This Christmas, for most of the U.S. (and it sounds like most of Europe as well), it was absurd to be singing about snow. There was a high temperature of nearly 70˚F in New York City! The climate is changing, and so let's focus for a moment on those carols that are particularly well-suited to warming weather.
- "Snow" is a problem: Let's start with the fact that many of our stalwart hymns do not contain references to the white stuff. "Once in royal David's city", "O come, all ye faithful", and "Hark! the herald angels sing", these are all safe. But there are some carols that should be chosen with care (and not in an El Niño year!). Chiefly:
- The first Nowell - with the line "on a cold winter's night that was so deep" is probably first in line for the rubbish heap. Once it's there, let's set it alight whether we need the warmth or not. With the it's repetitive form (each stanza is essentially the same melody three times), one sings the same cloying tune a mere 18 times in the course of this carol. Enough is enough.
- The snow lay on the ground - Let's be honest, is this carol even about Jesus, or is it about weather?
- In the bleak midwinter - This carol, with it's troublesome lines "snow had fallen, snow on snow,/ snow on snow", needs to be put on ice. Not your finest hour, Christina Rossetti.
- "Winter" is coming - just usually not by Christmas.
- 'Twas in the moon of wintertime - was it though? "When all the birds had fled". Have they? There are plenty of birds here at Christmas. Let's ditch this one too, unless we're at the Canadian latitudes where it was written.
- Sorry Bob Chilcott, I'm not sure winter has "won" anything yet. So I'm not sure how we can justify singing your gorgeous Shepherd's Carol until maybe mid-February at the earliest.
- Sorry John Rutter,
- I don't think "the chilling winter's morn" will arrive in time for your What sweeter music. Maybe we can rewrite the words to "temperate sunny morn", or something.
- And the newer carol All bells in paradise just won't do either. It begins "Deep in the cold of winter".
Now, some carols we could stand a bit more of:
- I saw three ships - This one came especially to mind as the state where I live set a new yearly rainfall record. Jesus and Mary (where's Joseph in this carol, anyway?) don't sled but sail into Bethlehem. With rising sea levels we may need to buy a few more boats. Here's Philip Marshall's arrangement just to "wet" (ha ha) your appetite.
Sed Angli points out that Wells Cathedral sang this carol twice on Christmas Day. They're on the right track! (Let's just agree to call it "I saw six ships").
- O holy night - no one can argue that it's night. It's just not very cold. And I secretly love this carol, just not when sung atrociously.
- There is a flower - with its beautiful spring-like imagery, this is perfect for a warming climate. It's become very popular at Advent. We should sing it more at Christmastide.
- There is no rose - here is a rarity: a non-weather-reliant flower carol. And the ending macaronic latin words are lovely.
The close flower contenders: One might be tempted by "Lo, how a Rose e'er blooming", but with the line "amid the cold of winter" the effect is lost. "A tender shoot" suffers from the same problem ("cold bleak winter"). And, heartbreakingly, "A spotless rose" is out ("amid the winter cold" -- twice!). We get it! It's amazing when flowers bloom in the cold. Well, guess what? It's not so amazing any more - BECAUSE IT'S NOT COLD AND IT NEVER WILL BE AGAIN! Where did that White Witch of Narnia go when you need her?
- Tomorrow shall be my dancing day - Since the weather's nice, why not dance outside?
Labels: Christmas, weather, Wells Cathedral
We have noted previously on the blog (see flower - summer's) the seldom sung stanza of "Praise, my soul, the King of heaven", that marvelous paraphrase of Psalm 103.
Wikipedia tangent: By the way, did you know that "Praise, my soul, the King of heaven" has its own Wikipedia article? How many other hymns have this distinction? This is a notable hymn, apparently, having been sung at "the 1947 royal wedding of Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh." One assumes that the stanza in question was included then.
The time has come to actually sing this, I think. It's about that time of year, of course, the autumnal equinox falling on Tuesday, September 23 this year.
We're editing that Hallelujah to "Alleluia" so that it matches the Hymnal 1982.
The stanza serves the hymn, we think, with only a little kink in the syllabification being the line that begins "Our God . . ." That "Our" gets a little too much emphasis for our taste.
