Adam Lay Ybounden Peter Warlock
The manuscript on which the poem is found (Sloane 2593, ff.10v-11) is held by the British Library, who date the work to c.1400 and speculate that the lyrics may have belonged to a wandering minstrel; other poems included on the same page in the manuscript include "I have a gentil cok", the famous lyric poem "I syng of a mayden" and two riddle songs – "A minstrel's begging song" and "I have a yong suster".
The Victorian antiquarian Thomas Wright suggests that although there is consensus that the lyrics date from the reign of Henry V of England (1387–1422), the songs themselves may be rather earlier. Wright speculated that the lyrics originated in Warwickshire, and suggested that a number of the songs were intended for use in mystery plays. However, more recent analysis of their dialect places them within the song tradition of East Anglia and more specifically Norfolk; two further carol MS from the county contain songs from Sloane 2593.
Taken from Wikipedia.
Peter Warlock is a pseudonym for Philip Arnold Heseltine. The name Warlock is used in all of his published works and also reflects his interest in the occult. He is best known for his song writing and other vocal music. He was also a music critic.
Whilst at Eton he met Delius and began a long friendship. Failing at academe, he started work as a music journalist and was very interested in folk song and Elizabethan music. His first serious compositions are from around 1915 and after a stay in Ireland studying Celtic culture and language he returned to England in 1918 and began serious composition. His major work was done in the 1920s developing his own style. He is thought to have killed himself by coal gas poisoning in 1930 due to depression fearing a loss of creative inspiration.
A Virgin Most Pure English traditional carol arranged by Charles Wood (1866-1926)
Whilst at Eton he met Delius and began a long friendship. Failing at academe, he started work as a music journalist and was very interested in folk song and Elizabethan music. His first serious compositions are from around 1915 and after a stay in Ireland studying Celtic culture and language he returned to England in 1918 and began serious composition. His major work was done in the 1920s developing his own style. He is thought to have killed himself by coal gas poisoning in 1930 due to depression fearing a loss of creative inspiration.
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A Virgin Most Pure English traditional carol arranged by Charles Wood (1866-1926)
One of the most delightful of English folk-carols, A virgin most pure tells the Christmas story with affecting simplicity. Charles Wood (whose settings of many carols including this one have come to be regarded as definitive) was a lecturer and later the Professor of Music at Cambridge University. He is remembered now mainly for his fluent and craftsman-like choral writing.
from notes by Collegium Records © 1987
Charles Wood (1866-1926) was born in Ireland. He was a treble chorister in the nearby St Patrick’s Cathedral, Armagh. He received his early education in the cathedral choir school and also studied the organ under Robert Turle and Dr Thomas Marks. In 1883, he was one of the inaugural students of the Royal College of Music, studying composition under Charles Villiers Stanford and CHH Parry. After four years he continued his studies at Selwyn College, Cambridge. In 1889 he was appointed as organ scholar in Gonville and Caius college, Cambridge, becoming a fellow in 1994 and Director of Music and organist. Following the death of Stanford in 1924 Wood took over the role of Professor of Music in Cambridge.
He is remembered for his Anglican Church music.
He is remembered for his Anglican Church music.
| From Wikipedia |
The Angel Gabriel from heaven came. Sabine Baring-Gould Basque traditional arr. Edgar Pettman.
This is a Basque Christmas folk carol based on the annunciation of the Virgin Mary by Archangel Gabriel. It was collected by Charles Bordes (1863 -1909) a french music teacher and composer and paraphrased into English by Sabine Baring-Gould (1834-1924) an Anglican priest and collector of folk songs. It is commonly sung to an arrangement by Edgar Pettman (1866-1943) English organist, choral conductor and music editor.
Away In A Manger Words anon. (19th Century American) Melody W J Kirkpatrick arr. David Willcox
"Away in a Manger" is a Christmas carol first published in the late nineteenth century and used widely throughout the English-speaking world. In Britain, it is one of the most popular carols; a 1996 Gallup Poll ranked it joint second. Although it was long claimed to be the work of German religious reformer Martin Luther, the carol is now thought to be wholly American in origin. The two most-common musical settings are by William J. Kirkpatrick (1895) and James Ramsey Murray (1887).
