Looking at the schedule for weddings and there's been a request for a hymn that begins: God of all living....

And that's all they've given me. Not even the dot dot dot so I don't know what comes next.
Its not in NMP, A+MR, JP or S of P (1959) and I've just pored through the current Sunday by Sunday and found no sign of it.

Does it ring a bell with anyone here? If so, please tell me which book has it because I'll need to give it a working over before the 28th and besides, I want to know the punchline.

Hello

I dont play the hymn myself so couldn't tell you which book it is in.

However, I can tell you that its a Wedding hymn sung to the tune Bunessan (Morning has Broken).

Here are the words....

God of all living,
Father, we praise you,
Full of Thanksgiving,
For so much love;
Now in this wedding,
Come down among us,
Pour out your blessing,
Heavenly dove.

With love's true slendour,
Father, delight us,
Each giving hourour,
With faithfulness;
And may the sharing,
Of this sweet union
Deepen our caring,
With tenderness.

May there be children,
Fruit of our loving,
True men and women,
With faith beside;
Grant us your keeping
In all our future,
Your love caressing
Bridegroom and bride.

Hope this helps

Organistno1 you come to my rescue yet again, thank you indeed!

There seems to be a cottage industry penning verses to Morning Has Broken, what a relief that it is a familiar tune.
The one we normally have to this melody begins "Vows have been Spoken.."

I can now relax in the knowledge that I don't have to hunt down another book.

Thanks again.

post deleted

Organisto1 beat me to it, but you might find the following link useful.

Link to WeddingGuide UK.com

Two other hymns listed are 'Be Our Chief Guest Lord' and 'Come To A Wedding'.

What's so wrong with the 'proper' hymns in A&MNS.

SB

What's so wrong with the 'proper' hymns in A&MNS.

SB

Nothing wrong with them SB, it's just that in most of the weddings I play for, the vicar and I seem to be the only people in the church who know them.
So, it's either we have five verses of organ and vicar duet, or, let 'em have the simple, pretty wedding stuff (which they don't sing either!).

Of course, back when Noah's dog was a puppy, and we only used A & M Whatevers, every couple chose 'Love Divine', which was only marginally more appropriate than 'Day of Wrath, O Day of Mourning' or 'Fight the Good Fight' would have been

Chris Baker - Durham
The Incompetent Organist

Dear me.
No wonder the author of BOCGL chose to be anonymous.
Must dig out the hip flask.

Are they all... that... sappy?

Can we have a competition to write some more... more... worse?

Or maybe, something suitable and... a bit more grown up... to the tune of MHB?


On the matter of appropriate hymn, my father wanted Onward Christian Soldiers at his wedding. I don't think he even meant it as a joke, it just happened to be his favourite hymn. He got overruled.

Board members will, I am sure, know the hymn 'O Perfect love' which is eminenetly suitable for weddings.

It started life as an anthem by Joseph Barnby, using the familiar tune, but with different music for the middle verse. It is a wonderful anthem for weddings and, with rehearsal, manageable by choirs of moderate ability.

Those fine words also go well, as an hymn, to 'Highwood', the superb and thrilling tune by Richard Runciman Terry. Alas, that fine tune is not well known, though it deserves to be, as do so many of Terry's excellent hymn tunes.

Wedding hymns are currently a real problem to organists and clergy. The problem has arisen because several generations of children have been fed inappropiate material, such as 'Songs of Fellowship', at school and church, instead of hearing and singing material of greater theological and musical worth. The many fine hymns, often paraphrases of psalms or Scripture passages, simply did not get used in schools because teachers tried to be 'trendy'. The result now is a dumbing down in choice by wedding couples.

Of course, the problem goes wider than that, for many of the current clergy have been similarly affected. (Or should I say 'afflicted'?)

Barry Williams

I know you are right Chris, but I just have an intense dislike of the sweet, sticky, guey, sickly artificial music that seems to accompany wedding shows ceremonies these days. Why spoil a good hymn tune with such shallow words?

What's more, it doesn't alter the fact that whilst the music is playing, the divorce lawyers will already be perched high up in the trees outside the church, just waiting to pick up the peices.

I agree with Tamsin that we should have a competition to write something even worse -perhaps so bad that there will be a backlash, and happy couples will revert to proper hymns.

SB

"I agree with Tamsin that we should have a competition to write something even worse"

For a very competent review of rubbish hymnody in general try 'Seriously Silly Hymns' published by The Guild of Church Musicians.

This is a scholarly work that pulls no punches and gives a few smiles in the process.

Barry Williams

I think maybe I wrote too soon.

By some kind of miracle of organisation we recieved a hymn book this afternoon, with a list of hymns for the Christingle service.

