long upon the stage,

I dance and tumble and do rage
So vehemently, I scarcely see
The inner and eternal me.
I have a temple I do not
Visit, a heart I have forgot,

A self that I have never met,
A secret shrine—and yet, and yet ......

As a composer, Charles Wood (1866-1926) exhibited "fastidious taste and fine scholarship". Wood was an important teacher at Cambridge University where he became Professor of Music in 1924 following Stanford's death. “Expectans expectavi” was published in 1919. It is slightly unusual in its construction: it has a short and effective pianissimo coda, and a bar of silence before the build-up to the climax begins.

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NOVEMBER 11

Bagpiper ROB CRABTREE is the special guest at “Remembering”, our November 11 concert. He’s an internationally known artist and teacher, having won several competitions including the Gold Medal in 1998 at Braemar, Scotland. In 1999 his first recording “The Piper’s Legacy” was nominated for a Juno award, and he has since released three other albums. Rob Crabtree will join with our choir and soloists to present a varied programme of music associated with Remembrance Day, including some ‘singalong’ pieces such as ‘The Maple Leaf Forever’ and “It’s a Long Way to Tipperary”. We hope you’ll join us, and invite your friends and family members to come and enjoy an hour or so of music and a glass of sherry after the concert. Tickets are $8 in advance and $10 at the door and are available from choir members following this morning’s service.

Pentecost 21 - Sunday 21 October 2012

• Organ Prelude: Andante (from Sonata in C minor) – Josef Rheinburger 
• Opening Hymn 436 “I bind unto myself today” 
• Service Music: John Merbecke 
• Psalm 104: 1-9, 25, 37 
• Solo: “Draw near, all ye people” (from ‘Elijah’) – Felix Mendelssohn (Ross Hewitt, baritone) 
• Offertory Hymn 645 “Come down, O love divine” 
• Communion Hymn 65 “Here, Lord, we take the broken bread” 
• Communion Motet: “Lord, for thy tender mercies’ sake” – Richard Farrant
• Final Hymn 356 “Ye boundless realms of joy” (Darwall #365) 
• Organ Postlude: Te deum laudamus – Dietrich Buxtehude

Pentecost 20 - Sunday 14 October 2012

• Prelude: Adagio (from Flute Concerto in C) – Jean Marie Leclair (Fiona Strachan, flute) 
• Opening Hymn 388 “Glorious things of thee are spoken” 
• Psalm 22: 1-15 (Tone VIII.3) 
• Anthem: Lead me, Lord – Samuel Sebastian Wesley
  Lead me, Lord, lead me in thy righteousness; make thy way plain before my face. For it is thou, Lord, thou, Lord only, that makest me dwell in safety. (from Psalms 4 and 5) 
• Offertory Hymn 602 “Lift high the cross” 
• Communion Hymn 84 “Lord, enthroned in heavenly splendour” 
• Final Hymn “Who would true valour see” (original text from Pilgrim’s Progress – John Bunyan) 
• Postlude: La Vibray (from Flute Sonata 2 in D minor) – Michel Blavet (Fiona Strachan, flute)

Music Notes

Two weeks ago the organ prelude was by Samuel Wesley, who, as mentioned in the Music Notes, was notorious for fathering children out of wedlock. He eventually married his first relationship, but left her for another woman with whom he had four more children, one of whom was Samuel Sebastian Wesley (1810-1876). S.S. Wesley was involved in church music from an early age, first as a boy chorister at the Chapel Royal and subsequently as organist of Hereford, Exeter, Winchester and Gloucester Cathedrals. He also composed a great deal of music for the church. One of his most popular anthems is “Lead me, Lord” which is extracted from a longer piece, “Praise the Lord, O my soul”.

Alas, this morning’s final hymn was not included in our current hymnbook; and had it been, the words would have been altered substantially. We’re going back to the original text, from John Bunyan’s allegory, “Pilgrim’s Progress”. It has been suggested as a reflection on today’s gospel reading.

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Pentecost 19 – Thanksgiving – Sunday 7 October 2012

• Organ Prelude: Before the Image of a Saint – Siegried Karg-Elert 
• Opening Hymn 262 “Come, ye thankful people, come” 
• Psalm 126 (Tone VI)
• Anthem: Achieved is the glorious work (from ‘The Creation’) – Franz Josef Haydn 
• Offertory Hymn 330 “O Praise ye the Lord” 
• Communion Hymn 259 “For the fruit of all creation” 
• Final Hymn 399 “Now thank we all our God” 
• Organ Postlude: Chorale Prelude on “Now thank we all our God” – Siegfried Karg-Elert

Music Notes:

Considered by many to be his masterpiece, Franz Josef Haydn (1732-1809) composed The Creation over a 2-year period beginning in 1796. It’s an oratorio in three parts that depicts and celebrates the creation of the world as described in the Book of Genesis and in “Paradise Lost” (John Milton). The chorus “Achieved is the glorious work” is an acknowledgement that, on the sixth day, God completed his work.

Sigfrid Karg-Elert (1877-1933) was a German composer of considerable fame in the early twentieth century, best known for his compositions for organ. Among his many compositions are 66 ‘chorale improvisations’, or preludes on hymn tunes. Born in Denmark, Karg-Elert moved to Germany as a child and spent all of his life there, composing and teaching. Although his music was greatly admired in the UK and USA, it was generally ignored in his adopted country.

“REMEMBERING”

The choir is planning a special Remembrance Day concert on Sunday 11 November at 4 pm. It will feature our choir and lead singers with special guest Rob Crabtree, a Juno nominated bagpiper, all performing a variety of both sacred and secular music (Scottish, Welsh, English and Canadian) that is associated with both World Wars - and maybe a singalong or two! A programme is posted on various bulletin boards around the church. It would be a wonderful thing to fill the church for this concert, so please tell your friends and relatives. Advance tickets at $8 ($10 at the door) are now available from choir members and the church office. The money raised will be used to support the Organ Restoration Fund.