William James Kirkpatrick (27 February 1838 – 20 September 1921) was an American hymnwriter of Irish birth.
Kirkpatrick was born in the Parish of Errigal, Keerogue, County Tyrone, Ireland to a schoolteacher and musician, Thomas Kirkpatrick and his wife, Elizabeth Storey. The family immigrated to Philadelphia on 5 August 1840, living first in Duncannon, Pennsylvania. William did not accompany his parents on the initial immigration as he was too young and they wished to be settled before bringing him to America. They did, however, give birth to a daughter on the ship in transit. William was exposed to and given formal training in music at a very young age. In 1854, he moved to Philadelphia to study music and carpentry. It was here that he studied vocal music under Professor T. Bishop. Kirkpatrick was a versatile musician playing the cello, fife, flute, organ, and violin. He joined the Harmonia and the Haydn Sacred Music Societies where he was exposed to many great composers. In 1855, he became involved in the Wharton Street Methodist Episcopal Church serving the choir with his musical talent and teaching Sunday school.
Beginning in 1858, Kirkpatrick began working with A.S. Jenks who helped him publish his first collection of hymns, Devotional Melodies, in 1859. His involvement with the Harmonia Society introduced him to another man, Dr. Leopold Meignen, under whose tutelage he devoted himself primarily to the study of music focusing on theory and composition.
In 1861, William Kirkpatrick married his first wife. Not long after the marriage, he enlisted in the 91st Regiment of the Pennsylvania Volunteers as a Fife-Major. This lasted until October 1862, when under general orders, the position was terminated. He returned to Philadelphia and supported his wife by working in carpentry. Over the next 11 years, Kirkpatrick was elected lead organist for the Ebenezer Methodist Episcopal Church, studied the pipe organ, continued in vocal lessons, and began publishing more and more hymns. It was also during this time that he was introduced to John R. Sweney. They soon became partners in their musical careers. The death of Kirkpatrick’s wife in 1878 acted as a catalyst in his life to give up the trade and devote himself fully to music and composition.
Between 1880 and 1897, Sweeney and Kirkpatrick published 49 major books. It was also during this time that Kirkpatrick was given command over all of the music at Grace Methodist Episcopal church. He married again in 1893 and became a world traveler with his wife. Over the years he published close to 100 major works and many annual works such as anthems for Easter, Christmas, and children’s choirs.
William J. Kirkpatrick died on 20 September 1921. He told his wife that night that he had a tune running through his head and he wanted to write it down before he lost it. His wife retired to bed and awoke in the middle of the night to find that he was not there. She went to his study to find him, and when she did, he was slumped over on his desk, dead. His interment was located in West Laurel Hill Cemetery near Philadelphia.
Kirkpatrick participated in many of the Camp meetings the Methodist churches held. He often led the music portion of the meeting and enlisted the help of soloists and other musicians to perform for the attenders. During one of these meetings, he became saddened by his observation of the soloist, who would perform the required songs and then leave without staying to hear the preacher. William feared that this young man did not really know Christ and so he began to pray that God would somehow get a hold of the soloist's heart. One evening while he was praying, a song began to form in his mind. He quickly jotted down the lyrics and asked the soloist to sing the song that night. The lyrics of the song convicted the young man's heart and he ended up staying and listening to the message. When the preacher gave the altar call at the end of the night, the soloist got up and went to the front of the tent and accepted Jesus into his heart. The lyrics that so touched this young man, and many people since, are: "I've wandered far away from God, Now I'm coming home; The paths of sin too long I've trod, Lord, I'm coming home. Coming home, coming home, Nevermore to roam; Open now Thine arms of love, Lord, I'm coming home." The song, Lord, I'm Coming Home, was based on the story of the Prodigal Son found in Luke 15.
