Person Results

Switch back to the old search page.Advanced Search

Showing 11 - 20 of 141Results Per Page: 10 20 50

William R. Featherston

1846 - 1873 Person Name: William R. Featherstone Meter: 11.11.11.11 with refrain Author of "My Jesus, I Love Thee" in The Hymnal of The Evangelical United Brethren Church William Ralph Featherston(e) Canada 1846-1873. Born at Montreal, Quebec, Canada, he joined the Wesleyan Methodist Church there. He became a Christian at age 16 while in Toronto, and is thought to have written his famous hymn about the same time. He sent the poem to his aunt, Ms. E. Featherston Wilson and she gave it to a publisher. Adoniram. J Gordon, an evangelist, founder of Gordon College & Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, found the hymn in a 1870 London hymnal and was impressed with the words, but did not like the tune, so he composed the melody that has been used with the hymn ever since. Featherstone is thought to have married Julie R MacAlister in 1869 and that they had a son, John, in 1870. Featherstone died in Montreal at age 26. John Perry

Ira David Sankey

1840 - 1908 Person Name: Ira D. Sankey Meter: 11.11.11.11 with refrain Composer of "HIDING IN THEE" in Trinity Hymnal (Rev. ed.) Sankey, Ira David, was born in Edinburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1840, of Methodist parents. About 1856 he removed with his parents to New Castle, Pennsylvania, where he became a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Four years afterwards he became the Superintendent of a large Sunday School in which he commenced his career of singing sacred songs and solos. Mr. Moody met with him and heard him sing at the International Convention of the Young Men's Christian Association, at Indianapolis, and through Mr. Moody's persuasion he joined him in his work at Chicago. After some two or three years' work in Chicago, they sailed for England on June 7, 1872, and held their first meeting at York a short time afterwards, only eight persons being present. Their subsequent work in Great Britain and America is well known. Mr. Sankey's special duty was the singing of sacred songs and solos at religious gatherings, a practice which was in use in America for some time before he adopted it. His volume of Sacred Songs and Solos is a compilation from various sources, mainly American and mostly in use before. Although known as Sankey and Moody’s Songs, only one song, "Home at last, thy labour done" is by Mr. Sankey, and not one is by Mr. Moody. Mr. Sankey supplied several of the melodies. The English edition of the Sacred Songs & Solos has had an enormous sale; and the work as a whole is very popular for Home Mission services. The Songs have been translated into several languages. --John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907) Pseudonymns: Harry S. Lower Rian A. Dykes ==================== Sankey, I. D., p. 994, i. During the past fifteen years Mr. Sankey's Sacred Songs and Solos have had a very large sale, which has justified him in increasing the number of songs and hymns, including " New Hymns and Solos," to 1200. In 1906 he published My Life and Sacred Songs (London : Morgan & Scott). In addition to the "Story of his Own Life," the work contains an account of the most popular of his solos, with interesting reminiscences of the spiritual awakening of many who were influenced through his singing of them in public. In this respect it corresponds in some measure with G. J. Stevenson's Methodist Hymn Book, &c, 1883 (p. 1094, i.). It is an addition to the Sacred Songs and Solos, which will be held in esteem by many. In addition to his hymn, noted on p. 994, ii., Mr. Sankey gives details of the following:— 1. Out of the shadow-land into the sunshine. [Heaven Anticipated.] Mr. Sankey's account of this hymn is:— "I wrote this hymn specially for the memorial service held for Mr. Moody in Carnegie Hall, where 1 also sang it as a solo. It is the last sacred song of which I wrote both the words and music. The idea was suggested by Mr. Moody's last words, 'Earth recedes; heaven opens before me . . . God is calling me, and I must go.' On account of its peculiar association with my fellow-labourer in the Gospel for so many years, the words are here given in full." The hymn follows on p. 185, in 3 stanzas of 4 lines and a chorus. 2. Rejoice! Rejoice! our King is coming, [Advent.] Mr. Sankey writes concerning this hymn:— "During one of my trips to Great Britain on the SS. City of Rome a storm raged on the sea. The wind was howling through the rigging, and waves like mountains of foam were breaking over the bow of the vessel. A great fear had fallen upon the passengers. When the storm was at its worst, we all thought we might soon go to the bottom of the sea. The conviction came to me that the Lord would be with us iu the trying hour, and sitting down in the reading room, I composed this hymn. Before reaching England the tune had formed itself in my mind, and on arriving in London I wrote it out, and had it published in Sacred Songs and Solos, where it is No. 524 in the edition. of 1888. From Mr. Sankey's autobiographical sketch we gather that he was born at Edinburgh, in Western Pennsylvania, Aug. 28, 1840, joined Mr. Moody in 1871, and visited England for the first time in 1873. The original of the Sacred Songs, &c, of 23 pieces only, was offered as a gift to the London publishers of P. Phillips's Hallowed Song, and declined by them. It was subsequently accepted by Mr. K. O. Morgan, of Morgan & Scott, and is now a volume of 1200 hymns. From a return kindly sent us by Messrs. Morgan & Scott, we find that the various issues of the Sacred Songs and Solos were:— In 1873, 24 pp.; 1874, 72 pp. ; 1876, 153 hymns; 1877, 271 hymns; 1881, 441 hymns; 1888, 750 hymns; 1903, 1200 hymns. In addition, The Christian Choir, which is generally associated with the Sacred Songs and Solos, was issued in 1884 with 75 hymns, and in 1896 with 281. The New Hymns & Solos, by the same firm, were published in 1888. --John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology, New Supplement (1907)