There are also musical/choral reasons for singing it.
John Goss's setting provides
- organ accompaniment for unison singing, intended for the first stanza
- Four parts
- A (softer) organ accompaniment for unison singing of treble voices (st. 3 in the Hymnal 1982, but note that Goss's indication for trebles is not included).
- A different accompaniment for unison singing for the final stanza.
Singing the "Frail as summer's" stanza as st. 4 allows the replication of the four part version of the harmony, which adds a very nice symmetry to the hymn, we find.
But this stanza is not included in any hymnals that we can find. Do you know of one that uses it?
Frail as summer’s flower we flourish,
Blows the wind and it is gone;
But while mortals rise and perish
Our God lives unchanging on,
Praise Him, Praise Him, Hallelujah
Praise the High Eternal One!
Henry F. Lyte
Labels: Goss, Henry Francis Lyte, Hymnal 1982, hymns, Psalms, weather
You've just missed the annual commemoration of the "Ice Saints". These three saints are commemorated on successive days in May, and after which time, you can safely expect that there will not be another frost. No more ice. (But there is often a cold snap around this time of May, isn't there? How delightfully folkloric.)
- St. Mamertus, May 11
- St. Pancras, May 12
- St. Servatius, May 13
- St. Boniface, May 14
Please note that different localities have different groupings of Ice Saints.
The Episcopal church commemoration of Boniface confuses things (he is June 5). The other Ice Saints are not commemorated in the calendar, nor are there any commemorations May 11-14.
The BBC Evensong broadcast typically does celebrate one of the Ice Saints, with the annual broadcast of Evensong from St. Pancras Church, as part of the London Festival of Contemporary Church Music.
This year's broadcast is now available for listening online (or will be shortly after this post), and will remain available for the next week.
Labels: Evensong, saints, St. Pancras (London), weather
Given the weather in much of the country today, and the massive snow fall in the Hoosier heartland, the line "snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow" seems appropriate.
Bonus: Good King Wenceslas sung by the Choir of York Minster.
Labels: 12 Days of YouTube, Darke, King's College (Cambridge), St Stephen, weather, York Minster
One year ago (28 Jan 2009) 12 inches of snow fell and I live-blogged a triple chant.
One year later, I can hear the chant and remember how much fun shoveling the driveway was. I also have a composer to go with that delightful triple chant: Jonathan Bielby.
It's sung on this webcast
Labels: Anglican chant, St Thomas (New York), weather
All Starbucks stores (even those in close proximity to Episcopal cathedrals) were closed for several hours yesterday for some training. Here's an excerpt from an article about the closure in the Houston Chronicle
Luong is a regular at the Starbucks at Westheimer and Post Oak Boulevard, and employees had warned him about the closure. But 45 minutes after they locked the doors, he still was shivering outside, hanging out with a dozen other people who consider the coffee shop their second home.Claudia Feldman and Jeannie Kever. "Starbucks' break brews frustration" Houston Chronicle 27 Feb 2008, emphasis added
I just want to point out that it was 60 degrees Fahrenheit (16 Celcius) in Houston when Starbucks closed yesterday.
Brrr!
Elsewhere in Houston, for those who may be unfamiliar with the distribution of Starbucks stores in the city, are two stores located across the street from each other. I visited both on Christmas Day, 2007. One was closed.
At evensong tonight for the Feast of St. Luke we sang Psalm 67.
I'm not sure why we sang 67, but that doesn't metter much to this story. Actually, it makes this story much less effective. It's just that 67 isn't listed in my prayer book, so I'm just not sure where it came from. It is associated with evensong in the 1928 prayer book in as far as it is an alternate to the Nunc after the second lesson.
Anyway, Psalm 67 is also being sung at my wedding, so for me it was a Lukan Psalm convergence at my last evensong as an unmarried man tonight.
May God be merciful to us and bless us, *
how us the light of his countenance and come to us.
Let your ways be known upon earth, *
your saving health among all nations.
Let the peoples praise you, O God; *
let all the peoples praise you.
Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, *
for you judge the peoples with equity
and guide all the nations upon earth.
Let the peoples praise you, O God; *
let all the peoples praise you.