Taken from Wikipedia
Ding Dong! Merrily On High 16th Century French Melody harmonised by Charles Wood (1866-1926) Words by G R Woodward (1848-1934)
The present setting of Ding dong! merrily on high is the well-known one with words by G R Woodward and a catchy sixteenth-century French tune harmonized by Charles Wood. The tune is taken from a dance manual called Orchésographie, published in Langres in 1588 by a canon named Jehan Tabourot, who used as a pseudonym the anagrammatic form, Thoinot Arbeau. In the book the dance is described as a ‘branle de l’official’—implying particular vibrancy and exuberance. Charles Wood (1866–1926) was a product of the Royal College of Music and studied composition with Sir Charles Villiers Stanford whom he succeeded as professor of music at Cambridge in 1924. Vaughan Williams was among his pupils. His best-known pieces are his anthems, which include O Thou the central Orb and Expectans expectavi.
from notes by Wadham Sutton © 1993
George Ratcliffe Woodward (27 December 1848 – 3 March 1934) was an English Anglican priest who wrote mostly religious verse, both original and translated from ancient authors. The best-known of these were written to fit traditional melodies, mainly of the Renaissance. He sometimes harmonised these melodies himself, but usually left this to his frequent collaborator, composer Charles Wood.
Woodward was born at 26 Hamilton Square, Birkenhead and educated at Elstree School, then located in Elstree, Hertfordshire, then Harrow School. In 1867 he won a Sayer Scholarship to Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, graduating in 1872, third class in the Classics Tripos.
On 21 December 1874 he was ordained deacon by the Bishop of London, to serve as Assistant Curate at St Barnabas, Pimlico. In September 1882 he moved to St Mary and All Saints, Little Walsingham with Houghton St Giles, in Norfolk. Woodward played the cello, and the euphonium, sometimes in procession. Other hobbies included bellringing and beekeeping and he also published and printed booklets of his own verse. In 1889 he married Alice Dorothy Lee Warner, at St Barnabas, Pimlico, having moved to Chelmondiston, near Ipswich, in 1888.
In 1893, Woodward published Carols for Christmas-Tide, Series II. His wife Alice died in October 1893, and was buried in Walsingham. In 1894, Woodward published Carols for Easter and Ascension-tide, with one original composition: This joyful Eastertide. In 1894 Woodward resigned as Rector of Chelmondiston, to return to St Barnabas', Pimlico, as Assistant Priest and Precentor.
Woodward helped create the St Barnabas Choral Society, and continued his interests in carols and plainsong. In 1897 he published Hymns and Carols for Christmas-tide, and in 1898 produced Legends of the Saints, and then in 1902 and 1903 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus and Poemata. In 1899 Woodward left St Barnabas to edit the Cowley Carol Book.
In 1904 Songs of Syon was published, and In 1910 Woodward’s edition of Piae Cantiones, compiled for the Plainsong and Medieval Music Society. In 1917, he jointly wrote The Acathist Hymn of the Holy Orthodox Church in the Original Greek Text and done into English Verse. In 1920, collaborating with Charles Wood, An Italian Carol Book was published. In 1922, Hymns of the Greek Church.
In 1924, Woodward and Wood published A Cambridge Carol Book: Being Fifty-two Songs for Christmas, Easter and Other Seasons. It included "Ding Dong Merrily on High" and "Past Three O'Clock". The same year Woodward received an honorary Lambeth Doctorate in Music. Woodward died at 48 West Hill, Highgate on 3 March 1934. His interment was at Little Walsingham, Norfolk, on 8 March 1934, at 2 PM.
taken from Wikipedia
O Little One Sweet Old German melody harmonised by J S Bach (1685-1750) Translated by Percy Dearmer
This German lullaby-carol first appeared in print in Scheidt’s Tablaturbuch of 1650, though it may have been written before then, either by Scheidt himself or by an unknown author. J. S. Bach’s version (in the form of a melody and figured bass) was included in Schemelli’s Gesangbuch of 1736.
from notes by Collegium Records © 1987
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 – 1750) was a German composer and musician of the Baroque period. He was a highly respected organist in his lifetime, although not recognised as a composer of magnitude (possibly one of the greatest) until a revival of his works in the first half of the 19th century. He showed considerable skill in counterpoint and harmony. He was able to adapt rhythm, form and texture from abroad. He was a prolific composer of church music due to the demand for huge numbers of cantatas over the Christian year. It is thought he wrote over 300 with only around 200 surviving. He also wrote many other works sacred and secular. It is now agreed that his music has technical command, intellectual depth and artistic beauty.
