Music Notes – Sunday, December 19th
This Sunday’s musicians are Eldreth, The Chancel Choir, and UUCC Music Director Mike Carney
A familiar face (and voice) at UUCC, singer/songwriter and guitarist Eldreth (aka Robert McDonald) has been singing since preschool, playing guitar since junior high, and writing his own songs since high school. He sang in the Columbus Boys’ Choir while in elementary school and later with The Singing Angels. He sang in school and church choirs from an early age and played with several bands before he began to perform as a solo singer-songwriter. Eldreth has played in many venues, including the New Orleans Jazz Fest, the Summer Solstice Festival in Stonehenge, England, and in numerous social justice events and demonstrations across the U.S. He has opened for many other musicians, including Richard Thompson, Bunny and the Wailers, and Jimmy Cliff.
Opening Hymn: #147 When All the Peoples on This Earth – Angebrannt
#147 in our Singing the Living Tradition hymnal, “When All the Peoples on This Earth” is a setting of an anonymous text by Betsy Jo Angebrannt (1931-2018), a UU pianist, music educator, choral director, and composer of songs and musicals. As a composer and arranger, Ms. Angebrannt is responsible for no fewer than seven hymns in Singing the Living Tradition.
Centering Music: Anji – Graham
“Anji” (also known as “Angi”, “Angie” or “On gee”) is a 1961 composition for acoustic guitar by British folk guitarist and songwriter Davy Graham (1940-2008). Graham was one of the most influential folk guitarists of all time, and he wrote “Anji” (which is now probably his best-known song) when he was just 19 years old, naming the song after his girlfriend at the time. Mastering “Anji” is considered something of a rite of passage among acoustic finger-style guitarists, and “Anji” has been covered by many other artists, including Bert Jansch, Lillebjørn Nilsen, and Paul Simon, whose version is featured on Simon & Garfunkel’s 1966 album Sounds of Silence.
Sung Meditation: May the Light Around Us Guide Our Footsteps – Zabriskie/McTigue
“May the Light Around Us Guide Our Footsteps” is Utah-based composer David Zabriskie’s 2009 musical setting of a well-known reading by Unitarian Universalist minister Kathleen McTigue, who is currently serving as the director of the UU College of Social Justice. Rev. McTigue’s words are as follows:
May the light around us guide our footsteps,
and hold us fast to the best and most righteous that we seek.
May the darkness around us nurture our dreams,
and give us rest so that we may give ourselves to the work of our world.
Let us seek to remember the wholeness of our lives,
the weaving of light and shadow in this great and astonishing dance in which we move.
Offertory music: Urge for Going – Mitchell
“Urge for Going” is a 1966 song by folk-rock singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell (b. 1943). Mitchell, a 9-time Grammy Award winner and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Inductee. “Urge for Going” describes the coming of winter in Saskatoon, Canada, where Mitchell grew up. It was Mitchell’s first song to gain prominence when it was recorded in 1966 by Tom Rush (Mitchell later recorded her own version of the song in 1971).
Closing Hymn: #118 This Little Light of Mine
“This Little Light of Mine” is an African American gospel song whose origins are unknown. The song first began appearing in church and school settings during the 1920s and 1930s. Interestingly, the first few known instances of the song being performed are scattered around the United States, from Illinois to Texas to Montana to Missouri, so we cannot even say with any certainty in which particular city or region the song originated. Today, “This Little Light of Mine” is sung all over the world and is found in dozens of hymnals, including our own Singing the Living Tradition (#118).
Postlude: Mary’s Boy Child – Hairston
“Mary’s Boy Child” is a Christmas song written in 1956 by Jester Hairston (1901-2000), a prominent African American composer, arranger, and choral conductor who was considered one of the world’s foremost experts on Spirituals and Gospel Music during his lifetime. This song began when Hairston’s then-roommate asked him to write a song for an upcoming birthday party for a mutual friend. Hairston composed a song called “He Pone and Chocolate Tea” in calypso style, knowing most of the party attendees would be West Indians. A few months later, when conductor Walter Schumann asked Hairston to write a new Christmas Carol for his choir, Hairston wrote new lyrics to the existing birthday song, and “Mary’s Boy Child” was the result. Harry Belafonte heard Schumann’s choir perform the new carol, and asked for permission to record it himself. Belafonte’s version reached number one in the United Kingdom in 1957 and has been certified platinum (over 1 million sold). Since then, “Mary’s Boy Child” has been recorded by many artists, including Andy Williams, Jose Feliciano, and Kathleen Battle among many others.
-Mike Carney, UUCC Music Director