His Voice - Volume 8, Number 1

= =h.From Co-Director Arthur A. Just Jr.

Conversations on Church Music Practice: The Elephant in the Room

Last year, The Good Shepherd Institute ventured into unknown territory with its topic “Shepherd of Tender Youth: Connecting Postmoderns to Christ.” We saw some new faces as a result, as well as many of our

faithful attendees whom we see every year. Overall, we were delighted at the response and received some e-mails indicating that “stepping out” of our normal pattern was a good thing.

But there was something missing. Some of our guests who are musicians noted that there were no “break-out” sessions for them, something they missed, something we knew they would miss, but our emphasis on youth didn’t lend itself to a particular session for our musicians.

Alongside this healthy critique of last year’s conference, a topic began to emerge from conversations we were having with some of our most trusted friends. As someone put it, “maybe it is time to address ‘the elephant in the room.’”

For years in teaching and presenting on the historic liturgy of the church, we have found that most people do not have trouble with the “ordo” of the Divine Service. They recognize that the “liturgy” of Word and Sacrament and its traditional structure is salutary for the life of the church, along with the structures that prepare us to hear Christ’s Word and receive His Sacrament, as well as the distribution of the Sacrament itself. Even most people acknowledge that the ordinaries—the Kyrie, Gloria in Excelsis, Creed, Sanctus, and Agnus Dei—are meet, right, and salutary. When presented clearly with historical and theological rationales, the beauty of the Divine Service, what many call the historic liturgy, is something almost everyone can agree on, and even assent to its necessity for Sunday eucharistic practice.

The “elephant in the room,” of course, is the music that we use for the Divine Service, not just for the ordinaries, but the hymns and songs we sing. So we think it’s time to have a conversation about this, and our conference this year is entitled “Conversations on Church Music Practice: The Elephant in the Room.” Both Kantor Resch and I are grateful for conversations we’ve already had with our Dean of Chapel, Dr. Paul Grime, and our Associate Kantor and resident composer, Kevin Hildebrand. Together we are acknowledging that it’s time to talk about “the elephant in the room.”

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Volume 8 - Number 1 April 2013

H I S

VOICE

THE GOOD SHEPHERDI N S T I T U T E

Pastoral Theology and Sacred Music for the Church

HIS Voice • April 2013 2

continued from previous page

Our format this year will be unlike any we have had before in the previous thirteen conferences. We are inviting four speakers we believe are the finest conversation partners we can think of for this conference. Each of them will give a short presentation—about fifteen minutes, and then the rest of the conference will be a conversation between them and us around some questions we will pose to them about church music practice.

Dr. Barbara Resch will help us understand how we hear and access music. As Director of Music Education and Professor of Music at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne, as well as Associate Dean of the College of Visual and Performing Arts, Barbara’s research interests include teenagers’ contextual decisions about music, implications for music education of brain-

based learning, and curriculum development in music education. She is currently Past President of Indiana Music Educators Association and in this role participates in music education policy and organizational discussions on state, regional, and national levels.

Stephen R. Johnson will be our conversation partner in the composition of music in service for the church. As music instructor at Monsignor Scanlan High School in New York City, co-founder of Liturgy Solutions, Inc., as well as a concert pianist, composer, and choral director, Stephen brings his experience as composer and church musician to the making of music for

today’s church. He holds a graduate degree from the Manhattan School of Music in piano performance. He has studied composition with Alice Parker and is a Melodious Accord Fellow. Stephen participated in the Lutheran Hymnal Project of The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, and four of his hymn settings can be found in Lutheran Service Book. As musician/theologian, Stephen frequently presents lectures and classes on church worship practice and culture.

Dr. Kent J. Burreson, Dean of the Chapel at Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, will offer his insights into how beauty is determined for music that serves the church. Kent’s teaching at our sister seminary, and his planning and supervising of worship life on the Concordia Seminary campus, give him a unique perspective on the aesthetics of our worship life. Although Kent’s

primary research is on the history of Reformation and post-Reformation worship, he also engages in research on worship and culture, on worship as ritual performance, and on the theology of worship. Kent served on the liturgy subcommittee of the Lutheran Hymnal Project that prepared Lutheran Service Book.

