In my English school our hymns were mostly in Latin which, despite years of instruction, rendered them sufficiently opaque to be appropriate. What few hymns we sang in English seemed rather weepy, which didn’t appeal.
Therefore, emerging from that place into a wider England, it was a surprise to discover there was a culture of hymns in good English, some with marvellous tunes, and almost a lingua franca derived from them among those who had dutifully bellowed those tunes and words when young. Nor was this only middle-class — think of the Salvation Army. This little book is a selection of the best of them: 52 hymns, 15 carols, each with a punchy introduction and a few necessary bars of the tune, and that tune’s provenance.
Heroes emerge, the same names again and again: Vaughan Williams, Gustav Holst, Percy Dearmer and others.
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