His Voice - Volume 9, Number 2

VOICE HIS

Volume 9 - Number 2

From Co-Director Kevin

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September 2014

Hildebrand

t is with gratitude and humility that Dr. Paul Grime and I assume the leadership of The Good Shepherd Institute. To follow in the footsteps of the groundbreaking leadership of Dr. Arthur Just and Kantor Richard Resch is an honor and a privilege. We also want to acknowledge former Seminary President, Dr. Dean Wenthe, who helped to envision the purpose of The Good Shepherd Institute, and the current Seminary President, Dr. Lawrence Rast, whose continuing support of the Institute is so greatly appreciated.

It is also a particularly humbling blessing to assume the office of Seminary Kantor, following Richard Resch’s long and distinctive service. As with any change of personnel, there will surely be some changes that accompany the transition. One thing that will not change, however, is the tireless and principled dedication to confessing the faith in the church’s song that Concordia Theological Seminary has for so long modeled, taught, and encouraged, in no small part due to Kantor Resch’s leadership and example.

As the oft-quoted words of Norman Nagel state in the Introduction to Lutheran Worship, “We are heirs of an astonishingly rich tradition.”

Together with Associate Kantor Matthew Machemer, the Seminary in general, and The Good Shepherd Institute in particular, we will continue to be faithful stewards of this rich and ever-expanding tradition. As we teach our future pastors more about church music, and as we teach church musicians more about theology, we pray that the church will be blessed through those pastors and musicians as Christ is proclaimed in song.

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Pastoral Theology and Sacred Music for the Church

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Recommended Pastoral Resources

by JOHN PLESS

Martin Luther, Church Postil II,

ed. Benjamin T. G. Mayes and James L. Langebartels, Luther’s Works, vol. 76 (Concordia Publishing House, 2013), 484 pp.

ISBN 9780758628176. [$46.99] This volume brings to completion the winter portion of Luther’s Church Postil, as revised

by Luther for publication in 1540. These postils provide significant insights into the reformer’s own understanding of preaching. For example, a postil on Galatians 3:23–29, the Epistle for New Year’s Day, demonstrates Luther’s ability to distinguish the Law from the Gospel, noting that the confusion of the two pits false saints, who attempt to use the Law for self-righteousness, against the true saints, who rely on the promise alone. Most of the postils are reflective of the lectionary from Epiphany through Palm Sunday. The volume concludes with Luther’s “Meditation on the Holy Suffering of Christ” and his “Confession and the Sacrament.” __________________________________________

Oswald Bayer, “Reliable Word: Luther’s Understanding of God, Humanity, and the World,” Logia 23 (Holy Trinity 2014): 5–10.

Luther was a master of language. Living within the words of Holy Scripture, Luther’s use of language gave his hearers the space to grow into the biblical words, be interpreted by these words, and understand themselves before God and the world. “Whoever shuts himself off to this word, for him heart, mouth, and hand are closed. The entire world becomes too narrow for him. He experiences anxiety and suffers God’s wrath. Whoever shuts himself off to the reliable word, the promise, loses the world as a home and trades it in as a wasteland” (10). Preaching that has the capacity to distinguish the Law from the promise opens the hearer to live with confidence, delivered from oscillation between pessimism and optimism, between enthusiasm and resignation.

There is much to ponder here for preachers. __________________________________________

Stephen Pietsch, “Sure Comfort: Luther on Depression,”

Logia 23 (Epiphany 2014): 37–43.

Stephen Pietsch, a professor of pastoral theology at Australian Lutheran College in North Adelaide, rehearses Luther’s care of people suffering from depression and melancholy, showing how both the experiences as well as Luther’s sensitive pastoral care resonate with people today. Luther utilized the truth of Holy Scripture and a keen awareness of the human situation to minister to people in such a way as to bring Christ crucified as our “highest comfort” within the darkness of life. __________________________________________

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Recommended

Pastoral Resources continued

Bruce Waltke, James Houston, and Erika Moore, The Psalms as Christian Lament: A Historical Commentary

(Eerdmans, 2014), 328 pp.

ISBN 9780802868091. [$28.00]

In recent years there has been a renewed interest in the place of lament as a theological category, and, more specifically, in the psalms of lament.

This volume by three Evangelical Old Testament scholars provides a generally helpful introduction to the psalms of lament and their spiritual use by contemporary Christians. Particularly useful is the authors’ examination of historical figures, e.g., Origen, Augustine, Aquinas, Luther, Erasmus, and Calvin, and how they used these psalms. The book contains a welcome interplay between historical use and exegetical commentary. __________________________________________

Robert Kolb, “Pastoral Practice in the Funeral Sermons of Nikolaus Selnecker (1530–1592)” Lutheran Quarterly 28 (Spring 2014): 22–48.

Pastoral care of the dying and grieving was a chief task of Lutheran pastors in the sixteenth century.

As the Reformation replaced the Masses said for the dead and intercessions for the deceased with the funeral sermon, Selnecker’s preaching modeled how the Lutheran sermon would face death realistically and proclaim the promise of the resurrection to the mourners. Kolb demonstrates that Selnecker’s funeral preaching was exegetical and catechetical, even as he used a variety of homiletical tools and rhetorical devices to admonish and console.