Dr. Thomas M. Winger, President, Professor, and Dean of Chapel at Concordia Lutheran Theological Seminary, St. Catharines, Ontario, will lead us through the most critical question of how pastors and musicians choose what music is appropriate and fitting for the liturgical life of the church. Thomas’s work on Lutheran Service Book, as well as his writings, demonstrate a theological,

philosophical, and pastoral approach to the issues facing our church. He is writing the prolegomenon for the forthcoming commentary on Lutheran Service Book, which addresses many of the questions we are asking in this conference. As both musician and theologian, and through the breadth and depth of his thinking about liturgy, theology, and music, Thomas will help us to see the big picture about church music practice.

So you can see that we have a rich table set for you this coming November. Please join us in our conversations on Lutheran church music practice at the annual conference of The Good Shepherd Institute, November 3–5, 2013.


Pastoral resourcesby JOHN PLESS

Gericht und Gnade, Gesetz und Evangelium: Werner Elert als Prediger zwischen 1910 und 1950, ed. Niels-Peter Moritzen (Martin-Luther Verlag, 2012), 375 pp. ISBN 9783875131765.[EUR 18.00]

Werner Elert (1885–1954) is remembered as one of the most significant confessional Lutheran theologians of the last century. Associated with Erlangen for most of his career, Elert also served as a parish pastor and a military chaplain. The sermons in this volume reflect the range of Elert’s homiletical activity in the congregation, in the military, and in the university. The sermons demonstrate Elert’s masterful capacity to proclaim Law and Gospel in trying times. __________________________________________

Ronald K. Rittgers, The Reformation of Suffering: Pastoral Theology and Lay Piety in Late Medieval and Early Modern Germany (Oxford University Press, 2012), 482 pp. ISBN 9780199795086.[$74.00]

This is a comprehensive and richly textured investigation of the impact of the Reformation on the theological interpretation of human suffering and, in turn, how pastors in the sixteenth century responded in preaching and pastoral care. Consolatory literature is examined as are directives for addressing sickness and death in the church orders. This is an outstanding contribution to the history of pastoral theology. __________________________________________

Robert Kolb, Teaching God’s Children His Teaching: A Guide for the Study of Luther’s Catechism (Concordia Seminary Press, 2012), 173 pp. ISBN 9780911770797.[$14.95 ]

This is a completely new edition of a little book on teaching the Catechism by the premiere Luther scholar in The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod. Crisp and clear in his exposition of the Small Catechism, incorporating insights from the Large Catechism, Robert Kolb provides pastors and lay catechists alike with a reliable handbook for teaching doctrine, prayer, and vocation. This book is highly recommended for parish libraries, and it would be an apt text to use with an adult Bible class.__________________________________________

John A. Maxfield, “Martin Luther and Idolatry,” in The Reformation as Christianization: Essays on Scott Hendrix’s Christianization Thesis, ed. Anna Marie Johnson and John A. Maxfield (Mohr Siebeck, 2012), 141–68. ISBN 9783161517235.[EUR 109.00]

John Maxfield skillfully demonstrates how the reformer rejected both Roman and Protestant forms of idolatry, seeking to eradicate it from the hearts and lives of people and replace it with forms and practices of the Christian faith that conformed to the commands and promises of God. This well-researched thematic study of Luther’s confrontation with idolatry as a counterfeit faith will enrich teaching and preaching of the First Commandment as pastors now face new forms of idolatry in a secularized and pluralistic context. __________________________________________

Recommended


Pastoral resources continued

C. F. W. Walther, The Church and the Office of the Ministry, ed. Matthew C. Harrison (Concordia Publishing House, 2012), 536 pp. ISBN 9780758634030.[$34.99]

Originally published in 1852 and translated by J. T. Mueller in 1962, Walther’s work is the definitive statement of the Missouri Synod’s ecclesiology and the doctrine of the office. Unfortunately, Mueller’s translation obscured, in some places, the actual language of Walther. Matthew Harrison did not retranslate Walther but where necessary corrected and clarified Mueller’s work. This book is rightly identified as a “study edition,” since Harrison has carefully annotated the text with historical notes, Luther references, and bibliographical data. Over one hundred pages of supplementary material are provided in the appendices, including writings from Grabau and Löhe, which are essential to understanding Walther’s argument. One hopes that this fine study edition of The Church and the Office of the Ministry will be used not only in seminary courses but also in circuit pastoral conferences. __________________________________________

