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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Crappy Choruses & Horrible Hymns redux
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Mockingale
Shipmate
# 16599
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
Except for one thing: it rightly shows "saints" as ordinary Christians doing ordinary things. And there are very few other hymns that do that.
I'd like to think there's at least one that's not a cloying 1930s English Sunday School sing-along.
Posts: 679 | From: Connectilando | Registered: Aug 2011
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
You could try writing one, or adapting Ms Scott's.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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Mockingale
Shipmate
# 16599
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Albertus:
You could try writing one, or adapting Ms Scott's.
If I had any song-writing skills I would. I'm sure that Lesbia Scott meant well, and it's a fine song for five-year-old children to sing (they are probably its originally intended audience). But much like "Jesus Loves Me This I know" or "Jesus Loves the Little Children," it holds little appeal to me as an adult.
My objection isn't really to its existence as a song, but to its inclusion in the Episcopal Hymnal 1984, where music directors might feel at liberty to program it as a song for worship services that involve adults.
Posts: 679 | From: Connectilando | Registered: Aug 2011
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Chorister
Completely Frocked
# 473
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Posted
Once a year, on Education Sunday, all the choirs from the local schools get invited to church and sing all these songs in one go. You are all invited (next service this Sunday, 9.45am) to come along and sing your little hearts out. You know all the words now, they're all on this thread if you need reminding. A whole hour of CC&HH fun!
And boy, will you need the coffee afterwards. With an extra shot of morphine, no doubt (BYO).
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Retired, sitting back and watching others for a change.
Posts: 34626 | From: Cream Tealand | Registered: Jun 2001
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Offeiriad
Ship's Arboriculturalist
# 14031
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mockingale:
quote:
Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
Except for one thing: it rightly shows "saints" as ordinary Christians doing ordinary things. And there are very few other hymns that do that.
I'd like to think there's at least one that's not a cloying 1930s English Sunday School sing-along.
I'm fond of the newish hymn from the A & M stable:
'Rejoice in God's saints'
Posts: 1426 | From: La France profonde | Registered: Aug 2008
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Offeiriad
Ship's Arboriculturalist
# 14031
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Posted
...oh, by the way...
sorry, I'm too lazy/busy to read through all 35 pages, please can anybody point me to the website mentioned somewhere which has a number of excellent parodies of main-line hymns? I saw this a few years ago, and especially enjoyed a good one on the subject of Christian Stewardship. I'd love to rediscover this website if anybody can tell me where to find it. Thanks.
Posts: 1426 | From: La France profonde | Registered: Aug 2008
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Mockingale
Shipmate
# 16599
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Chorister:
Once a year, on Education Sunday, all the choirs from the local schools get invited to church and sing all these songs in one go. You are all invited (next service this Sunday, 9.45am) to come along and sing your little hearts out. You know all the words now, they're all on this thread if you need reminding. A whole hour of CC&HH fun!
And boy, will you need the coffee afterwards. With an extra shot of morphine, no doubt (BYO).
If it's all the same to you, I think I'd rather eat bees.
Posts: 679 | From: Connectilando | Registered: Aug 2011
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Offeiriad
Ship's Arboriculturalist
# 14031
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Posted
Thank you, HB, you are a stout fellow!
(PC translation = you are kind and good to supply this information: I infer no judgement of your height/weight ratio)
Posts: 1426 | From: La France profonde | Registered: Aug 2008
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Chorister
Completely Frocked
# 473
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Posted
We sang a song tonight (in preparation for Education Sunday) called 'We are climbing Jesus's Ladder'. WTF? Jesus didn't have a ladder - it was Jacob. I've heard of changing words to make things clearer, but this is just daft. What do they teach them these days? ![[Confused]](confused.gif)
Vewy vewy quietly, just so only the people either side of me could hear, I sang 'In my tights there is a ladder, ladder', which made more sense than the printed words in front of me.
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Retired, sitting back and watching others for a change.
Posts: 34626 | From: Cream Tealand | Registered: Jun 2001
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Penny S
Shipmate
# 14768
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Posted
Chorister, you have just supplied me with today's earworm - I might even remember the actions! (We did sing Jacob's ladder, though, I think.
