I've written elsewhere about Kevin Twit and the Indelible Grace project, whose hope is to "help the church recover the tradition of putting old hymns to new music for each generation." Of course, Kevin and his friends aren't the only ones doing this -- a student of mine from Fuller Seminary, Luke Hyder, has been doing it for years, too.
The other day I came upon one of his compositions while I was searching for an upbeat setting of Psalm 103 as a way to conclude a Eucharist service. Psalm 103 is commonly used in this liturgical position, but the more common settings -- by Andre Crouch, or Brother Roger of Taize, or Graham Ord -- weren't quite right. This one was. He agreed to let me post it here, as a gift to the readers of this blog. Click here for the PDF., and here for the MP3.
Hey Ron,
Thanks for reminding me of this song. I think it's one of the better examples of the its genre. I have mixed feelings about the movement of updating classic hymn texts with new music, even though I've done it myself on occasion (http://gregscheer.com/praise/may_the_mind.html). I'm all for it in principle, but in practice the modernized hymns are often less singable and less memorable than the ones they replace. Also, the texts are often kept intact with all the "thees" and "thous" which creates a strange tension between old text and new music. Sometimes this anachronistic approach works, sometimes it's awkward, but it always leaves me wondering whether these songwriters' talents would be better utilized by simply composing a completely new song.
Speaking of completely new songs, here's one of mine that's based on Psalm 103: http://gregscheer.com/praise/my_soul_will_glorify.html
Posted by: gregscheer | July 30, 2006 at 05:45 PM