Bo Giertz, Then Fell the Lord’s Fire: New Life in Ministry—Ordination Sermons and Essays on Pastoral Theology and Practice, trans. Bror Erickson (Magdeburg Press, 2012), 276 pp.ISBN 9780982158647.[$29.99]

Pastors looking for solid and edifying devotional reading should surely purchase and digest this outstanding anthology of ordination sermons and short essays of pastoral theology from the pen of the famed author of The Hammer of God, Bo Giertz. Warmly evangelical and crisply written, these sermons and essays will strengthen pastors in the word of the Lord and challenge them to faithfulness in the care of the flock committed to them. __________________________________________

Gilbert Meilaender, Should We Live Forever? The Ethical Ambiguities of Aging (Eerdmans, 2013), 135 pp. ISBN 9780802868695.[$18.00]

Pastors and deaconesses who provide spiritual care for the aging will be well served by Gilbert Meilaender’s most recent offering. Long recognized as a leading ethicist, Meilaender addresses ethical and spiritual issues that are attached to growing old. He cautions against those forces in our culture that would treat aging as a disease rather than a stage of life. __________________________________________

Johann Gerhard, On the Ecclesiastical Ministry: Part Two, trans. Richard J. Dinda and ed. Benjamin T. G. Mayes and Heath R. Curtis (Concordia Publishing House, 2012), 380 pp. ISBN 9780758631169.[$54.99]

The German scholar, Johann Anselm Steiger, has pointed out that Johann Gerhard’s dogmatics is pastoral care for pastors. That is especially seen in this latest volume of Gerhard’s “theological commonplaces” to be released by Concordia Publishing House. Gerhard deals with issues ranging from the authority of the ministry, to grades within the ministry, and the life and conduct of the pastor.__________________________________________

David H. Petersen, Thy Kingdom Come: Lent and Easter Sermons (Emmanuel Press, 2012), 215 pp. ISBN 9781934328071.[$20.00]

Pastor David Petersen of Redeemer Lutheran Church in Fort Wayne is well known for his focused and penetrating preaching. As a parish pastor he has modeled liturgical, Law/Gospel preaching for the consistent stream of seminarians who worship at Redeemer. In this volume Petersen shares the fruits of his sermonic labors from Lent and Easter with a wider audience of readers. Carefully crafted, these sermons will edify and enrich brother pastors and serve as solid devotional reading for individuals and families.__________________________________________

Recommended


Pastoral resources continued

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Collected Sermons, ed. Isabel Best (Fortress Press, 2012), 240 pp. ISBN 9780800699048.[$29.95]

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–1945) was a gifted preacher and teacher of preachers. The sermons in this collection range from 1928, when young Bonhoeffer was a vicar in Barcelona, to November 1939, early in the days of World War II. The sermons bear the imprint of the tensions in which Bonhoeffer lived and worked, while reflecting an intimacy with the biblical text. Most of the sermons are based on New Testament texts, but the few that are on Old Testament pericopes demonstrate Bonhoeffer’s Christological approach to the Old Testament. A sermon on Matthew 16:13–18 (“Who Do You Say That I Am?”) is especially potent, with human attempts to build the church contrasted with Christ’s own construction of the church. It is as timely today as it was when preached in Berlin in 1933. __________________________________________

Hermann Sasse, Letters to Lutheran Pastors, Volume I: 1948–1951, ed. Matthew C. Harrison (Concordia Publishing House, 2013), 464 pp. ISBN 9780758628008.[$34.99]

Hermann Sasse (1895–1976) was an extraordinary Lutheran theologian, churchman, and ecumenist whose career started in Germany and concluded in Australia. These letters are from a transitional period of his life—his final days at Erlangen and his early days in Adelaide. They reflect his struggle to confess the doctrine of Scripture faithfully. Sasse’s correspondence gives deep and often prophetic insight into the life of confessional Lutheranism. Other letters take up the theology of the cross, Baptism, the Lord’s Supper, the papacy, and Mary. Sasse’s work provides us with fascinating reading that is abidingly relevant for contemporary Lutherans who have ears to hear.__________________________________________

Theology Is Eminently Practical: Essays in Honor of John T. Pless, ed. Jacob Corzine and Bryan Wolfmueller (Lutheran Legacy Press, 2012), 272 pp. ISBN 9781613270066.[$16.95]