Arthur Sullivan

1842 - 1900 Person Name: Arthur S. Sullivan Meter: 11.11.11.11 with refrain Composer of "FORTUNATUS" in Psalter Hymnal (Blue) Arthur Seymour Sullivan (b Lambeth, London. England. 1842; d. Westminster, London, 1900) was born of an Italian mother and an Irish father who was an army bandmaster and a professor of music. Sullivan entered the Chapel Royal as a chorister in 1854. He was elected as the first Mendelssohn scholar in 1856, when he began his studies at the Royal Academy of Music in London. He also studied at the Leipzig Conservatory (1858-1861) and in 1866 was appointed professor of composition at the Royal Academy of Music. Early in his career Sullivan composed oratorios and music for some Shakespeare plays. However, he is best known for writing the music for lyrics by William S. Gilbert, which produced popular operettas such as H.M.S. Pinafore (1878), The Pirates of Penzance (1879), The Mikado (1884), and Yeomen of the Guard (1888). These operettas satirized the court and everyday life in Victorian times. Although he composed some anthems, in the area of church music Sullivan is best remembered for his hymn tunes, written between 1867 and 1874 and published in The Hymnary (1872) and Church Hymns (1874), both of which he edited. He contributed hymns to A Hymnal Chiefly from The Book of Praise (1867) and to the Presbyterian collection Psalms and Hymns for Divine Worship (1867). A complete collection of his hymns and arrangements was published posthumously as Hymn Tunes by Arthur Sullivan (1902). Sullivan steadfastly refused to grant permission to those who wished to make hymn tunes from the popular melodies in his operettas. Bert Polman

Charles P. Whitford

Person Name: C. P. Whitford Meter: 11.11.11.11 with refrain Arranger of "Just Over the Mountains" in The Church Hymnal

Johnson Oatman, Jr.

1856 - 1922 Meter: 11.11.11.11 with refrain Author of "Count Your Blessings" in Baptist Hymnal 1991 Johnson Oatman, Jr., son of Johnson and Rachel Ann Oatman, was born near Medford, N. J., April 21, 1856. His father was an excellent singer, and it always delighted the son to sit by his side and hear him sing the songs of the church. Outside of the usual time spent in the public schools, Mr. Oatman received his education at Herbert's Academy, Princetown, N. J., and the New Jersey Collegiate Institute, Bordentown, N. J. At the age of nineteen he joined the M.E. Church, and a few years later he was granted a license to preach the Gospel, and still later he was regularly ordained by Bishop Merrill. However, Mr. Oatman only serves as a local preacher. For many years he was engaged with his father in the mercantile business at Lumberton, N. J., under the firm name of Johnson Oatman & Son. Since the death of his father, he has for the past fifteen years been in the life insurance business, having charge of the business of one of the great companies in Mt. Holly, N. J., where he resides. He has written over three thousand hymns, and no gospel song book is considered as being complete unless it contains some of his hymns. In 1878 he married Wilhelmina Reid, of Lumberton, N.J. and had three children, Rachel, Miriam, and Percy. Excerpted from Biography of Gospel Song and Hymn Writers by Jacob Henry Hall; Fleming H. Revell, Co. 1914

