The UK's leading Digital Church Organ specialist
Decembers hymn is the much-loved Christmas carol “ O Come, O Come, Emmanuel ”. The words were originally written in Latin text and combined from various antiphons by an unknown author, possibly in the 12th Century. The Latin text was translated into English by John Mason Neale in 1851. It is believed that the melody…
[Read More]
For the month of November we have selected the hymn “O God our help in ages past”, written by Isaac Watts (1674 – 1748) and accompanied by the tune “St. Anne”. This tune is written by the English composer and Organist, William Croft (1677 – 1727). The hymn is often sung as part of Armistice…
[Read More]
Hymn of the Month for October is “Jerusalem the Golden” which is a Christian hymn by John Mason Neale (1818-1866). The text is a translation of a section of Bernard of Cluny’s (12th century) Latin verse satire De Contemptu Mundi. The hymn is accompanied by the tune Ewing by the Scottish born composer Alexander Ewing…
[Read More]
The Hymn of the Month this time is “Let us with a gladsome mind” which is a text written in 1623 by John Milton (1608-1674), the famous poet and author of Paradise Lost. This is set to the hymn tune Monkland, by John Antes (1740-1811), a Moravian minister and composer. Monkland’s melodic contour is a…
[Read More]
This time our Hymn of the Month is the song, “Faithful Shepherd, feed me” accompanied by the beautiful tune “Pastor Pastorum” by Friedrich Silcher (1789-1860). The words, by Thomas Benson Pollock (1836-1896), are appropriate for Communion. Faithful Shepherd is a gentle, serene hymn and Silcher’s simple yet elegant hymn tune Pastor Pastorum provides a perfect…
[Read More]
In this “Hymn of the Month” we present you with the hymn song “Praise to the Holiest in the height” by John Henry Newman (1801 – 1890). This is accompanied by the hymn tune “Gerontius” by the English musician and clergyman John Bacchus Dykes (1823 – 1876). John B. Dykes was born in Hull, England,…
[Read More]
In this “Hymn of the Month” we present you with the hymn song “ 0 Thou who at Thy Eucharist didst pray ” by William Harry Turton (1856 -1938). This is accompanied by the hymn tune “Song 1” from the outstanding English composer and organist Orlando Gibbons (1583-1625). Orlando Gibbons was one of the greatest…
[Read More]
This month we present the hymn “Hail the Day That Sees Him Rise”, by the great hymn writer Charles Wesley (1707 – 1788). This hymn is usually sung to the Welsh tune LLANFAIR, attributed to Robert Williams (1782 – 1821), even though some historians have certain doubts about his authorship. This hymn was written for…
[Read More]
The hymn tune of the month this time is “Passion Chorale” which was originally composed by Hans Leo Hassler (1564-1612). The most common text associated to this hymn tune is “O Sacred Head, Now Wounded” which is a Christian Passion hymn based on a Latin text written during the Middle Ages. Paul Gerhardt (1607-1676) originally…
[Read More]
This month’s hymn, “Tell Out, My Soul”, is a Christian hymn paraphrasing the Magnificat written by Timothy Dudley-Smith (1926 – ) in 1962. In the early days this hymn was paired to a tune by Michael Baughen but it was later paired and greatly enhanced by the sweeping music of Walter Greatorex’s (1877 – 1949)…
[Read More]
Our final tune in this year’s series is befittingly the old English traditional Christmas carol “God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen”. The composer is unknown but there are records of it being sung within the Christian Church since the 15th century. The hymn was first put into print in 1760 but made available to a wider…
[Read More]
The hymn tune Thaxted is taken from the middle section of “Jupiter”, one of the seven movements in the orchestral suite “The Planets” by Gustav Theodore Holst (1874 –1934). Holst adapted the theme from Jupiter to suit the patriotic poem “I Vow to Thee, my Country”, by Cecil Spring-Rice (1859–1918), which honours the soldiers who…
[Read More]
Our tune this month is Golden Sheaves, composed by the very popular man of his time (and ours) Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan (13 May 1842 – 22 November 1900). Sullivan was a Member of the Victorian Order (MVO) and an English composer. William Chatterton Dix (1837 – 1898) wrote the words to “To thee, O…
[Read More]
When choosing the hymn tunes for this first series of ‘Hymn of the Month’ I was determined that we should have at least a couple of ‘Welsh’ ones and Bleanwern is as good an example as you can find. Composed by William Penfro Rowlands (1860–1937), during the Welsh revival of 1904–1905. William is pictured here…
[Read More]
This tune is possibly one of the best known from its inclusion in almost all hymnals and it is a fitting accompaniment for the words ‘Now thank we all our God’ Both words and music originate in Germany in the early 1600’s. The tune written by Cruger who was simultaneously a teacher at the school Zum Grauen…
[Read More]
Sir Charles Hubert Hastings Parry, ( 1848 – 1918) was a fine composer, teacher and historian of music. As a composer he is no doubt best known for the choral song Jerusalem which sets the words of William Blake. And recently he came to notice again when his coronation anthem I was Glad was part of…
[Read More]
For our 2016 series of You Tube videos we have changed to present a Hymn of the Month. This is in response to customers requesting recordings of how our instruments would support church worship. The tutorial series has moved to a new channel dedicated to our custom built Regent Classic instruments. These videos can now be…
[Read More]
Our tune this month is written by a most remarkable American William Howard Doane Doane was born in Connecticut in 1832 to prosperous parents. His father was the head of Doane and Treat, cotton manufacturers. Doane showed impressive musical talent and by early adolescence he was playing the flute, violin and double bass fiddle. Doane attended…
[Read More]
The first record of this tune is in a hymnal (Gesangbuch) published in 1784 for the Duke of Wurtemberg. Ellacombe takes the name of a village in Devonshire. It was first set to the words “Ave Maria, klarer und lichter Morgenstern.” During the first half of the nineteenth century various German hymnals altered the tune….
[Read More]
This month we feature “Lord of All Hopefulness” as part of our Hymn of the Month series played by our in-house organist, Jonathan Kingston. Slane is believed to be an old Irish folk tune and the name is certainly common to a hill near Tara in County Meath, Ireland. It first came to significant attention…
[Read More]
This month we feature “All My Hope on God is Founded” as part of our Hymn of the Month series played by our inhouse organist, Jonathan Kingston. The original words “Meine Hoffnung stehet feste” were written in around 1680 by Joachim Neander and these are often sung to an early German tune of the same name….
[Read More]
We have received a number of requests asking us to present music that our instruments would routinely play in a church context. So what better examples than well known and loved hymn tunes? This year we are launching our new tutorial series called ‘Hymn of the Month’. So watch out for them each month. This month we…
[Read More]
Stay up to date with Viscount on Facebook and Twitter