At the 2013 Symposium on the Lutheran Confessions at Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, I was honored to receive this Festschrift, with essays by former students. The fourteen chapters cover a range of topics in the four theological disciplines. Especially pertinent for pastoral theology are the entries on a baptismal perspective on apologetics, by Peter Brock; Luther’s understanding of the fight against the devil, by Esko Murto; doubt and consolation in Gerhard’s theology, by Steven Parks; propitiation and praise, by Mark Preus; and recovering the difficulty of the Law/Gospel distinction, by Bryan Wolfmueller. __________________________________________

Around the Word is a new electronic journal for laity edited by Pastor Bryan Wolfmueller of Hope Lutheran Church in Aurora, Colorado. The first issue (Spring 2013) is devoted to “Suffering and the Christian Faith.” The articles are biblical and meaty. In addition to feature articles, the issue contains numerous sections, including a Bible study, hymn study, a neglected theological topic, a book review, pop culture, church history, etc. This journal could well be used for adult Bible class or a youth group discussion piece. For more information see www.aroundthewordjournal.com.__________________________________________

Concordia Publishing House www.cph.orgConcordia Seminary Press store.csl.edu Eerdmans www.eerdmans.comEmmanuel Press emmanuelpress.us Fortress Press www.fortresspress.comLutheran Legacy Press www.lutheranlegacy.org Magdeburg Press magdeburgpress.com Martin-Luther Verlag www.martin-luther-bund.de Mohr Siebeck www.mohr.de/en Oxford University Press www.oup.com/us

Recommended

A little-known fact about the Kantors at Concordia Theological Seminary is that they are both fans of the National Public Radio program “Car Talk.” This call-in show is hosted by two gregarious Boston brother-mechanics who are able to

diagnose car problems and suggest how to repair them solely on callers’ descriptions. They are experts at finding what is at the root of a car problem—and very funny, also!

Choir and vocal ensemble directors need to be good at musical diagnosis. Whenever there are problems in rehearsals (and that’s just the nature of rehearsing), good teachers need to make on-the-spot diagnoses about what factors are causing the singing problems, and then suggest remedies to fix them.

Trouble ahead: Taking time to study the music prior to a rehearsal allows the director/teacher to identify possible difficulties in the music, such as rhythm, pitches, or articulation. Singing each voice part can help to identify these places. For example, if you discover that you have difficulty singing a particular passage or interval, your volunteer singers might have the same problem.

Diagnosis in the rehearsal: Much of the vocal rehearsal is real-time evaluation of the singing. This is easy when everything sounds right. But when the music suddenly falls apart, what went wrong? Were there incorrect pitches? Did a voice part enter at the wrong time? Is someone singing an incorrect rhythm? All of the above? And which part or parts need help?

Should we just do it again? Sometimes repeating a section can be helpful, but if a problem persists, a better method of repair is in order. If the music is sung in multiple voice parts, it can be helpful to rehearse just one or some of the parts in order to hear them more clearly. Or perhaps the passage needs to be rehearsed slowly. It may be as simple as modeling what that interval sounds like, so the singers can start to internalize and remember that same interval.

Rhythm can be corrected by having the singers speak the text in the correct rhythm. Harmonies or individual notes can be evaluated by having the singers sing one word or note at a time, allowing the singers and the director/teacher to listen closely. Experimenting with different repair strategies can make practicing more efficient for everyone involved. Consider these real-life examples:

Christ Jesus Lay in Death’s Strong BandsJ. S. Bach, ed. Michael BurkhardtMorningStar Music 50-4021www.morningstarmusic.com

The children at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, Fort Wayne, are preparing the tenor aria from this Bach cantata (BWV 4), edited and arranged by Michael Burkhardt (and transposed down a step to the key of D minor). Most of the aria is a basic presentation of the chorale, with sparkling violin interludes. But the concluding alleluias are quick and energetic melismatic passages. Anticipating that these passages would pose the greatest difficulties, I began our rehearsals by focusing first on the alleluias.

In order to help clarify the long passages, we sang phrases on “Sinatra syllables” (doo-be-doo-be-doo-be-doo) before singing them with the text and its sustained vowels.