I have to own, I used to like that saint one. Oh dear. Though the line "and one was slain by a fierce wild beast" might not encourage emulation. And there are comparitively few females.
Penny
Posts: 5833 | Registered: May 2009
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pererin
Shipmate
# 16956
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Posted
Well, I've now read through all 35 pages of this, which clearly is much more of an achievement than the noobs who read through it when it was only 23 pages long. ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
And I agree with many of the nominations of dreary, languishing stuff, and also the sort of music that would almost be a human rights violation to inflict on people using lifts (yes, I do mean the Shepherd's Pipe Carol).
As I've mentioned elsewhere, I find worshipping in Welsh helps avoid a lot of the bad material, as it usually means that someone will have to go to the trouble of translating it; but of course when they actually do, that makes it all the worse, so I wish to nominate "Seek ye first the kingdom of God" and "Father, I adore you" as horrible hymns, because their perniciousness has stretched to translation.
But I must admit that Hatherop Castle (O Jesus, I have promised) is a particular guilty pleasure of mine.
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"They go to and fro in the evening, they grin like a dog, and run about through the city." (Psalm 59.6)
Posts: 446 | From: Llantrisant | Registered: Feb 2012
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Theophania
Shipmate
# 16647
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Posted
Is there nothing terrible written in Welsh?
That is clearly a gap in the market and you should write some. Have proper original appalling lyrics, rather than having to put up with translations from appalling English ones! ![[Devil]](graemlins/devil.gif)
Posts: 78 | Registered: Sep 2011
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Baptist Trainfan
Shipmate
# 15128
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Posted
Perhaps some of the songs have been improved in the translation?
Posts: 9750 | From: The other side of the Severn | Registered: Sep 2009
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pererin
Shipmate
# 16956
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Theophania:
Is there nothing terrible written in Welsh?
Oh of course there is. There's some piece of doggerel about one of the Welsh saints that includes something about "ffurfafen Eglwys Gymru" — the Church of Wales' firmament — I mean, renaming the Church is fine, as it's what it gets called half the time anyway, but I was not aware that amongst its glories was its own sky.
quote:
Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
Perhaps some of the songs have been improved in the translation?
Definitely. The "holy Church as his creation and her teaching as his own" bit of "Firmly I believe and truly" (which I suspect I am far from alone in feeling more than a little bit uncomfortable about!) becomes "geiriau ei hathrawiaeth iachus ddwg im genadwri'r nef" — the words of her wholesome teaching will bring me to the mission of heaven.
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"They go to and fro in the evening, they grin like a dog, and run about through the city." (Psalm 59.6)
Posts: 446 | From: Llantrisant | Registered: Feb 2012
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Offeiriad
Ship's Arboriculturalist
# 14031
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Posted
I can think of a few other horrors in Welsh, although the actual texts are now in my Reserve Library (or, as my OH prefers to call it, 'under the bed'). I only discovered too late (in the middle of the service...) that there were two translations of Shine, Jesus, shine in circulation, only one of which was actually singable to the music... ![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
In terms of home grown bilge, I went to one parish and found a box of incense dating from before the (Great!) War - the Archdeacon advised that Bomb Disposal didn't need to be called, but that burning it would probably be a bad idea.
In the same parish I found an equally smelly ancient Welsh hymnbook still in use. This was one of those Victorian jobs offering a text for every possible liturgical and pastoral occasion. My favourite was one headed 'on the death of the Vicar' (no, NOT for the death of the Vicar..), a piece of purple prose about (God's) 'servant's lamp being taken from the lampstand'.
I took care to avoid giving them opportunity to sing it, but I confess I did nick a copy for future amusement when I moved on from there... ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
Posts: 1426 | From: La France profonde | Registered: Aug 2008
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ThunderBunk
Stone cold idiot
# 15579
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by pererin:
The "holy Church as his creation and her teaching as his own" bit of "Firmly I believe and truly" (which I suspect I am far from alone in feeling more than a little bit uncomfortable about!)
Translating the whole thing into Welsh is not strictly necessary at that point; my own solution is simply to change the gender of the last pronoun, which neatly expresses my own position on the point, namely that, quite a lot of the time, the church makes it up as it/she goes along.
