LORD, Our Lord, Your Glorious Name (EVENING PRAISE)

Notes:

Performance Notes:

The following article is from the Psalter Hymnal Handbook.

Text Information:

Praise of the heavenly Creator's high majesty and of the dignity and authority God has bestowed on humanity.

Scripture References:
st. 1 = v. 1
st. 2 = v. 2
st. 3 = vv. 3-4
st. 4= vv. 4-5
st. 5 = vv. 6-8
ref. = vv. 1, 9

God's glory displayed in the heavens inspires the psalmist and us to proclaim the greatness of Cod's name (st. 1, refrain). So great is the LORD's name and glory "in all the earth" that praise from even the weakest members of society, infants and children, will silence God's enemies (st. 2). The starry heaven's majesty shows what puny creatures human beings are (st. 3), and yet the One who fashioned the moon and stars has also crowned humans with almost godlike glory and honor (st. 4), appointing them to authority over all creation (st. 5)-this thought evokes in the poet a wonder that refuses to be silent. New Testament writers see these divine appointments for humanity fully realized only in Jesus Christ (Heb. 2:5-9). The Psalter Hymnal versification is from the 1912 Psalter.

Liturgical Use:
Beginning of worship; anticipation of Christ's final victory and the reign of his people with him in the new heaven and earth.

Tune Information:

William Fiske Sherwin (b. Buckland, MA, 1826; d. Boston, MA, 1888) composed EVENING PRAISE (also called CHAUTAUQUA) in 1877 as the tune to Mary A. Lathbury's text "Day Is Dying in the West." The text and tune were included in the hymnal (1878), and the song was sung at vespers at the Lake Chautauqua assembly in New York for more than one hundred years.

Although he lacked much formal education, Sherwin's interest in music prompted him to attend singing schools and to study with Lowell Mason and George Webb. He became the music director at Pearl Street Baptist Church in Albany and a teacher at the Albany Female Seminary. Later he taught voice at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. In 1874 Methodist Bishop John H. Vincent, founder of the Chautauqua Assembly in New York State, asked Sherwin to organize and direct the Assembly's choruses. Sherwin retained that position until his death. He wrote few hymn texts but many hymn tunes and contributed to song collections such as Robert Lowry's Bright Jewels (1869) and Silas Vail's Songs of Grace and Glory (1874).

EVENING PRAISE neatly reserves its melodic climax for the final phrase of the refrain. Perform this psalm at a good tempo, with two beats per measure. Try the following for a beautiful rendition of this song: sing stanza 1 together, gather the children to sing stanza 2 (memorized ahead of time), and sing stanzas 3 and 4 unaccompanied and stanza 5 with solid accompaniment. The refrain should always be accompanied. Emily R. Brink composed the descant in 1987 for the Psalter Hymnal. The key lends itself well to voices as well as instruments such as recorders, flutes, or violins. Just before the refrain is an option of A-C-sharp-D or, if A is too high for comfortable performance, F-sharp-E-D.

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