Venantius Honorius Clementianus Fortunatus

540 - 600 Person Name: V. H. C. Fortunatus, c. 530-609 Meter: 11.11.11.11 with refrain Author of "Welcome, Happy Morning" in Psalter Hymnal (Blue) Venantius Honorius Clematianus Fortunatus (b. Cenada, near Treviso, Italy, c. 530; d. Poitiers, France, 609) was educated at Ravenna and Milan and was converted to the Christian faith at an early age. Legend has it that while a student at Ravenna he contracted a disease of the eye and became nearly blind. But he was miraculously healed after anointing his eyes with oil from a lamp burning before the altar of St. Martin of Tours. In gratitude Fortunatus made a pilgrimage to that saint's shrine in Tours and spent the rest of his life in Gaul (France), at first traveling and composing love songs. He developed a platonic affection for Queen Rhadegonda, joined her Abbey of St. Croix in Poitiers, and became its bishop in 599. His Hymns far all the Festivals of the Christian Year is lost, but some of his best hymns on his favorite topic, the cross of Jesus, are still respected today, in part because of their erotic mysticism. Bert Polman ================== Fortunatus, Venantius Honorius Clementianus, was born at Ceneda, near Treviso, about 530. At an early age he was converted to Christianity at Aquileia. Whilst a student at Ravenna he became almost blind, and recovered his sight, as he believed miraculously, by anointing his eyes with some oil taken from a lamp that burned before the altar of St. Martin of Tours, in a church in that town. His recovery induced him to make a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Martin, at Tours, in 565, and that pilgrimage resulted in his spending the rest of his life in Gaul. At Poitiers he formed a romantic, though purely platonic, attachment for Queen Rhadegunda, the daughter of Bertharius, king of the Thuringians, and the wife, though separated from him, of Lothair I., or Clotaire, king of Neustria. The reader is referred for further particulars of this part of the life of Fortunatus to Smith and Wace's Dictionary of Christian Biography, vol. ii. p. 552. It is sufficient to say here that under the influence of Rhadegunda, who at that time lived at Poitiers, where she had founded the convent of St. Croix, Fortunatus was ordained, and ultimately, after the death of Rhadegunda in 597, became bishop of Poitiers shortly before his own death in 609. The writings, chiefly poetical, of Fortunatus, which are still extant, are very numerous and various in kind; including the liveliest Vers de Societé and the grandest hymns; while much that he is known to have written, including a volume of Hymns for all the Festivals of the Christian Year, is lost. Of what remains may be mentioned, The Life of St. Martin of Tours, his Patron Saint, in four books, containing 2245 hexameter lines. A complete list of his works will be found in the article mentioned above. His contributions to hymnology must have been very considerable, as the name of his lost volume implies, but what remains to us of that character, as being certainly his work, does not comprise at most more than nine or ten compositions, and of some of these even his authorship is more than doubtful. His best known hymn is the famous "Vexilla Regis prodeunt," so familiar to us in our Church Hymnals in some English form or other, especially, perhaps, in Dr. Neale's translation, "The Royal Banners forward go." The next most important composition claimed for him is "Pange, lingua, gloriosi praelium certaminis," but there would seem to be little doubt according to Sirmond (Notis ad Epist. Sidon. Apollin. Lib. iii., Ep. 4), that it was more probably written by Claudianus Mamertus. Besides these, which are on the Passion, there are four hymns by Fortunatus for Christmas, one of which is given by Daniel, "Agnoscat omne saeculum," one for Lent, and one for Easter. Of "Lustra sex qui jam peregit," of which an imitation in English by Bishop. Mant, "See the destined day arise," is well-known, the authorship is by some attributed to Fortunatus, and by some to St. Ambrose. The general character of the poetry of Venantius Fortunatus is by no means high, being distinguished neither for its classical, nor, with very rare exceptions, for its moral correctness. He represents the "last expiring effort of the Latin muse in Gaul," to retain something of the "old classical culture amid the advancing tide of barbarism." Whether we look at his style, or even his grammar and quantities, we find but too much that is open to criticism, whilst he often offends against good taste in the sentiments he enunciates. Occasionally, as we see in the "Vexilla Regis," he rises to a rugged grandeur in which he has few rivals, and some of his poems are by no means devoid of simplicity and pathos. But these are the exceptions and not the rule in his writings, and we know not how far he may have owed even these to the womanly instincts and gentler, purer influence of Rhadegunda. Thierry, in his Récits des Temps Mérovingiens, Récit 5, gives a lively sketch of Fortunatus, as in Archbishop Trench's words (Sacred Latin Poetry, 1874,p. 132), "A clever, frivolous, self-indulgent and vain character," an exaggerated character, probably, because one can hardly identify the author of "Vexilla Regis," in such a mere man of the world, or look at the writer of "Crux benedicta nitet, Dominus qua carne pependit" q.v., as being wholly devoid of the highest aspirations after things divine. A quarto edition of his Works was published in Rome in 1786. [Rev. Digby S. Wrangham, M.A.] - John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907) ==================== Fortunatus, V. H. C., p. 384, i. The best edition of his poems is F. Leo's edition of his Opera Poetica, Berlin, 1881 (Monumenta Germaniae, vol. iv.). --John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology, Appendix, Part II (1907)

E. O. Excell

1851 - 1921 Person Name: Edwin O. Excell Meter: 11.11.11.11 with refrain Composer of "[When upon life's billows you are tempest-tossed]" in Timeless Truths Edwin Othello Excel USA 1851-1921. Born at Uniontown, OH, he started working as a bricklayer and plasterer. He loved music and went to Chicago to study it under George Root. He married Eliza Jane “Jennie” Bell in 1871. They had a son, William, in 1874. A member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, he became a prominent publisher, composer, song leader, and singer of music for church, Sunday school, and evangelistic meetings. He founded singing schools at various locations in the country and worked with evangelist, Sam Jones, as his song leader for two decades. He established a music publishing house in Chicago and authored or composed over 2,000 gospel songs. While assisting Gypsy Smith in an evangelistic campaign in Louisville, KY, he became ill, and died in Chicago, IL. He published 15 gospel music books between 1882-1925. He left an estate valued at $300,000. John Perry

Ruth C. Duck

b. 1947 Person Name: Ruth Duck, 1947- Meter: 11.11.11.11 with refrain Author of "Not in Grand Estate" in Community of Christ Sings

Adoniram J. Gordon

1836 - 1895 Meter: 11.11.11.11 with refrain Composer of "GORDON" in The Hymnal of The Evangelical United Brethren Church Adoniram J. Gordon (b. New Hampton, NH, 1836; d. Boston, MA, 1895) was educated at Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, and Newton Theological Seminary, Newton, Massachusetts. After being ordained in 1863, he served the Baptist Church in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, and the Clarendon Street Baptist Church, Boston. A close friend of Dwight L. Moody, he promoted evangelism and edited The Service of Song for Baptist Churches (1871) as well as The Vestry Hymn and Tune Book (1872). Both Gordon College and Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary are named after Gordon. Bert Polman ================== Gordon, Adoniram Judson, D.D., born at New Hampton, N.H., Apr. 19, 1836. Graduated at Brown University, 1860; entered the Baptist ministry; Pastor of Clarendon Street Baptist Church, Boston, 1869; and died in 1895. He published The Vestry Hymn and Tune Book, 1872; and was one of the editors of the Service of Song for Baptist Churches, 1871. His hymns in common use include:— 1. O blessed Paraclete. [Holy Spirit .] Given in Sursum Corda, 1898, as having been written in 1890. 2. O Spirit's anointing, for service appointing . [Foreign Missions.] This hymn was "written in the summer of 1886, at Northfield School for Bible Study, organised by Mr. Moody. More than one hundred college students connected with this school gave themselves to the work of foreign missions during their stay at Northfield. Four of their number were chosen to visit the colleges in different parts of the country, and endeavour to awaken a deeper interest in missions during the succeeding academic year. At their request Dr. Gordon” wrote this hymn. Baptist Hymns and Hymn Writers. 3. Where art thou, soul! I hear God say. [Divine Chiding.] Published in social meeting edition of The Service of Song, 1881. --John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology, New Supplement (1907)

W. Howard Doane

1832 - 1915 Person Name: William H. Doane Meter: 11.11.11.11 with refrain Composer of "TO GOD BE THE GLORY" in Psalter Hymnal (Gray) An industrialist and philanthropist, William H. Doane (b. Preston, CT, 1832; d. South Orange, NJ, 1915), was also a staunch supporter of evangelistic campaigns and a prolific writer of hymn tunes. He was head of a large woodworking machinery plant in Cincinnati and a civic leader in that city. He showed his devotion to the church by supporting the work of the evangelistic team of Dwight L. Moody and Ira D. Sankey and by endowing Moody Bible Institute in Chicago and Denison University in Granville, Ohio. An amateur composer, Doane wrote over twenty-two hundred hymn and gospel song tunes, and he edited over forty songbooks. Bert Polman ============ Doane, William Howard, p. 304, he was born Feb. 3, 1832. His first Sunday School hymn-book was Sabbath Gems published in 1861. He has composed about 1000 tunes, songs, anthems, &c. He has written but few hymns. Of these "No one knows but Jesus," "Precious Saviour, dearest Friend," and "Saviour, like a bird to Thee," are noted in Burrage's Baptist Hymn Writers. 1888, p. 557. --John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology, Appendix, Part II (1907) =================== Doane, W. H. (William Howard), born in Preston, Connecticut, 1831, and educated for the musical profession by eminent American and German masters. He has had for years the superintendence of a large Baptist Sunday School in Cincinnati, Ohio, where he resides. Although not a hymnwriter, the wonderful success which has attended his musical setting of numerous American hymns, and the number of his musical editions of hymnbooks for Sunday Schools and evangelistic purposes, bring him within the sphere of hymnological literature. Amongst his collections we have:— (1) Silver Spray, 1868; (2) Pure Gold, 1877; (3) Royal Diadem, 1873; (4) Welcome Tidings, 1877; (5) Brightest and Best, 1875; (6) Fountain of Song; (7) Songs of Devotion, 1870; (8) Temple Anthems, &c. His most popular melodies include "Near the Cross," "Safe in the Arms of Jesus," "Pass me Not," "More Love to Thee," "Rescue the Perishing," "Tell me the Old, Old Story," &c. - John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)