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Notes from Nola: On Writing Hymns – Guest Columnist Riddick Weber

The Moravian Music Foundation preserves, shares, and celebrates Moravian musical culture…

With this post I welcome my first “guest blogger” — the Rev. C. Riddick Weber, who has written about his experiences in writing hymns. Thank you, Riddick, for allowing us to use part of your writings about your writings!

Reflections on Writing Hymns:
An Encouragement to Potential Authors

I did not like English class for most middle school or high school, particularly anything related to my having to write, but most especially I disliked writing poetry. However, during my last year in high school, I began to understand what my English teachers were saying as they dug into the words, especially the wordplay in poetry.  By college, I could no longer say I did not like my English classes, but still did not enjoy the process of writing.

Soon after finishing college, I began working for the Southern Province as the Director of College-Age Ministry. Over time I became more comfortable with writing, mostly newsletter articles and the occasional sermon as a guest preacher. I was 30 when our first son, Isaac, was born, followed two years later by JC and Daniel, and I found that after we started having kids, I also started having words. All of which is to say, writing hymns did not come easily or quickly to me (you may feel the same way).

I do not consider myself a songwriter. Words and sometimes phrases come to mind as I think about a particular situation. Often I become aware of the first line of a tune that I already know that fits the words that have come to mind. The meter of that song then helps the words to flow, or helps me realize I need to change the wording to get the stress and number of syllables correct.  Normally within a half an hour, a song has appeared in good draft form.

For me, it is then important to share those songs with others who I know are hymn writers or have a way with words. I solicit their suggestions relating to the song in general, but I especially point out lines or phrases where I had problems with words, or where they still do not seem quite right to me. I do this for several reasons.  First, I find that friends often easily find solutions to wording that seems problematic or forced to me.  Secondly, sometimes my mind tricks me into reading through problems with the meter, thus overlooking them.  I do not catch these problems, but friendly readers do.  Sometimes I take these friends’ suggestions as they are; other times I continue to work with them, revising their revisions.  Sometimes, even though I value part of the suggestion, I choose not to accept that because a different concern might outweigh it. Often when I choose not to accept a suggestion, it is because the suggestion misses a theological nuance I am trying to convey.

I would like to share a series of stories about the creation of songs, with the hope that they might inspire others to write words that might come to them.

“I’m Making All Things New,” 2010
Sing to the Lord A New Song, #62

“I’m making all things new,” God says for us to hear.
The old is gone the new is coming ever near.
So we give thanks, our heartfelt thanks, for these past days of prayer and praise.

We’ve heard your call anew; we’ve read and we have prayed
to op’n our heart and minds to sense the new you’ve made.
And now we plead, may we find faith to follow you where’re you lead.

And now make us new, too; please make us one in you.
Draw us together through your Spirit by your pow’r.
So we may be the church you want to minister this very hour.

Christ calls us and we are! You make us and we’re new!
We live and move alone by grace that comes from you.
Let us take cheer! And standing at the ready be when you appear.

© C. Riddick Weber
July 22, 2010

I jokingly say that this was a failed assignment for writing a prayer. I was on the team that planned the devotions for the 2010 Synod, which had “Behold, God Is Making All Things New” for its theme.  Rev. Russ May asked me to write an opening prayer as part of the introduction to the devotional booklet that would go out to delegates to help them prepare for synod.  After sitting down at my desk and getting nowhere with the prayer, the phrase “I’m making all things new” came to mind.  Even though the song does not stay there, starting things from God’s perspective seemed to open the door.  Very quickly, too, the tune “Darwall” came into my head, giving me structure for the words.  Words flowed very quickly and probably within half an hour the song was finished.

“Love of God is a Fragrant Garden,” 2011
Sing to the Lord A New Song, #83

Love of God is a fragrant garden, full of color, life and fruit.
Throughout its annual cycle, we find seed and bulb and shoot.
Hiding under the snows of winter, soaking up the rain of spring,
bathing in the gold of summer, they an autumn harvest bring.

Science teaches us all life’s cycles; faith turns them into song;
together they can guide us throughout our whole lives long.
With humble thanks we learn to see what those before us saw:
comprehending God’s creation, instills a greater awe.

Comenius we celebrate as the teacher we know best.
Still more enlarged his wisdom even though we know them less:
Brother David and Bishop George, Sister Anna in the wood,
furthered what we know of nature and shared that as they could.

Like them let us praise our Creator and rejoice in God’s largess,
offer thanks unto the Savior, who endured creation’s distress,
and sing now to the Spirit, whose gifts beyond compare
enable us God’s blessings to study, reap and share.

Sung to “Down By The Salley Gardens”
Riddick Weber
March 26, 2011

“Love of God is a Fragrant Garden” is very important to me in several ways. In the summer of 2009 Laurel Ridge, the camp and conference center for the Southern Province, offered its first Ecocamp.  This long-term vision of the Revs. Rick Sides and David Guthrie offered the campers and the counselors opportunities to focus intensely on the creation in and around Laurel Ridge, as a way to appreciate the wonder of its Creator.  I was a counselor, and two of my sons, JC and Daniel, were campers.  In addition to enjoying time with them and watching them interact with the beauty of the environment around them, over the course of the week, I began to appreciate the long but undervalued strain within Moravian history and theology that teaches the importance of studying nature in order to appreciate God.  Furthermore, we were encouraged to write haikus in order to develop our artistic expressions in relation to creation.

The following year, I began teaching at Moravian Theological Seminary. In some of my classes I require students to write hymns (How do they know they cannot write them if they have never tried?).  One of my students asked me if I would be writing any hymns since they were having to write them.  This hymn, reflecting my thoughts on the creative nature of God and the history of Moravians who devoted significant portions of their lives to the understanding of the natural world, was written in response to this student’s question.

I knew early on that I would be working with gardening imagery, so I chose this tune to help me structure my thoughts. I learned this Irish folk tune from my oldest son, Isaac, because it was in a book of simple tunes for pennywhistle, which he had learned to play while in elementary school.

This total piece then ties together many of my loves and passions: for my children; for the educational ministries, the camping programs, the history, and the musical traditions of the Moravian Church; and for science and the Creator, fully revealed in Jesus Christ, and empowering and inspiring the creation today through the power of the Holy Spirit.

Within the song itself, Brother David refers to Lewis David de Schweinitz, the first American to earn a PhD. In addition to being the father of mycology, he was also an ordained Moravian pastor, administrator, and educator. Bishop George refers to George Higgins, Moravian Bishop, who was active in Christian Education and in the camping ministries of Laurel Ridge and well-known for knowledge of the flora and fauna on and around the mountain. Sister Anna refers to Anna Rosina Gambold who served as a missionary among the Cherokee in northwest Georgia prior to the Trail of Tears.  She was renowned for her vast botanical knowledge.

The processes of writing “I’m Making All Things New” and “Love of God is a Fragrant Garden” were very important to me. As I mentioned, I did not like writing poetry in high school, particularly haikus.  As a teenager, I found the process of trying to make words fit metric patterns forced.  However, as an adult, I found that having a tune in my head really helped the words to flow.  Ironically it was in writing the haikus (which I had hated in high school) for Ecocamp that I first experienced this sense of a rhythmic pattern helping the words to flow.

Thank you, Brother Riddick, for sharing your experiences! Keep writing, Brother — and to ALL of you, give it a try! You never know until you try …

Next time: What’s your “elevator speech” about Moravian music?

 

 

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Other resources at MMF:

  • Reference library: the Peter Memorial Library in Winston-Salem
  • Irving Lowens Collection of early American tunebooks and songbooks, in Winston-Salem
  • An extensive international collection of hymnals (mostly Moravian) in many languages, dating to the 16th century, in Winston-Salem

 
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ArchivGrid

ArchiveGrid                         LINK

This is a collection of over 7,000,000 archival descriptions, including documents, personal papers, family histories, and other archival materials held in about 1,500 archival institutions. ArchiveGrid helps researchers looking for primary source materials, but who may not know exactly where to go to find them. MMF’s finding aids can be discovered through ArchiveGrid. For an example, go to https://researchworks.oclc.org/archivegrid/help/; type in the search box (upper right) “Bethlehem congregation” and the first thing you will find is MMF’s finding aid for the Bethlehem Congregation Collection, and also related collections and suggested search terms (Lancaster, Dover, Lititz, etc.), linked to those finding aids on the MMF website.

Finding Aids

Individual Finding Aids       LINK

Guide: Arranged by Collection          LINK

The archival holdings of MMF are divided into collections. (some in Bethlehem, some in Winston-Salem)

The finding aid for each collection is a “30,000-foot view” of the collection in its context. Each finding aid contains information about the size of the collection, how it was created, history of the community or key individuals involved in the collection, and a description of the contents.

A guide to the MMF collections is available at MoravianMusic.org:

For the individual finding aids, see https://moravianmusic.org/category/finding-aids/
Then, click on any of the titles and read about that collection. When this work is completed, there will be a finding aid for every collection we hold.

RISM

RISM: Répertoire International des Sources Musicales    LINK

RISM, or International Inventory of Musical Sources, is an international, non-profit organization that aims to comprehensively document extant musical sources worldwide: manuscripts, printed music editions, writings on music theory, and libretti that are found in libraries, archives, churches, schools, and private collections.

The RISM Catalog of Musical Sources contains over 1.2 million records and can be searched at no cost. Early western music from 1600 through to the early 19th century is included.    https://rism.info/de/search.html

RISM was founded in Paris in 1952 and is the largest and only global organization that documents written musical sources. RISM records what exists and where it can be found. RISM is where scholars go when they are looking for music manuscripts or early prints around the world. RISM entries include the musical incipits – the first phrase or so of music – to enable identification of a specific piece of music (which setting of “Sing to the Lord a New Song” is this?).

GemeinKat

GemeinKat is the MMF digital catalog on WorldCat.org    LINK

“GemeinKat” is the name given to MMF’s project to upload new and enhanced digital records to the OCLC and RISM databases. We have used the name “GemeinKat” as our umbrella term for the entire project, involving Backstage Library Works, OCLC, WorldCat, and RISM and the work of cataloging; also, the creation of the digital records and the creation of finding aids.

