One of the hymnological tenets that I often examine concerns what contributions people with roots in Churches of Christ/Restoration Movement have made to broader “mainline” hymnody…read that as “songs they’ve written that have had a wide influence outside Churches of Christ.”
While I often lament that our tradition has been so insulated and because of this, a number of hymns & gospel songs written by our people have not made the beyond the walls of our churches, there are several individuals who’s songs are still Sung today in churches and denominational settings of all shapes, flavors, and sizes.
“Softly and Tenderly” is a prime example of this. Earlier this week, Carrie Underwood performed this song on a national award show…and the online chatter it created is remarkable. Everywhere I seemed to look, whether it was facebook, twitter, etc., there were people commenting about how moved they were by this performance. A HYMN? POPULAR PERFORMANCE? IN 2017? SURELY NOT!
Will Lamartine Thompson (1847-1909) is one of only a handful of hymn writers from Churches of Christ whose hymns have been broadly accepted outside of Churches of Christ. His “SOFTLY AND TENDERLY” is probably his most well known hymn. Hymnary.Org claims it has been found in some 720 hymnals in total.
Alongside his catalogue of hymns and texts that we know about, He also published a number of his own smaller hymnals and church music educational publications as well under his own publishing label in Ohio. He was acquainted with the Fillmore Brothers, also Restoration Movement folks in origin, and Thompson is believed to have found a home in each flavor of our northern Restoration Movement Churches.
This hymn can also claim one of the earliest “gold records” of all time.
Alongside a long list of hymns that only appear once or twice, here are a few more titles you may recognize that Thompson wrote that are sung across mainline hymnody, across the years, and across the world.
There’s A Great Day Coming
Jesus is All the World to Me
Lead me gently home, Father
A Sinner Was Wandering at Eventide
Jesus Bids You Come
For a brief bio of Thompson, click here.
Will Lamartine Thompson (1847-1909).
Finally and unrelated, I wanted to point you to two wonderful sites that I use often in my weekly planning.
First, is a wonderful site called WordtoWorship. WordtoWorship.com is an incredible site that has created a wide compendium of “modern” “or contemporary” titles of the last 25 years (and that is kept remarkably up to date) that allows you to search, create lists, and also, if you choose, become a member to add, upload, and submit titles to help keep the growing list of titles current. Go and search, look around, and help support this great site.
Lastly, it’s easy to get lost in the vast number of texts, tunes, hymns, and songs available to us with this wonderful thing called technology and the internet. I’m always looking and adding to a growing list of bookmarks…A few days ago, I was looking for a particular text by Brian Wren, and I was pointed to an excellent search interface at Hope’s website. You can find it, a link to Hope Publishing’s hymn catalogue, here. This site is one I’d encourage you to look to from time to time, especially in light of more recently written hymns. Texts and Tunes from the New British Invasion of the 1960’s, Brian Wren, Timothy Dudley-Smith, Fred Pratt-Green, Erik Routley, and many others can be found here. These are texts that, thanks to hymnals from Wiegand in 1997 (Praise for the Lord) and the more recent Psalms, Hymns, and Spiritual Songs (Sumphonia), we are finally beginning to see eek themselves into our Church of Christ congregational hymnody, slowly but surely.
PAX.
DJB