[ 25. February 2012, 07:35: Message edited by: FooloftheShip ]
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Currently mostly furious, and occasionally foolish. Normal service may resume eventually. Or it may not. And remember children, "feiern ist wichtig".
Foolish, potentially deranged witterings
Posts: 2208 | From: Norwich | Registered: Apr 2010
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busyknitter
Shipmate
# 2501
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Posted
Hello Gamaliel, I would actually quite like to know why you hate The Greatest Day in History so much. Is it an aversion to modern choruses in general, in which case, each to his own? Or is there something in particular about this one that riles you so?
Posts: 903 | From: The Wool Basket | Registered: Mar 2002
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Jengie jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
Also Gamaliel you need to be aware that the modern version is badly bowdlerised. For starters the chorus ain't by Dodderidge at all. If you want to see what the original was like you need to get hold of Congregational Praise (I don't have a copy and it is way out of print but I know it is in there as I got caught out*). I am not sure how much change there is to the verses but I have had to talk my father down. Its as bad as the stuff done to some of Wesley's hymns.
Jengie
*United Reformed churches always sing the words they know not those in the hymn book or on the overhead projector. So without annoucement I was faced with verses only and no chorus while the people around me happily sung a chorus.
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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge
Back to my blog
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Snags
Utterly socially unrealistic
# 15351
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Posted
Am I going blind, or has the Gamaliel/Greatest Day thing come in from somewhere else?
I know some of the older people at our shack get all twitchy about it because they see it as a re-working of the much older gospel "Oh happy day, when Jesus washed my sins away", but AFAICT it's a totally different song. I certainly treat it as such. And as an up tempo, modern, celebratory song it works well, as long as you have a half-decent band to belt it out, and you transpose it down to a key that people who aren't Tim Hughes can sing it in.
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Vain witterings :-: Vain pretentions :-: The Dog's Blog(locks)
Posts: 1399 | From: just north of That London | Registered: Dec 2009
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Gracious rebel
Rainbow warrior
# 3523
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Snags:
Am I going blind, or has the Gamaliel/Greatest Day thing come in from somewhere else?
Yes, see here. Seasick made a hostly request for the tangent to come onto this thread.
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Fancy a break beside the sea in Suffolk? Visit my website
Posts: 4413 | From: Suffolk UK | Registered: Nov 2002
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Ramarius
Shipmate
# 16551
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Posted
Greatest Day's a cracker. Shows how traditional ideas can inspire contemporary creativity.
Posts: 950 | From: Virtually anywhere | Registered: Jul 2011
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Edith
Shipmate
# 16978
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Posted
The one I remember as being the very worst seems to have been slightly modified in recent years. It's called:
Oh come and mourn with me awhile
It has a terrible verse about sitting under the cross while
'The blood falls gently on me
Drop by drop'
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Edith
Posts: 256 | From: UK | Registered: Mar 2012
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Edith
Shipmate
# 16978
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Posted
My friend just reminded me about the hymn to Mary which contains the deathless lines:
The sun is shining brightly
And all the world is gay
For 'tis the month of Mary
The loveerlee month of May.
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Edith
Posts: 256 | From: UK | Registered: Mar 2012
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Edith:
The one I remember as being the very worst seems to have been slightly modified in recent years. It's called:
Oh come and mourn with me awhile
It has a terrible verse about sitting under the cross while
'The blood falls gently on me
Drop by drop'
Reminds me of John Betjeman's An Eighteenth Century Calvinistic Hymn - which was at least meant as a parody!
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My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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Edith
Shipmate
# 16978
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Posted
I think this one was by Father Faber. He wrote heaps and seemed to be obsessed by blood and suffering.
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Edith
Posts: 256 | From: UK | Registered: Mar 2012
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
Indeed, tho' to be fair, and to his great credit, he did also write There's a Wideness in God's Mercy
[ 16. April 2012, 13:50: Message edited by: Albertus ]
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My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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Dennis the Menace
Shipmate
# 11833
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Posted
Today we sang that dreadful chorus "Take Me Jesus, I can come no other way". Was made even more dire as I had to play it!! Nice tune though.
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"Till we cast our crowns before Him; Lost in wonder, love, and praise."