The hymn book in question, 'Come and Praise', takes some beating when it comes to banal lyrics.

SB

Good grief! Mind if I join you? Notice especially how the ineptness of the punctuation emhasises the ineptness of the match between verse and melody and the ineptness of the whole, well, ineptness of it all.

Yours ineptly...

Things have now gone way beyond that. I really believe that most children nowadays don't get to hear hymns at all. How many schools, other than, avowedly Christian ones, now have an assembly that ever features Christian hymns? I don't think many down here do. Religious programmes on TV and radio seem mostly to get switched off very promptly by most people. The majority of people out there today have moved beyond viewing Christianity as an important part of our heritage and culture which they have chosen to reject. Rather it has now become just a peripheral curiosity which is completely irrelevant in the real world. Whether a wedding congregation actually knows a hymn tune has little to do with it: most would stay tight-lipped anyway on a matter of principle. In recent years I have played for a couple of Remembrance day services attended by forces personnel, where one of the hymns has been "God is our strength and refuge" ssung to the Dambuster's March. I very much doubt there is anyone in the country who doesn't know this tune, but did they sing? Did they, ######!

I think that perhaps the mistake here is one of confusing 'the church' with 'Christianity'.

At one time these terms were synonymous, and Clergy were called to serve God and His people.

Sadly, we now seem to have lost that connection. I don't know what they teach in Theological College these days, but many modern Clergy seem to feel they are there to be served, whilst the politics in too many churches is distinctly un-Christian.

Some people have been hurt by this, and consequently tend to stay away, apart from weddings, baptisms, funerals and perhaps major feast days. Many many more people see this behaviour as an excuse for staying away; and frankly, who can blame them?

At a recent PCC meeting we discussed organising a parish review (to see how people felt about the church and parish), and finance. When it was pointed out that there was no point in holding a review unless we planned to listen to what people said, the response was 'just as long as people don't expect home visits from the clergy'.

On the subject of finance, the person who has done most to empty the church said that people needed to give more so that the work of the church can continue.

Need I go on?

What is needed is some kind of revolution where the church is reclaimed by ordinary Christian folk to worship God in proper English, and using proper music; rather than bowing to the PC brigade who want everything dumbed down into words of a single syllable and three chords on a guitar.

SB

Perhaps just a touch of unfounded spiritual arrogance!! I only wish schools did sing more from the likes of 'Songs of Fellowship' instead of the naff, pc stuff that most are singing - I think you'll find that's where the problem lies, Barry!

Oh dear! You mean there is worse than 'Songs of Fellowship'?

I have only come across one item worse and that was entitled !If I were a pussy cat" with the next verse !If I were a butterfly".

Perhaps I have been shielded from the real world.

Barry Williams

Perhaps!

It rather makes you wonder why they bother to attend at all. It seems nowadays that even the parents and grandparents of some wedding couples are at a loss with hymns and we finish up playing solo apart from (what remains of) the choir and the verger.
My own children, now in their 20s did have assemblies with hymns but I don't think it was every day and I don't know which books they used.

I will happily play any reasonable hymn, no matter how cheesy, if it is truly what the couple would like- but I am rarely asked along to offer alternatives because it takes too long.

In the best spirit of I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue, I was all set to start the ball rolling for a communal Organ Forum cheesy hymn, any contributor who cares to adding a line to what has gone before - all to Bunessan- but I can't think of a suitable first line. Any latent librettists out there?

Not quite what you want but there are some really bad ones here:
http://forum.ship-of-fools.com/cgi-bin/ult...c;f=11;t=000056

Oh dear Mel, I do so wish you hadn't asked.

If we are thinking of modern weddings how about ...... (to Bunessan)

Dearly beloved,
gathered together,
bride's in the puddy club,
no-one may'st care,
dad's at the lych gate,
loading his shot-gun,
groom's in the lounge bar,
drowning his woes.

Anyone for a second verse?

OK, I think I had better get my coat and go.

SB

I find the references to fuzzy wuzzy hair in the great big bear verse particularly offensive. I know the mop on top is usually a mess, and don't need to be reminded, thank you very much!

As for inappropriate wedding hymns, I put my foot down at my mother's suggestion of All Things Bright and Beautiful

Let us not forget 'As the Deer Pants for the Water'.

Always sounds like a love song gone wrong to me.

SB

No, SB that doesn't count because it is not at all cheesy - it's excellent and I'd far rather sing that than some of the dire choruses quoted in the ship of fools link provided by vectistim. (Must go back to that and read it to the end.)

You could have started something here- but it is a formidable beginning!

I'd be a birdie
Seeking the sunshine
Of the Lord's heaven;
That's where it's at.
But I'm in Britain,
So I'm a kitten
Eating and growing
Into a cat.

