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Thomas T. Lynch
1818 - 1871 Person Name: Rev. T. T. Lynch Author of "Christ in His Word draws near" in The Song Companion to the Scriptures Lynch, Thomas Toke, was born at Dunmow, Essex, July 5, 1818, and educated at a school at Islington, in which he was afterwards an usher. For a few months he was a student at the Highbury Independent College; but withdrew, partly on account of failing health, and partly because his spirit was too free to submit to the routine of College life. From 1847 to 1849 he was Minister of a small charge at Highgate, and from 1849 to 1852 of a congregation in Mortimer Street, which subsequently migrated to Grafton Street, Fitzroy Square. From 1856 to 1859 he was laid aside by illness. In 1860 he resumed his ministry with his old congregation, in a room in Gower Street, where he remained until the opening of his new place of worship, in 1862, (Mornington Church), in Hampstead Road, London. He ministered there till his death, on the 9th of May, 1871.
The influence of Lynch's ministry was great, and reached far beyond his own congregation (which was never large), since it included many students from the Theological Colleges of London, and thoughtful men from other churches, who were attracted to him by the freshness and spirituality of his preaching. His prose works were numerous, beginning with Thoughts on a Day, 1844, and concluding with The Mornington Lecture, 1870. Several of his works were published after his death. His Memoir, by W. White, was published in 1874.
Lynch's hymns were published in:—
The Rivulet: a Contribution to Sacred Song, London., Longman, 1855, 2nd ed., 1856. This was enlarged by an addition of 67 hymns in 1868.
From the first edition of The Rivulet, 1855, the following hymns have come into common use:—
1. All faded is the glowing light. Second Advent.
2. Be Thy word with power fraught. Before Sermon.
3. Christ in His word draws near. Holy Scripture.
4. Dismiss me not Thy service, Lord. Work for Christ.
5. Gracious Spirit, dwell with me. Holy Spirit's presence desired.
6. How calmly the evening once more is descending. Evening. Sometimes "How calmly once more the night is descending."
7. I give myself to prayer. Prayer in Trouble.
8. Lord, on Thy returning day. Public Worship.
9. Lord, when in silent hours I muse. Resignation.
10. Love me, O Lord, forgivingly. Resignation.
11. Mountains by the darkness hidden. Resignation.
12. Now have we met that we may ask. Public Worship.
13. O, break my heart; but break it as a field. Penitence desired.
14. O Lord, Thou art not fickle. Sympathy.
15. O where is He that trod the sea. Christ Walking on the Sea.
16. Oft when of God we ask. Trust in Trial.
17. Rise, He calleth thee, arise. Blind Bartimaeus.
18. Say not, my soul, from whence. Resignation.
19. Where is thy God, my soul? Resignation and Hope.
There are also from the 1856 and 1868 eds. the following:—
20. A thousand years have come and gone. Christmas.
21. Lift up your heads, rejoice; (1856.) Advent.
22. Praying by the river side. Holy Baptism.
23. The Lord is rich and merciful. Have Faith in God.
24. There is purpose in this waste. Easter.
Lynch's hymns are marked by intense individuality, gracefulness and felicity of diction, picturesqueness, spiritual freshness, and the sadness of a powerful soul struggling with a weak and emaciated body. Although The Rivulet was published for use by his own congregation as a supplement to Watts, more than one half of the hymns were designed for private use only, but were not so distinguished in the work. Its publication caused one of the most bitter hymnological controversies known in the annals of modern Congregationalism. Time, however, and a criticism, broader and more just, have declared emphatically in favour of his hymns as valuable contributions to cultured sacred song. [Rev. W. Garrett Horder]
--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)
==================
Lynch, T. T., p. 705, ii. Other hymns by him in recent books are:—
1. My faith it is an oaken staff. Faith in Christ. In the Rivulet, 1855, p. 78.
2. Together for our country now we pray. National, In the Rivulet, 1868, p. 170. [Rev. James Mearns, M.A.]
--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology, New Supplement (1907)
Thomas T. Lynch
Lowell Mason
1792 - 1872 Person Name: Dr. L. Mason Composer of "OLIVET" in The Song Companion to the Scriptures Dr. Lowell Mason (the degree was conferred by the University of New York) is justly called the father of American church music; and by his labors were founded the germinating principles of national musical intelligence and knowledge, which afforded a soil upon which all higher musical culture has been founded. To him we owe some of our best ideas in religious church music, elementary musical education, music in the schools, the popularization of classical chorus singing, and the art of teaching music upon the Inductive or Pestalozzian plan. More than that, we owe him no small share of the respect which the profession of music enjoys at the present time as contrasted with the contempt in which it was held a century or more ago. In fact, the entire art of music, as now understood and practiced in America, has derived advantage from the work of this great man.
Lowell Mason was born in Medfield, Mass., January 8, 1792. From childhood he had manifested an intense love for music, and had devoted all his spare time and effort to improving himself according to such opportunities as were available to him. At the age of twenty he found himself filling a clerkship in a banking house in Savannah, Ga. Here he lost no opportunity of gratifying his passion for musical advancement, and was fortunate to meet for the first time a thoroughly qualified instructor, in the person of F. L. Abel. Applying his spare hours assiduously to the cultivation of the pursuit to which his passion inclined him, he soon acquired a proficiency that enabled him to enter the field of original composition, and his first work of this kind was embodied in the compilation of a collection of church music, which contained many of his own compositions. The manuscript was offered unavailingly to publishers in Philadelphia and in Boston. Fortunately for our musical advancement it finally secured the attention of the Boston Handel and Haydn Society, and by its committee was submitted to Dr. G. K. Jackson, the severest critic in Boston. Dr. Jackson approved most heartily of the work, and added a few of his own compositions to it. Thus enlarged, it was finally published in 1822 as The Handel and Haydn Society Collection of Church Music. Mason's name was omitted from the publication at his own request, which he thus explains, "I was then a bank officer in Savannah, and did not wish to be known as a musical man, as I had not the least thought of ever making music a profession." President Winchester, of the Handel and Haydn Society, sold the copyright for the young man. Mr. Mason went back to Savannah with probably $500 in his pocket as the preliminary result of his Boston visit.