Prominent themes of these burial sermons were the place of godly grief, death as a call to repentance, death as an encouragement for godly living, and especially the comfort that is found in Christ alone.

Attentive study of Kolb’s article will enrich presentday pastoral care and funeral preaching. __________________________________________

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Thomas G. Long, What Shall We Say? Evil, Suffering, and the Crisis of Faith (Eerdmans, 2014), 172 pp.

ISBN 9780802871398. [$18.00]

Whether facing situations of tragic suffering and death in the congregation or ministering in the face of community or national disasters, pastors often hear the “why” question. Noting the perilous path that approaches to theodicy have taken, Long concludes, “If God needs to be defended, God will need a better attorney than I” (xii). Not content with easy answers or sentimental avoidance of questions raised by the persistence of evil in the world, Long carefully parses through the objections of Bart Ehrman as well as the “new atheists.” He sensitively examines but finds wanting the approach of Harold Kushner (When Bad Things Happen to Good People). Using the parable of the wheat and the tares (Matthew 13:24–30), Long argues that any approach to the question of evil must take into account the reality of the evil one, the enemy who has sown the weeds that God allows to grow alongside the ripening grain until the day of harvest.

The bottom line for Long, one of North America’s most respected teachers of homiletics, is that the preacher comes not to defend God or to offer explanations but to speak the promise of the Gospel, the divine “nevertheless” of God’s mercy in the cross of Jesus. While there is more that needs to be said, especially as we speak of God’s hiddenness in the way that Luther does, Long has written a book that deserves attention. I plan to use it as a textbook next time I teach my continuing education class, “Toward a Pastoral Theology of Suffering.” __________________________________________ Concordia Publishing House www.cph.org Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. www.eerdmans.com

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Recommended Music for Instrument(s) and Keyboard

by KEVIN HILDEBRAND

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is the season for music publishers to advertise their new releases for sale. It’s also the season for band and orchestra students to dust off their instruments prior to heading back to school (or band camp)! One problematic observation about much church music written for instruments is that many great compositions assume highly skilled or professional-level instrumentalists. If you have such players at your disposal, let us rejoice. More often than not, however, a parish will have more volunteer and amateur musicians available, whether they are students or adults. The following list provides recommended repertoire in a moderately easy ability level.

With Music Crowned: Chorale Settings for Organ and Instruments Donald Busarow CPH 97-7324, $20.00

This collection was originally published in several volumes by Concordia Publishing House in the 1980s, but now is conveniently contained within one spiral-bound volume. Instrumental parts for both C and B-flat instruments are included. In a typical setting, one instrument plays the cantus firmus, while the other instrument plays an accompanying counterpoint. The keyboard part is moderately easy and may be played on organ or piano. Hymn tunes from across the church year make this collection useful for practically any season. __________________________________________

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Come with Songs of Gladness: Organ and Instrumental Preludes on the Hymns of Paul Gerhardt Donald Busarow CPH 97-7158, $10.00

Written in 2007 for the quadricentennial of Paul Gerhardt’s birth, this collection includes seven settings of well-known Gerhardt hymns: “All My Heart Again Rejoices,” “Awake, My Heart, with Gladness,” “Evening and Morning,” “Jesus, Thy Boundless Love to Me,” “Now Rest beneath Night’s Shadow,” “O Lord, How Shall I Meet You,” and “O Sacred Head, Now Wounded.” Whereas the previous collection was for two instruments, this collection is for one solo instrument and keyboard.

The ability level of both instrument and keyboard is also similar, written in a moderately easy style. __________________________________________

Preludes for Flute and Organ: The Church Year and Other Occasions Charles Callahan MorningStar Music 20-606, $29.00

Charles Callahan has composed numerous volumes of instrument-plus-keyboard settings.

This collection for flute and organ is particularly useful. Callahan’s neo-romantic style lends a fresh and colorful palette of sound to the ears, and his writing style is always accessible to both flutist and organist. A variety of hymn tunes encompass the entire church year in this volume. __________________________________________

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Music for Instrument(s) and Keyboard continued Instruments for All Seasons: Chorale Preludes for the Liturgical Year

Volume 1, Brian Henkelmann, CPH 97-7227, $8.00 Volume 2, Robert J. Powell, CPH, 97-7255, $4.50 Volume 3, Benjamin M. Culli, CPH, 97-7297, $33.00 Whereas some instrumental collections are generically scored for “treble instrument,” each volume in the Instruments for All Seasons collections is scored for a specific instrument: flute (vol. 1), clarinet (vol. 2), horn (vol. 3). The advantage is that the composer writes with ranges, articulations, and phrasings that are particularly good for each specific instrument. __________________________________________

Festival Prelude on Old Hundredth for Trumpet and Organ Walter L. Pelz MorningStar Music 20-701, $5.50

