This week's Biblical text includes the story of Manna in the Wilderness. This was an easy one to find music to fit - after a fashion.
First off, the Handbell Choir makes its debut this Sunday, offering the prelude at both services.
Their selection will be Holy Manna (I told you it was an easy fit), a setting by Susan Geschke of one of the oldest American folk hymns. This Appalachian tune first appeared in 1825's Columbian Harmony, a four-note shaped note tune book published by William Moore, who wrote the music. Moore wrote the tune as a setting for Brethren, We Have Met to Worship, an 1819 hymn lyric by George Atkins. Atkins was a Methodist pastor and newspaperman. Not much is known of Moore, other than he, like Atkins, lived in Tennessee.
The tune is folklike in both its form and use of the pentatonic (5-note) scale. The AABA form, also known as rounded bar form, consists of a verse, a second verse, a bridge, and a third verse. It's called rounded because of the return of the verse after the bridge. Each verse usually has a different set of words.
The AABA form has been heavily used in popular music - think Somewhere Over the Rainbow, I Got Rhythm, I Want to Hold Your Hand, You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin' - you get the idea.
The pentatonic scale? Think using just the black keys on a piano. It's been used all over the world - it's very basic to Chinese, Japanese and Mongolian music, Javanese Gamelan, Scottish music and Appalachian tunes. Some of our favorite hymns are based on it - Amazing Grace, for instance.
The Handbell Choir's presentation has a little fun with the tune. The hymn itself is usually pretty uptempo, anyway, and the arranger played facilitates this by calling for the entire piece to be played with mallets. The group has fun with the mallets, and we hope you'll enjoy this prelude.
Susan Geschke has for 10 years been the Director of Music at Immanuel Lutheran Church in Crystal Lake, Illinois. She's published 75+ handbell pieces.
Worshipers at the 10:30 service will get a double portion of the Holy Manna hymn tune - the choir's presenting an anthem version of the original hymn (really easy fit, eh?). The setting is a cappella (without accompaniment), and I think listening to it will take you back to Early America - though it has a couple of interesting harmonic twists along the way.
In this hymn, the final A of the form (AABA, remember?) is either this line or some variant of it:
Brethren, pray, and holy manna will be showered all around.
The choral version has a few very nice canonic structures in it. In music, a canon is a round - like Row, Row Row Your Boat or Frère Jacques. Pentatonic tunes (black keys, remember?) are particularly well-suited for canons - no half-steps ganging merrily aft a-gley to make utter hash of your once well-tuned harmonies. Pentatonic canons sort of police themselves and keep the train on the rails.
This arrangement was done by John Carter, who was until recently Director of Music at University Baptist Church in Columbus, Ohio. Carter is a well-known composer with several hundred choral compositions to his credit as well as several musicals, an opera, and a dozen collections for keyboard and organ.
