When I choose choral music for Sunday, something that I always search for, is a compelling text and a well-crafted melody. Today’s offertory is a good example of an anthem that fits the bill.  My Spirit Longs for Thee, a text by John Byrom and music by Simon Lole, is a fine specimen of elegance […]

Today’s communion anthem is a well-known spiritual arrangement by Mark Hayes. There are several choral versions of this spiritual, but this one appealed to me for several reasons. I love how the music paints the words, but never obscures them. Like many spirituals this one utilizes repetition as a tool to drive home the meaning […]

In some translations of John, Jesus said that he came to give life to the fullest, other translations word it as life abundantly. This might conjure up images of joy, butterflies, rainbows, and riches. But that’s only one side of the story. A now-deceased friend of mine who spent 40 years as a church musician […]

Today’s prelude is a whimsical number by French composer Louis Vierne. It delights. But that’s the nature of a piece that’s full of spirit. It titillates, tickles, and teases. It is wiggly like a small, free-spirited creature. How fun! The creative act is spontaneous. You never know when the spirit will nip at you. Like […]

Fear paralyzes, especially when used in teaching. I’ve had teachers who have put the fear of God in me, but I never found them to be terribly effective. However, fear is a common educational tool. Call it “old school,” but I think it’s time for some “new school.” My grandparents attended a Pentecostal church, and […]

Tracing one’s roots is an important existential activity. You can find connectivity in anything, just as you can find differences. That’s no, new discovery. Einstein taught us that our universe is relative. For example, even though the prelude and the postlude are vastly different sounding, there is an underlying unity that’s hard to put into […]

Today’s music is brought to you by one of my favorites, Felix Mendelssohn. The organ voluntaries are from his treasured organ sonatas, and today’s anthem is “Verleih uns Frieden,” a Martin Luther text. It’s a paraphrase of Da pacem Domine, a Latin prayer for peace from the 6th or 7th century. It was a regular […]

I love the text of today’s offertory. It was composed by Walter Stanton who was known affectionately as “WK” by his students. As a boy, he was trained at Salisbury Cathedral, then received his diplomas at Merton College in Oxford. He then went on to be Professor of Music at Bristol University and conductor of […]

I love the idea of Advent – longing expectancy. You hear this hand-wringing yearning in the prelude, Come, Savior of the Heathens, where Bach is trying to plead with the nonbeliever. We hear this same kind of idea in the offertory, Paul Manz’s E’en So Lord Jesus. This piece was written by the bedside of […]

My friend, Ken says, “Don’t should yourself.” When you think that you should be or shouldn’t be; or that something in your life should or shouldn’t be; or that the world should or shouldn’t be, it makes reality seem like a hot mess. After all, should happens, right? No, reality happens. What should or shouldn’t […]