The book soon sprang into universal popularity, being at once adopted by the singing schools of New England, and through this means entering into the church choirs, to whom it opened up a higher field of harmonic beauty. Its career of success ran through some seventeen editions. On realizing this success, Mason determined to accept an invitation to come to Boston and enter upon a musical career. This was in 1826. He was made an honorary member of the Handel and Haydn Society, but declined to accept this, and entered the ranks as an active member. He had been invited to come to Boston by President Winchester and other musical friends and was guaranteed an income of $2,000 a year. He was also appointed, by the influence of these friends, director of music at the Hanover, Green, and Park Street churches, to alternate six months with each congregation. Finally he made a permanent arrangement with the Bowdoin Street Church, and gave up the guarantee, but again friendly influence stepped in and procured for him the position of teller at the American Bank.
In 1827 Lowell Mason became president and conductor of the Handel and Haydn Society. It was the beginning of a career that was to win for him as has been already stated the title of "The Father of American Church Music." Although this may seem rather a bold claim it is not too much under the circumstances. Mr. Mason might have been in the average ranks of musicianship had he lived in Europe; in America he was well in advance of his surroundings. It was not too high praise (in spite of Mason's very simple style) when Dr. Jackson wrote of his song collection: "It is much the best book I have seen published in this country, and I do not hesitate to give it my most decided approbation," or that the great contrapuntist, Hauptmann, should say the harmonies of the tunes were dignified and churchlike and that the counterpoint was good, plain, singable and melodious.
Charles C. Perkins gives a few of the reasons why Lowell Mason was the very man to lead American music as it then existed. He says, "First and foremost, he was not so very much superior to the members as to be unreasonably impatient at their shortcomings. Second, he was a born teacher, who, by hard work, had fitted himself to give instruction in singing. Third, he was one of themselves, a plain, self-made man, who could understand them and be understood of them."
The personality of Dr. Mason was of great use to the art and appreciation of music in this country. He was of strong mind, dignified manners, sensitive, yet sweet and engaging.
Prof. Horace Mann, one of the great educators of that day, said he would walk fifty miles to see and hear Mr. Mason teach if he could not otherwise have that advantage.
Dr. Mason visited a number of the music schools in Europe, studied their methods, and incorporated the best things in his own work. He founded the Boston Academy of Music. The aim of this institution was to reach the masses and introduce music into the public schools. Dr. Mason resided in Boston from 1826 to 1851, when he removed to New York. Not only Boston benefited directly by this enthusiastic teacher's instruction, but he was constantly traveling to other societies in distant cities and helping their work. He had a notable class at North Reading, Mass., and he went in his later years as far as Rochester, where he trained a chorus of five hundred voices, many of them teachers, and some of them coming long distances to study under him. Before 1810 he had developed his idea of "Teachers' Conventions," and, as in these he had representatives from different states, he made musical missionaries for almost the entire country. He left behind him no less than fifty volumes of musical collections, instruction books, and manuals.
As a composer of solid, enduring church music. Dr. Mason was one of the most successful this country has introduced. He was a deeply pious man, and was a communicant of the Presbyterian Church. Dr. Mason in 1817 married Miss Abigail Gregory, of Leesborough, Mass. The family consisted of four sons, Daniel Gregory, Lowell, William and Henry. The two former founded the publishing house of Mason Bros., dissolved by the death of the former in 19G9. Lowell and Henry were the founders of the great organ manufacturer of Mason & Hamlin. Dr. William Mason was one of the most eminent musicians that America has yet produced.
Dr. Lowell Mason died at "Silverspring," a beautiful residence on the side of Orange Mountain, New Jersey, August 11, 1872, bequeathing his great musical library, much of which had been collected abroad, to Yale College.
--Hall, J. H. (c1914). Biographies of Gospel Song and Hymn Writers. New York: Fleming H. Revell Company.
Lowell Mason
J. H. Cornell
1828 - 1894 Person Name: John H. Cornell Composer of "BETHEL" in The Riverdale Hymn Book An organist for St. Paul’s Chapel, Trinity Church, Cornell compiled the Congregational Tune Book in 1872.
--www.hymntime.com/tch/
J. H. Cornell
Edward Bunnett
1834 - 1923 Composer of "KIRBY BEDON" in The Hymnal Edward Bunnet Canada 1834-1923. Born at Shipdham and educated at Norwich Cathedral Choir School, he was a talented chorister, composer, a brilliant organist, and had a sharp sense of humour. He married Emma Elizabeth McGowan in 1890, and they had three children. He became assistant organist at Norwich Cathedral for 22 years and later at St. Peter Mancroft, Norwich, for another 31 years. He was organist for the Norwich triennial Musical Festival for 33 years. Over his life he taught thousands of young people how to play the organ. He composed 16 choral works.
John Perry
Edward Bunnett
W. F. Hurndall
1830 - 1888 Person Name: Dr. W. F. Hurndall Composer of "BENISON" in Worship Song William Flavell Hurndall was born July 10, 1830 at Basingstoke, England. He was the son of a minister. He was educated at Bonn University, Freidrich Wilhelms University Berlin, Glasgow University and Heidelberg University. He worked as a Congregational minister and later as headmaster. He composed over 150 hymn tunes. He died August 24, 1888 at Scarborough.
Dianne Shapiro, from email sent to Hymnary by Martin Thompson
W. F. Hurndall
