“Go Tell It on the Mountain” is one of the most well-known and beloved Negro spirituals and represents just one of the countless contributions made to American music by enslaved people. These songs represented a passion for life and living despite the suffering, humiliation, and unimaginable cruelty of slavery. Because […]
Song Story
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On Christmas Eve 1818, the villagers gathered for Christmas mass in the Church of St Nicholas in Oberndorf, a snow-covered village at the foot of the Austrian Alps near Salzburg. Because the church’s organ was not in a playable state, the curate and the village schoolteacher had composed a special […]
One of the greatest hymns in our heritage of faith, ‘The Church’s One Foundation’, was written in the 1860’s by an Anglican parish priest and hymnodist, The Rev. Samuel Stone, near London, England. His great hymn was born out of a passionate defense of not only the poor and vulnerable, […]
The lyrics of the hymn “Joy to the World” are by English writer Isaac Watts, inspired by Psalm 98, 96:11-12 and Genesis 3:17-18. The hymn was originally printed in 1719 in Watts’ collection The Psalms of David: Imitated in the language of the New Testament, and applied to the Christian state and […]
The song “We Three Kings of Orient Are” is a Christmas Carol written in 1857 by John Henry Hopkins, Jr. His original composition consisted of five verses. The first verse and last verse were written for the three kings to sing together. The remaining verses were written as a solo […]
“Angels We Have Heard on High” was written in 1862 by James Chadwick, an Anglo-Irish Roman Catholic who served as Bishop of Hexham and Newcastle. He modeled the song after a French Christmas carol called “Les Anges dans nos Compagnes,” which translates to “The Angels in our Countryside.” Though the English version […]
In 1739, prolific hymn writer Charles Wesley penned a Christmas hymn titled “Hark How All the Welkin Rings” for his and brother John’s collection, Hymns and Sacred Poems. The opening line referenced the “welkin,” an old English word for the sky or heavens, ringing with joyful praise for the newborn king. First published under […]
Cathy and Wayne Perrin say the song’s story actually began six years before it was written, in 1974, and continued well past its 1980 advent. A minister on a singing tour the Perrins took in 1974 predicted the couple would compose a song that would one day travel across the […]
Elisha Hoffman was born on May 7, 1839 in Orwigsburg, Pennsylvania. He was a Presbyterian minister and composer of over 2,000 hymns and 50 song books during his 90 years. Music historian Jacob Hall described Elisha Hoffman’s musical ability in the following manner, “When a melody is born in his […]
W. Spencer Walton (1850-1906) was a missionary and evangelist who worked with the South Africa General Mission in the latter part of the nineteenth century. About 1889 Walton founded The Sailor’s Rest, in the city of Durban, Natal and ministered to the spiritual needs of seaman there. During the Boer […]
“As the Deer” was written by Martin J. Nystrom in 1982. The hymn is based on Psalm 42:1, which states, “As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God.” A relatively recent hymn when you consider how long ago some of the most […]
Jamie Owens-Collins has written a song, “The Battle Belongs to the Lord”, that echoes how Israel faced its enemy (2 Chronicles 20) in battle – with divine protection. It reminds us that God, while often mysterious and invisible to us, can still overpower whomever He chooses, by Himself. Jamie Owens-Collins […]