GemeinKat is available to the public, on the internet, at moravianmusic.on.worldcat.org and is a WorldCat Discovery catalog, developed by OCLC, a nonprofit organization that provides services to thousands of libraries worldwide. Through WorldCat, users have the potential to access more than 1.8 billion items in libraries around the world.

GemeinKat itself is: the bibliographic records for each manuscript, book, or printed music item found in MMF holdings.
These archival holdings are grouped by collections and physically reside in either the Bethlehem or Winston-Salem archive (sometimes in both).
For a description, see the MMF website: https://moravianmusic.org/gemeinkat-catalog/.

WorldCat.org: to search the catalog, go to https://moravianmusic.on.worldcat.org/discovery. You can search by composer, title, collection, or any number of other keywords; just go try!

OCLC (Online Computer Library Center): the collective of organization(s) that built the online database called WorldCat. It is now owned by Backstage Library Works.

Timeline of the Transition

The current plan (subject to change and adjustments, of course) is shared here, and will be updated.

How it works; who hires whom?

A. The MMF Board of Trustees hires the Executive Director. 
B. The Executive Director hires the Asst. Director and other MMF staff.

The Plan

1. Nola and Gwyn will retire, effective the end of August, 2022.

2. The Board is currently searching and accepting applications for Executive Director.

3. A new Executive Director will be named by summer and will be in place by mid-July, 2022.
The new Director would then be able to experience Festival and spend up to 6 weeks with the current Director.

4. An interim Asst. Director will be hired by summer and will overlap with the current Asst. Director.
This position will be 2-days a week to finish out the 2022 calendar year, while the new Director considers applicants for Asst. Director.

5. Assistant Director opening will be posted in the fall of 2022.

6. A new Asst. Director will be hired by the new ED and should be in place to start as of Jan. 1, 2023.

We are open for business!

…however, we prefer you make an appointment to visit the WINSTON-SALEM office in-person, and follow the guidelines, below.

336-725-0651

We request visitors follow these requirements:

  • Researchers must call or email to make an appointment. Walk-in researchers will not be admitted.
  • There will be a limit of 3 persons in the research room at a time (including MMF and Archives researchers).
  • Masks required for ALL.
  • Researchers are required to bring their own writing materials (pencils & paper).

 

For shopping, when convenient, please order items on the MMF website. We can leave them at the door for pick-up or ship to you.

For anthem and lending library requests, research inquiries, and other inquiries,
you are welcome to send an email to info@moravianmusic.org or sales@moravianmusic.org
or, for research, dave@moravianmusic.org
or directly to any of the staff, using this pattern: [first name]@moravianmusic.org

We Are Open for Business!

…however, you must make an appointment to visit the BETHLEHEM office in-person. Masks, distancing, and limits of occupancy are mandated.  

610-866-3340

For shopping, when convenient, please order items on the MMF website. We can leave them at the door for pick-up or ship to you.

For anthem and lending library requests, research inquiries, and other inquiries,
you are welcome to send an email to info@moravianmusic.org or sales@moravianmusic.org or
directly to any of the staff, using this pattern: [first name]@moravianmusic.org

A recent inquiry to MMF - Subject: Copyright/Streaming

 

Dear MMF,

I have a question about copyright and streaming. We have CCLI license and streaming license at my church, but it does not cover many pieces for organ. Would the ASCAP license provide that protection for us to stream and include copyrighted organ music? I’ve read their website, and it seems like it would.  https://www.ascap.com/music-users/types/church-or-ministry

Thanks!

____________________________________________________

Dear Worship Leader,

We have been instructing folks to follow CCLI and OneLicense guidelines, which, as you discovered, unfortunately, rarely cover instrumental/keyboard music.

Yes, it appears as though ASCAP offers a “WorshipCast” streaming license, which is set up in much the same manner as CCLI and OneLicense licenses – i.e., the fee structure is based on worship attendance:

https://apps.christiancopyrightsolutions.com/purchase-license.aspx?svc=wc

A quick click brought up this fee structure:
1 – 199 (in attendance): $284.00
200 – 499 (in attendance): $424.00 (obviously it goes up from here)

Some further good news – the WorshipCast license offered above is controlled by Christian Copyright Solutions (a division of CCLI, and it appears as though purchase of this license would allow you to broadcast both ASCAP and BMI titles, opening up even more possibilities.

I don’t think, however, that this license includes SESAC titles; thus, if you wished to perform anything under the SESAC umbrella (Dan Gawthrop, for instance), you would need to approach that entity directly for a license:

https://www.sesac.com/#!/

Thank you for bringing this to our attention.

Blessings to you in your music ministry!

Gwyneth Michel, Assistant Director, Moravian Music Foundation      – – (with edits by Erik S.)

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Archie K Davis Center

Construction began on the building in the fall of 1999, and the facility was completed and occupied in July 2001. In September 2001, the building was dedicated as the Archie K. Davis Center. More about the man, the building, and a quick, visual tour of our beautiful home.

The Archie K. Davis Center