I am still working on 'Cheesy'. Will try to get something dwn when I'm on the train later today.

SB

I wonder if any of the staff from Kevin Mayhew are reading this thread, Vox. If so, you might be in line for some royalties....

haha. But don't expect to see it without typos ...

Shirley not!

I am a sinner
Longing for dinner
Eat the Lords bread
His blood was shed
Now I am wash-ed
And I am bless-ed
Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh,
Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh.

Not sure if it fits, ran out of ideas, but hey that's where it's at - isn't that what all the best do?

Shriven, forgiven,
Watered and fed.

Sorry, margaret - irresistable urge to finish off the unfinished!

very neat Mel2!

Yes, I like it! However, we'll have to sing a whole verse of ooh, oohs, otherwise we'll feel like we're missing out on ooh-ing!

We had Come and Praise at Primary school for assemblies. Once I got to secondary, the assemblies were strictly secular except when the ... I can't remember what they were called now, but basically they were a group that did Christian themed drama and missionary talks about once every few months. I remember having to sing "The wise man built his house upon the rocks" with them once when at Primary.

I don't remember Come and Praise being that bad. Certainly it never made me burst into giggles mid-hymn, which happens to me a lot during my rare visits to Church these days. I don't set out to scandalise congregations, honest, but there is so much to amuse in modern churches...

I'll see if I can come up with some cheesy hymn lyrics, but I genuinely think I'd struggle to do worse that some of what I've encountered...

This has to be the best one:

Oh, it's great, great, brill, brill,
wicked, wicked, skill, skill.
To have a friend like Jesus
Oh, it's great, great, brill, brill,
wicked, wicked, skill, skill.
To have a friend like Him


Edit: Having said that this (http://creativerush.blogspot.com/2009/09/very-funny-song.html) seems to be even better/worse:

I am the APPLE of God's eye,
His BANANA over me is love.
He ORANGES His angels to look after me,
As His blessings PLUM-met from above.

Never have to play the GOOSEBERRY,
Feel like a LEMON, no not me.
For wherever this MAN-GOES,
A RASPBERRY it never blows.

The GREAT FRUIT of God,
The GREAT FRUIT of God,
The GREAT FRUIT of God it overflows.
(Repeat)

I will praise Him on the TANGERINE,
Praise Him on the MANDARIN;
SATSUMA or later you will see
There is always a CLEMENTINE for praising Him.

^^^


I've come over a little faint......need a lie down, I think.

This is taking things too far. If this is meant for children then there is a whole load of faulty theology in there that they are going to have to unlearn, always supposing it doesn't alienate them in the first instance.
That is why I had to give up teaching in Sunday School. For the sake of simplification I was having to impart stuff that I knew full well was complete tosh and would have to be qualified in later years.
The truth is that when they hit the age of (some sort of) reason then they feel insulted and patronised and you never see them again until their wedding, when they feel in need of a Rite of Passage of some sort.
This sort of song needs a health warning with it - only sing it around campfires or sandwiched between something better.

Ok, here's another fruity number (real):-

I'm a peach of a christian
I'm the apple of his eye
He prunes back the branches
When the branches get too high
He loads the fruit in season
And his love will never die
And that's why I'm bananas for the Lord

Glory, Glory we're the branches etc.

OK, I said I would try to come up with something cheesy.

(To the tune of Bunesan again)

Oh my dear sweet-heart,
standing before me,
golden brown hair,
and sparkling blue eyes,
I want to hold you,
I want to love you,
Now and forever,
till I die.

But there’s a problem,
I haven’t told you,
Derek my best man,
he loves me too,
he wants to hold me,
now and forever,
coming out,
he wants us to.

I shall now go and stand in the naughty corner for an hour (with a beer).

SB

I really, really hope no-one from Kevin Mayhews is reading this thread. Any publisher which could include "God Made a Boomerang (And Called It Love)" in a hymnbook could well decide to take any of these tongue-in-cheek offerings seriously... and I don't think I could cope if they turned up in the next version of our hymnal As it is I need a shot of botox before singing the last verse of "Boomerang" if I'm not to end up in awful giggling fits...

And that's exactly what you did. I've been trying and not getting far....

The peach of a christian one to (I presume) the Battle Hymn of the Republic would take a fair bit of work to pull off. I have observed elsewhere that some of these things are a brute to play on an organ and that one is a particular stinker.

I hope KM are not listening in for all sorts of reasons; (am still not sure if vectistim's was a wind up) there ought to be some sort of censor at work.

I've just thought of another thread!

Certainly the 'great great brill brill wicked wicked skill skill' one is real - I've seen it in a supplement from one of those trendy teenage retreat/jamboree things.

Edit: (Spring harvest?)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBj9_PVgYQQ...feature=related