Posts: 853 | From: Newcastle NSW Australia | Registered: Sep 2006
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Edith
Shipmate
# 16978
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Posted
I've never heard of that one. Amazing. Please type out the chorus, it must rival the 'all the world is gay' one I mentioned above.
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Edith
Posts: 256 | From: UK | Registered: Mar 2012
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Dennis the Menace
Shipmate
# 11833
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Edith:
I've never heard of that one. Amazing. Please type out the chorus, it must rival the 'all the world is gay' one I mentioned above.
Jesus take me as I am
I can come no other way
Take me deeper into You
Kame my flesh melt away.....etc
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"Till we cast our crowns before Him; Lost in wonder, love, and praise."
Posts: 853 | From: Newcastle NSW Australia | Registered: Sep 2006
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Edith
Shipmate
# 16978
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Posted
Wow! That's impressive. I thought I'd heard some amazing lines in my time but that tops the lot!
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Edith
Posts: 256 | From: UK | Registered: Mar 2012
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Snags
Utterly socially unrealistic
# 15351
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Posted
Oi! I have a soft spot for that song (no sniggering at the back).
Admittedly:
- one has to turn the gain right down on the smut channel
- it should never, ever, ever be played on the organ (I heard that! I said no sniggering!)
However, used in the right context and with the right instrumentation, it can be a very effective, prayerful little song. Even if I do have to chant "To the pure all things are pure" for 20 minutes first.
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Vain witterings :-: Vain pretentions :-: The Dog's Blog(locks)
Posts: 1399 | From: just north of That London | Registered: Dec 2009
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Aravis
Shipmate
# 13824
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Posted
I've just discovered the joys of the "in Memoriam" column in the local paper. Maybe some of the "poems" it contains should be set to music??
My favourite lines last week were from a memorial poem for the person's deceased mother's birthday:
"Look out for Jesus,
He's coming soon,
With all our best wishes
And a big bunch of balloons"
Posts: 689 | From: S Wales | Registered: Jun 2008
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Edith
Shipmate
# 16978
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Posted
We had another of Fr Faber's best last Sunday
Oh purest of creatures...
V 5 is really dreadful.
What made him so obsessed
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Edith
Posts: 256 | From: UK | Registered: Mar 2012
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Pigwidgeon
Ship's Owl
# 10192
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Edith:
We had another of Fr Faber's best last Sunday
Oh purest of creatures...
V 5 is really dreadful.
What made him so obsessed
Can you provide a link? I'd hate to miss out on something so dreadful.
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"...that is generally a matter for Pigwidgeon, several other consenting adults, a bottle of cheap Gin and the odd giraffe."
~Tortuf
Posts: 9835 | From: Hogwarts | Registered: Aug 2005
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Edith
Shipmate
# 16978
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Posted
I'm afraid I'm ICT challenged but if you type in eHymnBooks.org on google you can type in the first line and it will give you the full text.
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Edith
Posts: 256 | From: UK | Registered: Mar 2012
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Offeiriad
Ship's Arboriculturalist
# 14031
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Posted
Please tell me my eyes are deceiving me. There can't really be a book out there called The Children's Hymnal and Sodality Manual ? ![[Killing me]](graemlins/killingme.gif)
Posts: 1426 | From: La France profonde | Registered: Aug 2008
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Japes
Shipmate
# 5358
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Posted
Apparently so...
Though, possibly as it was published in 1869, maybe not in current use.
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Blog may or may not be of any interest.
Posts: 2013 | From: Somewhere in the middle | Registered: Dec 2003
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Offeiriad
Ship's Arboriculturalist
# 14031
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Posted
I really don't think this is the worst Marian hymn I've seen, sorry!
The worst I've ever sung is thankfully nowhere on the web as far as I can tell. The first verse if I recall begins Mother Eve was walking in the garden, so they say, and the unforgettable chorus (I only heard it once when I was 17, and it has haunted me ever since) begins
You are my Star, my Star of the Sea,
over the ocean beckon to me.....
If I ever find a copy I'll post it, promise. Then I'll burn it. Even if it isn't mine....
Posts: 1426 | From: La France profonde | Registered: Aug 2008
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Edith
Shipmate
# 16978
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Posted
That sounds a bit like Hail Queen of Heaven only worse.