The earth has brought forth her increase; *
may God, our own God, give us his blessing.
May God give us his blessing, *
and may all the ends of the earth stand in awe of him.
p.s. It's windy outside. It'll be 78º on Sunday.
I got caught in a very small isolated storm system this evening. I was impressed both by its power and by its small size when I scoped it out on the radar at home.
Sunday's forecast seems unchanged.
I've always thought that my own wedding will be one of the easiest weddings I ever do. And this is true of the service (I think), but not of the preparation.
And so begins the storm before the calm.
Looks like a strong storm system will pass through our part of the Midwest on Thursday, but forecast highs for Sunday are up to 78º and sunny. I've even seen one forecast with the high up to 81.
Gee golly.
The projected high is up to 74º the low, 54º.
What was previously a 60% of rain has diminished to 20%.
There seems to be a superstition that precipitation, particularly rain, upon one's wedding day is bad luck. But if you think about how seldom it rains compared to when it does not, it is actually more rare to have rain during one's wedding. Even more so during the wedding liturgy itself (while this understandably could be less than desireable if a couple has elected to hold their wedding outdoors).
Here's hoping.
13 Feb 2007 16:16 The public radio station just turned back on. Sleet continues. Water droplets seem to be frozen to the window. The Winter Storm Warning, while still in effect, is not being updated. The short term forecast published four minutes ago offers this:
THE SLEET...MIXED AT TIMES WITH SNOW WILL CHANGE TO ALL SNOW LATE THIS AFTERNOON AND EARLY EVENING. ADDITIONAL SNOWFALL AND SLEET ACCUMULATIONS OF TWO TO FOUR INCHES ARE POSSIBLE THIS EVENING. BLOWING AND DRIFTING SNOW WILL BEGIN TO OCCUR...RESULTING IN WHITEOUT CONDITIONS. WINDS ARE EXPECTED TO INCREASE TO 20 TO 30 MPH WITH GUSTS TO 40 MPH. MOTORISTS SHOULD BE EXTREMELY CAREFUL AND NOT VENTURE OUT IF AT ALL POSSIBLE.
13 Feb 2007 15:46 I just noticed the public radio station is off the air. Either that, or it's some extended piece of musique concrète that I was unaware of.
13 Feb 2007 15:14 It's wet and slushy here. The preciptation goes in and out of an icy rain and something harder. Temperature is starting to fall below freezing, so things may ice up substantially in the next few hours. The trees have been coated with ice most of the day.
By the sound of things, emergency vehicles have been very busy in my area. The big airport stopped letting flights depart about three hours ago.
13 Feb 2007 06:49 I have been asked by my employer not to attempt to come into work.
12 Feb 2007 23:35 All is quiet under a sheen of new wet snow. The air hovers just above freezing. Right now, I am on the dividing line. The National Weather Service is predicting snow to the north (which is where I am potentially headed tomorrow, as travel is forecast to be "very hazardous to impossible") and nasty stuff to the south. But:
ANY SHIFT IN THE TRACK WILL HAVE A LARGE IMPACT ON THE AMOUNT AND TYPE OF PRECIPITATION RECEIVED ACROSS [THE AREA]. WE URGE EVERYONE TO MONITOR THE LATEST FORECASTS ON THIS DEVELOPING WINTER STORM.
12 Feb 2007 20:55 And so it begins. Some freezing rain is brushing against my window.
An exerpt from the text of the warning:
A MIX OF SNOW AND SLEET WILL FALL OVERNIGHT TONIGHT, WHILE A MIX OF RAIN...FREEZING RAIN...AND SNOW WILL FALL AT TIMES DURING THE DAY ON TUESDAY. SNOW WILL DIMINISH TUESDAY NIGHT...BUT GUSTY WINDS WILL CAUSE BLOWING OF ANY SNOW THAT FALLS. THE POTENTIAL EXISTS OF OVER A QUARTER OF AN INCH OF ICE TO FORM FROM THE FREEZING RAIN DURING THE DAY ON TUESDAY. THIS COMBINED WITH THE EXPECTED WINDS COULD CAUSE DAMAGE TO TREES AND POWER LINES.
Labels: weather
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