Sleepers Awake

Sleepers Awake (also known as Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, BWV 645) is a chorale cantata J.S. Bach composed in 1731 for the 27th Sunday after Trinity, which fell on the 25th of November that year.  That was a year when Easter came unusually early, because it's not often the calendar has twenty-seven Sundays after Trinity, so thankfully this piece has become a popular part of Advent.

Many hymnals have a version of it. The the 1940 Episcopal hymnal, the OPC's Trinity Hymnal, the LCMS's Lutheran Worship, and the UMC's 1989 hymnal all share Catherine Winkworth's 1858 translation, called "Wake, Awake, for Night Is Flying."

The Cyber Hymnal provides an 1864 translation by Frances E. Cox called "'Sleepers, Wake!' The Watch Cry Pealeth," and in 1982 Carl P. Daw, Jr, translated it anew, calling it "'Sleepers, Wake!' A Voice Astounds Us," for the hymnal that was published that year.

I had always assumed that the cantata was written first and the hymn was taken from it, but it turns out that it's exactly the other way around!

Philipp Nicolai was a Lutheran minister and hymnwriter who lived through an outbreak of the plague in the late 1500s.  He lost 170 of his parishioners in one week alone, and in 1598, to comfort those who remained, he wrote a series of meditations called  The Mirror of Joy, which contained this hymn.

I believe this is the original version of it:

Image source:
http://imslp.org/wiki/Wachet_auf,_ruft_uns_die_Stimme_%28Nicolai,_Philipp%29

I've been all over YouTube the last couple of days listening to dozens of lovely renditions of this hymn and of the cantata -- far too many to put into one blog post -- so I will post a few more of my favorites as the week goes on.  In the meantime I'll leave you with this, a congration singing it in Lituanian to the melody as originally composed by Philipp Nicolai.

Phos hilaron

O gracious Light,

pure brightness of the everliving Father in heaven,

O Jesus Christ, holy and blessed!

Now as we come to the setting of the sun,

and our eyes behold the vesper light,

we sing your praises, O God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

You are worthy at all times to be praised by happy voices,

O Son of God, O Giver of life,

and to be glorified through all the worlds.

How Firm a Foundation

Sunday in church we sang one of my all-time favorite hymns. It's a lot of fun to sing it this time of year when I'm optimistic, but I'm posting it here as a reminder for later on, when life is dreary and I wish I could quit -- and for y'all, in care you're in that place now and need the encouragement.

How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,
Is laid for your faith in His excellent Word!
What more can He say than to you He hath said,
To you that for refuge to Jesus have fled?

"Fear not, I am with thee, O be not dismayed,
For I am thy God and will still give thee aid;
I’ll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,
Upheld by my righteous, omnipotent hand.

"When through the deep waters I call thee to go,
The rivers of woe shall not thee overflow;
For I will be with thee, thy troubles to bless,
And sanctify to thee thy deepest distress.

"When through fiery trials thy pathway shall lie,
My grace, all sufficient, shall be thy supply;
The flame shall not hurt thee; I only design
Thy dross to consume, and thy gold to refine.

"The soul that to Jesus hath fled for repose,
I will not, I will not desert to its foes;
That soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake,
I’ll never, no, never, no, never forsake."



~ K. in John Rippon's Selection of Hymns, 1787, alt.
1940 Episcopal Hymnal version

Victimae paschali laudes

~ attributed to Wipo of Burgundy (995? - 1948?)
  tr. The English Hymnal, 1906


Christians, to the Paschal victim
offer your thankful praises!

A lamb the sheep redeemeth:
Christ, who only is sinless,
reconcileth sinners to the Father.

Death and life have contended
in that combat stupendous:
the Prince of life, who died,
reigns immortal.

Speak, Mary, declaring
what thou sawest, wayfaring:

"The tomb of Christ, who is living,
the glory of Jesus' resurrection;
Bright angels attesting,
the shroud and napkin resting.
Yea, Christ my hope is arisen;
to Galilee he will go before you."

Christ indeed from death is risen,
our new life obtaining;
have mercy victor King, ever reigning!

~*~ ~*~ ~*~

We sang this during communion Easter Sunday.  I couldn't find a good recording in English, but here's a nice Latin version:





And here's a luscious improvisation on the organ:

Kind Maker of the world

This is the hymn we’re learning now. It’s in a minor key, which is of course perfect for a Lenten hymn, but the Amen resolves in a major key. The trick to making his hymn sound right is not to sing it too slowly.

Kind maker of the world, O hear
The fervent prayers with many a tear
Poured forth by all the penitent
Who keep this holy fast of Lent!