Welcome Yule! C Hubert H Parry (1848-1918)
The words of Welcome, Yule! date from the fifteenth century and have a lilting rhythm which invites singing. There are several versions, one of which appears in a collection made in about 1430 by John Awdlay, the blind chaplain of Haughmond Abbey in Shropshire. Sir Hubert Parry (1848–1918) obtained his Bachelor of Music degree while still a pupil at Eton but went on to Oxford to study composition. Eventually he became director of the RCM and professor of music at Oxford. He is known for his choral piece Blest pair of sirens, for the unaccompanied Songs of Farewell and, of course, for Jerusalem. The lively setting of Welcome, Yule! is a minor piece but none the less enjoyable.
from notes by Wadham Sutton © 1993
C H H Parry was born in Bournemouth in 1848 into a rich family and was educated at Eton where he also gained his music degree. He went to study further at Oxford. His music influenced other great English composers such as Elgar and Vaughan Williams. He wrote his best music in his later years and this include his Songs of Farewell. He died in Rustington in 1918, just before the end of the Great War.
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| Sir Charles Hubert Hastings Parry From Wikipedia |
Good King Wensleslas J M Neale Melody from Piae Cantiones (1582) arr. David Willcox
"Good King Wenceslas" is a Christmas carol that tells a story of a Bohemian king going on a journey and braving harsh winter weather to give alms to a poor peasant on the Feast of Stephen (December 26, the Second Day of Christmas). During the journey, his page is about to give up the struggle against the cold weather, but is enabled to continue by following the king's footprints, step for step, through the deep snow. The legend is based on the life of the historical Saint Wenceslaus I, Duke of Bohemia or Svatý Václav in Czech (907–935). The name Wenceslas is a Latinised version of the old Czech language "Venceslav".
In 1853, English hymnwriter John Mason Neale wrote the "Wenceslas" lyric, in collaboration with his music editor Thomas Helmore, and the carol first appeared in Carols for Christmas-Tide, published by Novello & Co the same year. Neale's lyric was set to the melody of 13th-century spring carol "Tempus adest floridum" ("The time is near for flowering") first published in the 1582 Finnish song collection Piae Cantiones.
Wenceslas was considered a martyr and a saint immediately after his death in the 10th century, when a cult of Wenceslas rose up in Bohemia and in England. Within a few decades of Wenceslas's death, four biographies of him were in circulation. These hagiographies had a powerful influence on the High Middle Ages conceptualization of the rex iustus, or "righteous king"—that is, a monarch whose power stems mainly from his great piety, as well as from his princely vigor.
Sheet music of "Good King Wenceslas" in a biscuit container from 1913, preserved at the Victoria and Albert Museum.
Referring approvingly to these hagiographies, a preacher from the 12th century wrote:
But his deeds I think you know better than I could tell you; for, as is read in his Passion, no one doubts that, rising every night from his noble bed, with bare feet and only one chamberlain, he went around to God's churches and gave alms generously to widows, orphans, those in prison and afflicted by every difficulty, so much so that he was considered, not a prince, but the father of all the wretched.
Several centuries later the legend was claimed as fact by Pope Pius II, who himself also walked ten miles barefoot in the ice and snow as an act of pious thanksgiving.
Although Wenceslas was, during his lifetime, only a duke, Holy Roman Emperor Otto I (962–973) posthumously "conferred on [Wenceslas] the regal dignity and title" and that is why, in the legend and song, he is referred to as a "king". The usual English spelling of Duke Wenceslas's name, Wenceslaus, is occasionally encountered in later textual variants of the carol, although it was not used by Neale in his version. Wenceslas is not to be confused with King Wenceslaus I of Bohemia (Wenceslaus I Premyslid), who lived more than three centuries later.