Diagnosis anD rePair in the Vocal rehearsalby KEVIN HILDEBRAND

Choir Talk:

Diagnosis anD rePair continuedChoir Talk:


The third alleluia is the longest, with seventeen notes on the final syllable of “alleluia.” We rehearsed this by singing each one of those notes on a “da” syllable, in order to re-articulate each note:

We sang this very slowly at first. I drew the passage on a large display board in front of the students so I could point to the long passage of sixteenth notes. Then we sang the passage without the long melisma, just the “Alleluia,” ending on the first B-flat of the syllable “ia.” Then we sang it again, adding one note to what we just sang; then we sang it again, adding another note, then another and another, until finally we sang all seventeen notes of the melisma. The children would assure you that the alleluias are their favorite part!__________________________________________

The Seven Words of ChristDonald BusarowCPH 97-4744 (currently out of print, but soon to be available as part of Concordia’s print-on-demand/ download collection)www.cph.org

There were several places where the choir needed assistance finding the first pitch of their next phrase. Instead of just guessing, the choir found ways of using the accompaniment to guide their ears. Luckily, the instrumental parts are included in the choral score, so the singers were able to listen and follow along with one of the instrumental parts in order to help find their next pitch. One particular challenge was an entrance when the choir sings a “D” and the instruments are playing an “E.”

We rehearsed this by having our accompanist play the cello line on the piano prior to the choir entry. We saw how the cello part is a stepwise pattern, which leads exactly to the choir pitch. The accompanist played beats one and two, and then the choir sang its pitch on beat three. The first time or two the piano omitted its “E” on beat three, eventually playing that note so that the choir became secure with singing the intended dissonance.

(©1966, 1994 Concordia Publishing House. Used by permission.)

__________________________________________

Diagnosis anD rePair continuedChoir Talk:


Gradual for the Feast of the EpiphanyStephen R. JohnsonLiturgy Solutions www.liturgysolutions.com

The Concordia Theological Seminary Kantorei had the privilege of singing this delightful Gradual setting while on its January 2013 tour, singing it at the composer’s own congregation in New York. As talented as the Kantorei singers are, there were still a couple of bugs that needed to be worked out in rehearsal.

The first place was the triplet in measure three. It’s extremely important to have this rhythm exactly right, since later in the piece the choir sings this passage in canon, so there is a resulting three-against-two sound. The choir spoke the phrase in rhythm a few times in order to solidify that rhythm. Sensing the beat as the half note rather than the quarter note also assists that process.

(Music excerpt courtesy of Liturgy Solutions and Stephen R. Johnson.)

A second challenge appeared when the choir added the pitches. Wrong notes were being sung on “frankincense”—it was too low. Taking that phrase a little slower helped the singers discover that the problem was on the word “gold”: the men wanted to sing B-flat instead of C. Fixing that interval between “bring” and “gold” solved that pitch problem.

Coda: Although there’s no radio call-in show for singing problems, anticipating problems in the rehearsal, and planning and trying different strategies to make the singing better, will go a long way toward making rehearsals more efficient and enjoyable for both the singers and the director.


reaDing anD listeningby DANIEL ZAGER

ReadingPaul Koch, “Taunting Death in Song,” Lutheran Forum 47 (Spring 2013): 36–37.

Paul Koch’s brief hymn study focuses on the text “God’s Own Child, I Gladly Say It” (LSB 594). While observing that at times the church (unfortunately) reflects the culture’s denial of death, e.g., referring to funerals as “celebrations of life,” Koch writes: “We cannot speak of death, as many in our culture do, merely as a journey or a change. . . . In Christ’s cross, we see death for what it is. . . . It is an enemy. And yet Christ’s apostles referred to death as a defeated enemy. Paul understood that God has given us the victory over death through Jesus Christ, and so he even taunts death . . . (I Corinthians 15:54–55)” (36). Koch turns his attention to the Hamburg Lutheran pastor Erdmann Neumeister (1671–1756) whose hymn “Lasset mich voll Freuden sprechen,” translated by Robert Voelker as “God’s Own Child, I Gladly Say It,” similarly taunts death as a defeated enemy. Koch points to other of our hymns that do the same thing, but observes that “What sets Neumeister’s hymn apart is that it grounds our confidence in the saving power of baptism” (37). Koch’s brief study of this hymn provides thoughtful, helpful commentary that will assist the pastor or church musician to introduce and teach this hymn to a congregation, and indeed to use this hymn text in support of teaching the blessings of Baptism.__________________________________________

J. Michael Raley, “Traversing Borders—Defining Boundaries: Cosmopolitan Harmonies and Confessional Theology in Georg Rhau’s Liturgical Publications,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 43 (Winter 2012): 1079–1105.