Each heart is manifest to thee;
Thou knowest our infirmity;
Now we repent, and seek thy face;
Grant unto us thy pard’ning grace.

Spare us, O Lord, who now confess
Our sins and all our wickedness,
And, for the glory of thy Name,
Our weaken’d souls to health reclaim.

Give us the self-control that springs
From abstinence in outward things;
That from each stain and spot of sin,
Our souls may keep the fast within.

Grant, O thou blessèd Trinity;
Grant, O unchanging Unity;
That this our fast of forty days
May work our profit and thy praise! Amen.

Words: St. Gregory the Great, 540-604; Hymnal Version, 1940
Tune: JESU DULCIS MEMORIA, pub. Aldernach, 1608

I’ve tried unsuccessfully to find a version of it on YouTube sung by a choir, but here’s an organ version of it, so you can imagine how it would sound sung in four-part harmony. [The video calls the melody “A la Venue de Noel.” I don’t know why the difference. I also think it’s bad grammar — seems like it should be du Noel. :-p ]



~*~ ~*~ ~*~

Okay, I admit that I posted this just so I’d have something dated February 29 — this is the third Leap Year I’ve been blogging, and somehow I’ve never posted on Leap Day before. But still, it’s a lovely hymn, and one that’s not nearly well-enough known. :-D

Christus vincit!

[Traditional]

Christus vincit! Christus regnat!
Christus, Christus imperat!

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[This hymn is traditionally associated with Christ the King Sunday -- the last Sunday before the new Church year begins at Advent -- but it perfectly expresses my feelings on this resurrection day.]

A hymn for Advent

The King shall come when morning dawns,
And light triumphant breaks;
When beauty gilds the eastern hills,
And life to joy awakes.

Not as of old a little child
To bear, and fight, and die,
But crowned with glory like the sun
That lights the morning sky.

O brighter than the rising morn
When He, victorious, rose,
And left the lonesome place of death,
Despite the rage of foes.

O brighter than that glorious morn
Shall this fair morning be,
When Christ, our King, in beauty comes,
And we His face shall see.

The King shall come when morning dawns,
And earth’s dark night is past;
O haste the rising of that morn,
The day that aye shall last.

And let the endless bliss begin,
By weary saints foretold,
When right shall triumph over wrong,
And truth shall be extolled.

The King shall come when morning dawns,
And light and beauty brings:
Hail, Christ the Lord! Thy people pray,
Come quickly, King of kings.

Words: Greek, tr. by John Brown­lie, 1907
Music: ST. STEPHEN, William Jones, 1789

O day of rest and gladness, O day of joy and light,

O balm of care and sadness, most beautiful, most bright:
On Thee, the high and lowly, through ages joined in tune,
Sing holy, holy, holy, to the great God Triune.

On Thee, at the creation, the light first had its birth;
On Thee, for our salvation, Christ rose from depths of earth;
On Thee, our Lord, victorious, the Spirit sent from heaven,
And thus on Thee, most glorious, a triple light was given.

Thou art a port, protected from storms that round us rise;
A garden, intersected with streams of paradise;
Thou art a cooling fountain in life’s dry, dreary sand;
From thee, like Pisgah’s mountain, we view our promised land.

Thou art a holy ladder, where angels go and come;
Each Sunday finds us gladder, nearer to heaven, our home;
A day of sweet refection, thou art a day of love,
A day of resurrection from earth to things above.

Today on weary nations the heavenly manna falls;
To holy convocations the silver trumpet calls,
Where Gospel light is glowing with pure and radiant beams,
And living water flowing, with soul refreshing streams.

New graces ever gaining from this our day of rest,
We reach the rest remaining to spirits of the blessed.
To Holy Ghost be praises, to Father, and to Son;
The church her voice upraises to Thee, blessed Three in One.

Christopher Wordsworth, 1862

best sung to WOODBIRD, traditional German melody

Palm Sunday

Ride on! ride on in majesty!
Hark! all the tribes hosanna cry;
O Savior meek, pursue thy road
with palms and scattered garments strowed.

Ride on! ride on in majesty!
In lowly pomp ride on to die;
O Christ, thy triumphs now begin
o’er captive death and conquered sin.

Ride on! ride on in majesty!
The angel-squadrons of the sky
look down with sad and wondering eyes
to see the approaching sacrifice.

Ride on! ride on in majesty!
Thy last and fiercest strife is nigh;
the Father on his sapphire throne
expects his own anointed Son.

Ride on! ride on in majesty!
In lowly pomp ride on to die;
bow thy meek head to mortal pain,
then take, O God, thy power, and reign.