The tune is that of "Tempus adest floridum" ("It is time for flowering"), a 13th-century spring carol in 76 76 Doubled Trochaic metre first published in the Finnish song book Piae Cantiones in 1582. Piae Cantiones is a collection of seventy-four songs compiled by Jacobus Finno, the Protestant headmaster of Turku Cathedral School, and published by Theodoric Petri, a young Catholic printer. The book is a unique document of European songs intended not only for use in church, but also schools, thus making the collection a unique record of the late medieval period.
John Mason Neale (24 January 1818 – 6 August 1866) was an English Anglican priest, scholar and hymnwriter.
Neale was born in London on 24 January 1818, his parents being the clergyman Cornelius Neale and Susanna Neale, daughter of John Mason Good. A younger sister Elizabeth Neale (1822–1901) founded the Community of the Holy Cross. He was educated at Sherborne School, Dorset, and Trinity College, Cambridge, where (despite being said to be the best classical scholar in his year) his lack of ability in mathematics prevented him taking an honours degree. Neale was named after the Puritan cleric and hymn writer John Mason (1645–94), of whom his mother Susanna was a descendant.
At the age of 22 Neale was the chaplain of Downing College, Cambridge. At Cambridge he was affected by the Oxford Movement and, particularly interested in church architecture, helped to found the Cambridge Camden Society (afterwards known as the Ecclesiological Society). The society advocated for more ritual and religious decoration in churches, and was closely associated with the Gothic Revival. Neale was ordained in 1842. He was briefly incumbent of Crawley in Sussex, but was forced to resign due to a chronic lung disease. The following winter he lived in the Madeira Islands, where he was able to do research for his History of the Eastern Church. In 1846 he became warden of Sackville College, an almshouse at East Grinstead, an appointment which he held until his death.
In 1854 Neale co-founded the Society of Saint Margaret, an order of women in the Church of England dedicated to nursing the sick. Many Protestants of the time were suspicious of the restoration of Anglican religious orders. In 1857, Neale was attacked and mauled at a funeral of one of the Sisters. Crowds threatened to stone him or to burn his house. He received no honour or preferment in England, and his doctorate was bestowed by Trinity College (Connecticut).
He was also the principal founder of the Anglican and Eastern Churches Association, a religious organization founded as the Anglican and Eastern Orthodox Churches Union in 1864. A result of this organisation was the Hymns of the Eastern Church, edited by John Mason Neale and published in 1865.
Neale was strongly high church in his sympathies, and had to endure a good deal of opposition, including a fourteen years' inhibition by his bishop. Neale translated the Eastern liturgies into English, and wrote a mystical and devotional commentary on the Psalms. However, he is best known as a hymnwriter and, especially, translator, having enriched English hymnody with many ancient and mediaeval hymns translated from Latin and Greek. For example, the melody of Good King Wenceslas originates from a medieval Latin springtime poem, Tempus adest floridum. More than anyone else, he made English-speaking congregations aware of the centuries-old tradition of Latin, Greek, Russian, and Syrian hymns. The 1875 edition of the Hymns Ancient and Modern contains 58 of his translated hymns; The English Hymnal (1906) contains 63 of his translated hymns and six original hymns by Neale.
His translations include:
All Glory, Laud and Honour
A Great and Mighty Wonder
O come, O come, Emmanuel
Of the Father's Heart Begotten
Sing, My Tongue, the Glorious Battle
To Thee Before the Close of Day
Ye Sons and Daughters of the King
Since Neale died on 6 August 1866, the Festival of the Transfiguration, he is commemorated by the Anglican churches on the following day, 7 August. In the Episcopal Church in the United States, he shares this feast with Catherine Winkworth, who also translated hymns into English. Neale and Winkworth are also commemorated together in the Calendar of Saints of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America on 1 July, the anniversary of Winkworth's death. Neale was buried in St Swithun's churchyard, East Grinstead.
Taken from Wikipedia