I remember my father telling me that many years ago, in the 50s I think, there was a visit to the parish by the bishop. The choir began to sing the above mentioned hymn (it was May, after all) and his Lordship stopped mid aisle and said 'I am the the Lord Bishop of Nottingham, not the Queen of Heaven'.
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Edith
Posts: 256 | From: UK | Registered: Mar 2012
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Chorister
Completely Frocked
# 473
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Posted
That reminds me of when we processed out of the vestry to the opening hymn, 'Who are these like stars appearing'.
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Retired, sitting back and watching others for a change.
Posts: 34626 | From: Cream Tealand | Registered: Jun 2001
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Oferyas:
I really don't think this is the worst Marian hymn I've seen, sorry!
The worst I've ever sung is thankfully nowhere on the web as far as I can tell. The first verse if I recall begins Mother Eve was walking in the garden, so they say, and the unforgettable chorus (I only heard it once when I was 17, and it has haunted me ever since) begins
You are my Star, my Star of the Sea,
over the ocean beckon to me.....
If I ever find a copy I'll post it, promise. Then I'll burn it. Even if it isn't mine....
Just reading those words brings to mind guitars and jumpers and Scouse or Mancunian accents and the Mass setting they seem to use at my brother's (RC) parish church which I always think of as 'The Spinners in C'.
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My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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Mark Betts
Ship's Navigation Light
# 17074
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Posted
In the C of E in the town where I was born they sing something like:
- God Rules, OK!
No other Gods, no way!
He is the Boss, He is the King!
He is the Lord of Everything!
Even a google search couldn't find this song (can't think why!)
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"We are not some casual and meaningless product of evolution. Each of us is the result of a thought of God. Each of us is willed, each of us is loved, each of us is necessary."
Posts: 2080 | From: Leicester | Registered: Apr 2012
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Helen-Eva
Shipmate
# 15025
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Albertus:
Indeed, tho' to be fair, and to his great credit, he did also write There's a Wideness in God's Mercy
To me that hymn will always be "There's a Wideness in God's Trousers". Probably just me.
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I thought the radio 3 announcer said "Weber" but it turned out to be Webern. Story of my life.
Posts: 637 | From: London, hopefully in a theatre or concert hall, more likely at work | Registered: Aug 2009
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Stejjie
Shipmate
# 13941
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Aravis:
I've just discovered the joys of the "in Memoriam" column in the local paper. Maybe some of the "poems" it contains should be set to music??
My favourite lines last week were from a memorial poem for the person's deceased mother's birthday:
"Look out for Jesus,
He's coming soon,
With all our best wishes
And a big bunch of balloons"
Lo, the Lord shall come in triumph and glory upon the earth. And He shall stand before all peoples of the earth and shall say:
"Behold, I have come to bring the Kingdom to completion and to complete the New Creation! All things are made new! And I've brought balloons!"
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A not particularly-alt-worshippy, fairly mainstream, mildly evangelical, vaguely post-modern-ish Baptist
Posts: 1117 | From: Urmston, Manchester, UK | Registered: Jul 2008
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Mama Thomas
Shipmate
# 10170
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Helen-Eva:
quote:
Originally posted by Albertus:
Indeed, tho' to be fair, and to his great credit, he did also write There's a Wideness in God's Mercy
To me that hymn will always be "There's a Wideness in God's Trousers". Probably just me.
I really love that song! Except for the sickening last line:
And our lives would be all sunshine
In the sweetness of our Lord.
Every verse has great meaning and holds power for me, but that last bit reminds me of a Shirley Temple parody.
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All hearts are open, all desires known
Posts: 3742 | From: Somewhere far away | Registered: Aug 2005
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TonyK
Host Emeritus
# 35
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Posted
Hostly Message...
Many of you will be aware that the Ship Board software has thrown a bit if a wobbly recently.
It looks as thought this thread has suffered - Page 1 has duplicated the 50(?) most current posts!
Rather than have the Admins waste their time trying to resolve it, Louise and I have agreed to close it herewith. It won't be removed - just in case anyone has a burning (if improbable) desire to read it again.
Should there be a need, please start a new thread on this subject.
Thank you
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Yours aye ... TonyK
Posts: 2717 | From: Gloucestershire | Registered: May 2001
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