9 February 2014 - The Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany

      Treble Choir / Canterbury Choir

      Schuyler Robinson, Visiting Organist

            Buxtehude / Praembulum in D, BuxWV 139

            Willan / Prelude on Slane

            Willan / Prelude on Ton-Y-Botel

            Tallis / O nata lux

            Hymns

            488*                   Be thou my vision                                                       Slane

            593* (st. 1)         Lord, make us servants of your peace  Dickinson College

            339*                   Deck thyself, my soul, with gladness              Schm�cke dich

            381*                   Thy strong word did cleave the darkness        Ton-Y-Botel

11:15am Eucharist, II

      Parish Choir

      Schuyler Robinson, Visiting Organist

            Buxtehude / Praembulum in D, BuxWV 139

            Willan / Prelude on Slane

            Jacobs / Psalm 112

            Tallis / O nata lux

            Willan / Prelude on Ton-Y-Botel

            Hymns

            488*                   Be thou my vision                                                       Slane

            593* (st. 1)         Lord, make us servants of your peace  Dickinson College

            339*                   Deck thyself, my soul, with gladness              Schm�cke dich

            381*                   Thy strong word did cleave the darkness        Ton-Y-Botel

4:15pm Concert

      University of Kentucky Blue Note Ensemble; Demetrius Walker, Director

            Sacred and secular music spanning from spirituals to gospel

5:00pm Eucharist, II

      Sung by University of Kentucky Blue Note Ensemble

      Joshua Bracken, Music Intern / Assisting Organist

            Formerly attr. J.S. Bach / Prelude & Fugue in G Minor, BWV 558

            arr. Manz / God of Grace (from Ten Chorale Improvisations, Book V)

            Stephen Foster / Hard Times

            Gibbs / All my trials

            Hymns

            388*                   Be thou my vision                                                       Slane

            593* (st. 1)         Lord, make us servants of your peace  Dickinson College

            WLP 750            So the day dawn for me                                                       

                                                  Wildridge and St Charles, Queensborough Terrace

[* = Hymns chosen from the 2009 Hymn Survey]

Danish born Dieterich Buxtehude (1637-1707) was organist for St. Mary's Church, L�beck, Germany. The Praeludia developed to a high level featuring alternating sections of improvisatory Toccata sections with imitative or fugal sections. These works often were in five sections and are regarded as the "North German Organ Toccata". The various divisions of the organ allow for echo effects, colorful full sonorities, bold pedal points, and scalar toccata-like figurations.  J.S. Bach was strongly influenced by Buxtehude throughout his own compositional style of organ works.

The motet at the Offertory today is Thomas Tallis's (c. 1505-1585) setting of O nata lux, published in 1575 in the Cantiones Sacrae, a joint venture with William Byrd and one of the first sets of sacred music printed in England. Although Tallis and Byrd were practicing Roman Catholics, Queen Elizabeth I granted them a twenty-one-year monopoly on polyphony and on printing choral music. Despite this royal dispensation, O nata lux makes conservative use of polyphony; its simplicity both reinforces the text's plea for communion and hearkens to the unembellished clarity of true northern music.

Healey Willan (1880-1968) is perhaps best known to our Episcopal tradition from his setting of the Mass in The Hymnal 1940. As an Anglo-Canadian organist, he served at the Church of St. Mary Magdalene, Toronto from 1913 until his death.  From a catalogue of 800 works, he composed a large quantity of church music which includes volumes of organ chorale preludes and choral music anthems. The Prelude on Slane introduces our opening hymn on the same tune, Be thou my vision. The final Voluntary features the organ's Festival Trumpet soloing the hymn tune Ton-Y-Botel from the closing hymn of the day.