Between 1538 and 1545 the Wittenberg printer Georg Rhau (1488–1548) published fifteen volumes of polyphonic music (both Latin- and German-texted) for use in the Lutheran Divine Service. There has been no shortage of scholarly attention to these collections of liturgical music, including a modern edition: Georg Rhau, Musikdrucke aus den Jahren 1538 bis 1545 in praktischer Neuausgabe (Bärenreiter, 1953–1999). (Concordia Publishing House co-published vols. 1–7, Paul Bunjes serving as editor for vol. 5, and Walter E. Buszin for vol. 7.) J. Michael Raley’s recent article cited here provides a valuable overview of Rhau’s work, particularly as Raley criticizes older scholarly views that “characterized Rhau’s effort as international in musical style and interconfessional in theology . . .” (1079). “Rhau’s collections can no longer be regarded simply as the product of an ecumenical interconfessionalism. . . . Neither can they be seen as displaying a broad Protestant or Catholic theology of music. Rhau’s publication of old-fashioned polyphonic . . . settings by an array of international and German composers in a series of publications expressly intended for use by Germans in Lutheran worship acknowledged music’s divine nature in ways that neither Zwingli’s followers nor even Calvin would have accepted” (1091).__________________________________________

Recommended


reaDing anD listening continued

ListeningJan Bender, Ein neues Lied/A New Song: Choral and Organ Music by Hugo Distler and Jan Bender (David Herman, organ)[2012, available from the performer: [email protected]]

Hugo Distler (1908–1942) was a composition teacher to Jan Bender (1909–1994), who was a composition teacher to organist David Herman, who provides a varied program of organ and choral music by these two twentieth-century Lutheran composers. Playing on the twenty-one-stop Dobson organ (op. 74, 2000) at the University of Delaware, Herman offers a welcome selection of Bender’s organ compositions, which are not so easily found on compact disc recordings. I was particularly pleased to find seven of the brief, well-crafted chorale settings from Bender’s three-volume Kleine Choralvorspiele (Bärenreiter, 1949–1953, reprinted 1965–1968), as well as Bender’s Four Variations for Organ on Down Ampney, op. 47 (Augsburg Publishing House, 1971), and “Come, You Faithful, Raise the Strain,” from 5 Festive Preludes on Easter Hymns, op. 78 (Concordia Publishing House, 1979). Among Distler’s works recorded here are the Partita on Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland and selections from Dreißig Spielstücke. Noteworthy among the choral music is Bender’s Prayer from the Gallican Sacramentary, op. 42, no. 3 (1968)—sung from Bender’s manuscript. Kudos to David Herman for wonderful playing on an instrument well suited to this repertory, and thanks particularly for recording these works by Jan Bender, whose contributions to the Lutheran organ and choral repertory are among the very best of twentieth-century church music.__________________________________________

Helmut Walcha, Chorale Preludes, 1 (Wolfgang Rübsam)[2012, Naxos 8.572910]

The chorale preludes of Helmut Walcha (1907–1991) fill four printed volumes, extending from 1954 (vol. 1) to 1979 (vol. 4)—all published by Edition Peters, and distinguished in their physical appearance by their pink covers, as opposed to the customary trademark green covers of this famous and prolific publisher. Wolfgang Rübsam was a student of Walcha, and on this recording plays the twenty-five settings from volume 1. Among the highlights of this first volume is Walcha’s setting of the chorale “Herzliebster Jesu, was hast du verbrochen” (LSB 439). Walcha’s setting is profound in its utter simplicity: the straightforward chorale melody stated in the right hand accompanied by a six-measure ostinato in the left hand and pedal. Though admittedly a subjective observation, I find that Walcha’s stark, minimal setting captures rather well the sense of poet Johann Heermann’s (1585–1647) third stanza. Rübsam has chosen a wonderfully appropriate instrument for this music—John Brombaugh’s op. 35 organ at First Presbyterian in Springfield, Illinois. Sample the full sounds of this organ on Walcha’s setting of “Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott.” Naxos states that three more volumes are forthcoming in a planned complete recording of Walcha’s chorale preludes (these volumes will be noted in the next issue of this newsletter).__________________________________________