~*~ ~*~ ~*~
Words: Henry Hart Milman, 1820
Best sung to: Winchester New (Musikalisches Handbuch, Hamburg, 1690

Memory is a funny thing

Sunday night, Mosey came to me humming a tune and wanted to know what it was. I told her it was “Rise up, oh men of God,” and she went to look it up in the Trinity (Presbyterian) hymnal so she could play it on the piano.

It wasn’t in that hymnal, which I thought was odd — I know I’ve played it a lot in the last few years, and that’s the hymnal I use most often — but I told her to check the Baptist hymnal, the one I grew up with. Sure enough it was there. St. Thomas is the tune’s name, so I looked it up in the Trinity. “I love thy kingdom, Lord” is one of the two hymns sung to St. Thomas in the Trinity. It’s also the hymn we had sung before the Gospel reading that very morning.

As if that weren’t bad enough, not only am I the one who picked out that hymn, but I’m the one who played it during the service! And yet, the words that came to me when I heard the tune by itself were the ones I grew up with.

O Jesus, crowned with all renown

~ Edward W. Benson (1829-1896)

O Jesus, crowned with all renown,
Since Thou the earth hast trod,
Thou reignest, and by Thee come down
Henceforth the gifts of God.
Thine is the health and Thine the wealth
That in our halls abound,
And Thine the beauty and the joy
With which the years are crowned.

Lord, in their change, let frost and heat,
And winds and dews be giv’n;
All fostering power, all influence sweet,
Breathe from the bounteous Heav’n.
Attemper fair with gentle air
The sunshine and the rain,
That kindly earth with timely birth
May yield her fruits again.

That we may feed the poor aright,
And gathering round Thy throne,
Here, in the holy angels’ sight,
Repay Thee of Thine own:
That we may praise Thee all our days,
And with the Father’s Name,
And with the Holy Spirit’s gifts,
The Savior’s love proclaim.

Sung to Kingsfold, traditional Eng­lish mel­o­dy, ar­ranged by Ralph Vaugh­an Will­iams (1872-1958)

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Today is Rogation Sunday, which is the Sunday preceding the three rogation days — the Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday before Ascension Day. “Rogation” comes from the Latin rogare and means “to ask.” The traditional Scripture readings for this Sunday include John 16, where Jesus says to his followers, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you,” and James one where we are told that “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction…”

On this day, in the midst of rejoicing with our Saviour’s triumph over sin and death, remembering his Ascension and rule over the earth, and looking forward to our own resurrection and ascension, we ask him to bless the land and crops, the people and the work of their hands as we fulfill the Gospel, living for his glory.

Alleluia! Christ is risen

CHRIST our Passover is sacrificed for us:
Therefore let us keep the feast,
Not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness:
But with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

CHRIST being raised from the dead dieth no more:
Death hath no more dominion over him.
For in that he died, he died unto sin once:
But in that he liveth, he liveth unto God.
Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin:
But alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.

CHRIST is risen from the dead:
And become the firstfruits of them that slept.
For since by man came death:
By man came also the resurrection of the dead.
For as in Adam all die:
Even so in Christ shall all be made alive.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son:
And to the holy Ghost;
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be:
World without end. Amen.

Ah, holy Jesus, how hast Thou offended,

Ah, holy Jesus, how hast Thou offended,
That man to judge Thee hath in hate pretended?
By foes derided, by Thine own rejected,
O most afflicted.

Who was the guilty? Who brought this upon Thee?
Alas, my treason, Jesus, hath undone Thee.
’Twas I, Lord, Jesus, I it was denied Thee!
I crucified Thee.

Lo, the Good Shepherd for the sheep is offered;
The slave hath sinned, and the Son hath suffered;
For man’s atonement, while he nothing heedeth,
God intercedeth.

For me, kind Jesus, was Thy incarnation,
Thy mortal sorrow, and Thy life’s oblation;
Thy death of anguish and Thy bitter passion,
For my salvation.

Therefore, kind Jesus, since I cannot pay Thee,
I do adore Thee, and will ever pray Thee,
Think on Thy pity and Thy love unswerving,
Not my deserving.

~*~ ~*~ ~*~

Words: Jo­hann Heer­man, Herz­lieb­ster Je­su, 1630; trans­lat­ed from Ger­man to Eng­lish by Ro­bert S. Bridg­es, 1899.

Music: Herz­lieb­ster Je­su, Jo­hann Crü­ger, 1640. Bach used this mu­sic as the ba­sis for part of his St. Mat­thew Pas­sion.