This stately setting is sure to please performers and listeners alike. Pelz’s distinctive processional motives frame the familiar hymn tune, which appears in long note values. Any moderate-ability instrumentalist could sight-read the part with ease; even late-elementary players could use this as an etude in breath support and filling long note values with air. __________________________________________

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Duo Baroque: Classic Chorale Preludes Arranged for Keyboard and Any Solo Instrument, volume 1 Benjamin M. Culli CPH 97-7648, $28.00

Ben Culli has taken a marvelously simple idea to create an inherently useful collection. This setting rearranges organ chorale preludes for keyboard and solo instrument, where the solo instrument plays the cantus firmus, and the keyboard fills in the rest of the harmony. The keyboard parts are written for manuals only. In a brilliant move, the publisher has provided reproducible instrumental parts on CDROM for every common transposition (C, B-flat, E-flat, F, bass clef, even alto clef for viola) in order to accommodate any and all players. Look for volume 2 shortly, which is not yet in print. __________________________________________ Concordia Publishing House www.cph.org MorningStar Music Publishers www.morningstarmusic.com

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Recommended Reading and Listening

by DANIEL ZAGER

Reading Philip H. Pfatteicher, Journey into the Heart of God: Living the Liturgical Year

(Oxford University Press, 2013), 415 pp.

ISBN 9780199997121. [$35.00] Over the past few decades Philip Pfatteicher has written several books that have enlarged our understanding of worship and liturgy. Among those works are two books that served as very useful companions to the Lutheran Book of Worship (1978): Manual on the Liturgy—Lutheran Book of Worship (Augsburg Publishing House, 1979), and Commentary on the Lutheran Book of Worship: Lutheran Liturgy in Its Ecumenical Context (Augsburg Fortress, 1990). Both volumes remain useful, the second one in particular standing in chronological sequence as a more recent complement to Luther D. Reed, The Lutheran Liturgy (Fortress Press, 1947). My favorite of Pfatteicher’s previous monographs is The School of the Church: Worship and Christian Formation (Trinity Press International, 1995), whose sixth chapter, “Worship and Christian Formation,” has long been required reading in my courses on sacred music. Now Pfatteicher has given us a fullscale treatment of the church year, with detailed chapters on: Advent, Christmas, the Epiphany, Quadragesima/Lent, the Great and Holy Week, Easter/Pascha, Ordinary [Ordered] Time, and the Sanctoral Cycle. As he considers the church year he draws on “the treasury of classic hymns as expressions of the themes of the Church year,” noting that “One of the purposes of the inclusion of classic hymns in this study is to draw people away from thin and repetitive songs toward more nourishing fare” (xii). This is a rich study that at once complements and is more engaging than two earlier, seminal works: Adolf Adam, The Liturgical Year: Its History and Its Meaning after the Reform of the Liturgy (Pueblo, 1981), and Thomas J. Talley, The Origin of the Liturgical Year (Pueblo, 1986). __________________________________________

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Paul J. Grime, “Inclusive Liturgical Language: Off-Ramp to Apostasy?”

Concordia Theological Quarterly 78 (January/April 2014): 3–22.

Near the end of 1523 Martin Luther wrote to his long-time friend Georg Spalatin to enlist his help in providing German translations of psalms for the people to sing, “so that the Word of God may be among the people also in the form of music” (Luther’s Works [LW] 49:68). Luther stressed to Spalatin the necessity of using “only the simplest and the most common words” (LW 49:69). In this insightful article, Paul Grime demonstrates how the more recent insistence on inclusive language can take us very far indeed from Luther’s desire for direct expression in the language of the people.

More seriously, inclusive language may introduce theological error, as, for example, when the titles “Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier” are used to substitute for “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” Grime observes: “Using the title of ‘Creator’ for the Father is inadequate, given that the scriptures also speak of the participation of the Son and Spirit in the work of creation” (21). He cautions that adjustments in language for the sake of our contemporaneous sense of inclusivity have “served as an off-ramp to apostasy. What may have begun as good intentions by some has led the church quite astray” (22). __________________________________________

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Reading and Listening continued Alan Ludwig, “Mission in the Psalms,”

Listening

In examining “the mission theology of the Psalms,” Alan Ludwig points out that in the Book of Psalms “Proper thanksgiving and praise to the Lord includes recounting his merciful character and saving deeds” (13). Through reference to numerous psalms, he shows that praise is linked with the proclamation of God’s work of salvation. Luther, of course, knew this well, writing in the preface to a 1538 collection of sacred music that we “praise God with both word and music . . . by proclaiming [the Word of God] through music” (LW 53:323, emphasis added). Ludwig adds that “this praise to God is at the same time proclamation to fellow priests [I Peter 2] in the gathered church, and also to the nations. . . . [T]he Psalms show that there can be no dichotomy between missions and liturgy. In fact, proper liturgy is the foundation of missions” (18). With respect to the work of Lutheran church musicians, here is one final quotation from Ludwig: “Therefore, to the degree that we care about a lost world, to the same degree we should attend to the artistic quality of our ritual, our music, our hymnody, and to our conduct of these, so as to adorn and not deface the Christ whom we preach” (19). