The movers arrive TODAY, so I'll be losing internet connectivity for a few days at least. We won't meet up with our stuff again until late next week and I don't know where I might encounter a wi-fi hot spot en route.
In the meantime: Since we're coming on fast to Lent/Easter, let's reprise the Despised Music Meme. What is your least favorite Lent/Easter hymn of all time?? During Advent I encouraged everyone to name one sacred and one secular candidate--but that doesn't really work at this time of year. There are very few secular Easter songs and no secular Lent songs that I know of. So for the secular category here is the challenge: What secular song do you think would work as a Lent or Easter hymn--providing you could get your music director to go along with the idea, of course.
I'll share my choices later so as not to influence the process. Chat among yourselves while I drive. See you next week.
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The worst Lent/Easter hynmn I ever heard was He Grew the Tree. Sample lyric:
"He grew the tree that He knew would be the wood for the old rugged cross."
Really. I kid you not. It's a gospel hymn with a country-western flavor.
Barf.
I am sorry to say, I totally cannot stand "Jesus Walked That Lonesome Valley."
"You must walk that lonesome valley, you've gotta walk it by yourself..."
Umm, yeah... so much for that "I will be with you always" stuff.
My least favorite:
"Where you there when they crucified my Lord?"
Almost always sung badly, and keeps losing tempo with every verse. Ick!
My favourite Lenten hymn is "Tree of Life and Awesome Mystery" and my favourite Easter hymn is "Thine is the Glory" (yes, I know, the theology is dated, but something about this grand old hymn just feels right on Easter morning).
Least favourite -- same as Cheesehead -- that multi-verse dirge sung badly on Good Friday. I think it's the "ooo..ooo...ooo" part that the congregation masacres so badly that makes it like nails on a chalkboard.
Worst: "Alas! And Did My Savior Bleed," with the classic line, "Would he devote that sacred head for such a worm as I?"
I was so wound up about the worst hymn that I forgot to vote for my favorite, which is "Jesus Christ is Risen Today."
It's not Easter without it.
Least favorite: you may not know this one unless you've spent some time as a Baptist, but the hymn "He Arose" starts out as a dirge, "Low in the grave He lay, Jesus my Savior..." then suddenly bursts into a camp-meeting chorus,"Up from the grave he arose! With a mighty triumph o'er His foes!" Even in our mid-twenties, something about the corny music just always made my husband and me snicker like teenagers.
I do so love "Thine Is the Glory", theology and all.
I can think of two secular Easter songs: "Here Comes Peter Cottontail" and a little ditty from second grade called "Egbert the Easter Egg", which, God help me, I can still sing all the way through.
huh. secular lent song. huh. let me think....
I'm with the person who said "He Arose" is the worst Easter Hymn ever. It's very spastic, musically, which seems to appeal to the Baptists (I can say that because I'm one of them!)...
My favorite Easter Hymn is Christ Is Alive by Brian Wren. This is followed closely by "Christ The Lord Is Risen Today." But I have a gazillion more favorites and now I'm feeling bad for not mentioning them!!!
I'm with quotidian grace - He Grew the Tree is a candidate for worst song ever, regardless of category.
I don't really have a strong favorite for Easter. And being a Baptist, I'm all "Lent? There are songs for Lent?"
Oh, I love Were you There....and the Up From the Grave He 'Rose---I always think it should be done by a swing choir, ya know with jazz hands and all...
favorite---well it's not a hymn, but I love it when they sing Randall Thompson's "Alleluia" at Easter, because I think it sounds like Easter.
Wow - what great food for thought. My gut reaction lined up with zorra - "UP FROM THE GRAVE HE AROSE (HE AROSE!)"...it was always the echo part that did me in. I always laughed, too..
"He's Alive" is another scary 70's style pop thing that is unbearably energetic.
My favorite has to be "O Sacred Head"..the poetry, I love. The modal melody is haunting..
Up from the Grave He Arose - Yuck.
Actually, my father woke us up to this every morning of our childhood and I thought he wrote it until the choir of my first church sang it as the introit while I sat there stunned ("Dad didn't write that???")
Love those Holy Week hymns -- O Sacred Head Now Wounded is so wonderful. "What language shall we borrow . . ."
I too dislike the lonesome valley song...ugh. not only is it contradictory to the "end" of the gospel, but also the tune always makes me cringe. Even in the spirited-singing congregations I've been in, it gets slower and slower until you can barely make one line without a breath.
I really love Were You There, probably because of the aforementioned spirited singing congregations and some experiences with soloists and dark chapels that were really amazing.
And, of course, I find it absolutely necessary to sing Jesus Christ is Risen Today (how can you not go with hymn number 123?) on Easter Sunday. But year round, I find that Judas Maccabeus (Thine Is the Glory) is the most-hummed tune in my life.
I don't have an Easter song bugging me. It's those durn EASTER LILIES~ I hate 'em. They smell awful, take up too much space, drip pollen and don't die quick enough to suit me. Yuk!
A favourite for me is a hymn for the Easter vigil (not that I have ever been to an Easter vigil--Saturday nights are for sleeping) "Stay With Us Through the Night".
GIven my difficulty with sacrificial atonement I find many of the "cross" hymns not to my liking.
i'm a little late on this and i'm not a usual poster here, but i want to say that i am completely appalled at how many people dislike "were you there?".
it is, in my mind, one of the best among spirituals - which are all pretty good anyway.
just because few can sing it well doesn't mean it's a bad tune. there's plenty of widely-loved canonized music that gets played awfully, too.
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