Recommended


reaDing anD listening continued

Philip Stopford, Creation (Ecclesium Choir, Philip Stopford)[2007, Priory Records PRCD 891]

This is the first time in this column that I have cited a recording more than a year or two old. I do so now for two reasons. First, I find much of Philip Stopford’s music to be very pleasant listening. Second, MorningStar Music has begun to publish some of his choral music. Stopford (b. 1977) was a chorister at Westminster Abbey, Organ Scholar at Truro Cathedral, Senior Organ Scholar at Keble College, Oxford, before working successively at Canterbury Cathedral, Chester Cathedral, and St. Anne’s Cathedral, Belfast, Northern Ireland. The title of this recording comes from Stopford’s choral setting of the creation account in the first chapter of Genesis.

In 2013 MorningStar Music published three choral anthems by Stopford, one of which is recorded on this CD. According to the booklet notes, the Easter anthem Christ the Lord Is Risen Again was “commissioned by the Ulster Society of Organists and Choirmasters. . . . The commission requested a straightforward performable Easter anthem, and the easy tune and repeated ‘alleluias’ make it so.” Stopford sets the text mainly for unison voices and organ. Though the MorningStar publication (MSM-50-8210) specifies “SATB divisi,” most of the anthem is, in fact, for unison voices, with three groups of men and three groups of women required only on the closing “alleluia,” though even here the writing is very accessible and will require neither a large choir nor extended rehearsal time.

The choral music of Philip Stopford—pleasant listening and, in the case of this Easter anthem, very accessible music. This is a name to watch for!__________________________________________

ArkivMusicwww.arkivmusic.com

Naxoswww.naxos.com

Priory Recordswww.prioryrecords.co.uk

Recommended

The Good Shepherd Institute

Hymn FestivalRecorded in conjunction with and in celebration of the 175th anniversary of St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, Fort Wayne, Indiana, Blessed Are They Forever offers more than an hour of music featuring the Concordia Theological Seminary Kanotrei, congregational singing and children’s choir, plus commentary by the Rev. Peter Cage, senior pastor at St. Paul’s.

$1595 each for 1–4 copies

Available through the Concordia Theological Seminary Bookstore at [email protected] or 260-452-2160.

A New CD of Sacred Music!

prod master:sales order:acct mgr:artist:bus. rel.:contact:ofa date:

Blessed Are They Forever1. Invocation and Responsory :382. Choral Prelude Blessed Are They That Hear the Word of God and Keep It 5:303. Commentary 2:374. Hymn Praise the Almighty 7:115. Commentary 2:436. Hymn The Gifts Christ Freely Gives 7:217. Commentary 2:388. Hymn The Church’s One Foundation 4:459. Commentary 2:0910. Hymn Holy Spirit, the Dove Sent from Heaven 5:1611. Commentary 2:0712. Hymn Praise the One Who Breaks the Darkness 4:1313. Commentary 1:5814. Hymn O God of Light 4:4215. Commentary 2:4716. Hymn We Praise You and Acknowledge You 5:2317. Commentary 2:3918. Hymn Lord, Thee I Love with All My Heart 7:4019. Collect and Blessing :4820. Finale Fanfare on Thaxted 4:09

Total Playing Time 77:19

Recorded at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, Fort Wayne, Indiana on November 5, 2012.Production by Christopher Gillespie.Art Direction by Steve Blakey..

© 2013 The Good Shepherd Institute of Pastoral Theology and Sacred Music for the Church, Fort Wayne, Indiana.All rights reserved. Unauthorized reproduction of this recording is prohibited without written permission.

Blessed Are They Forever

A Hymn Festival for The Good Shepherd Institute at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, Fort Wayne, Indiana, in celebration of its 175th anniversary

THE GOOD SHEPHERDI N S T I T U T E

Pastoral Theology and Sacred Music for the Church

Kevin Hildebrand, organist @ Concordia Theological Seminary KantoreiSt. Paul’s Choristers @ Fort Wayne Symphonic Brass @ Rev. Peter Cage, commentary

$1200 $1000each for 5–9 copies each for 10+ copies

Bulk Order InformationLarger quantities are also available for purchase. Please contact the Music Department at Concordia Theological Seminary at [email protected] or by phone at 260-452-2224.

His Voice - Volume 8, Number 1

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Transcript of His Voice - Volume 8, Number 1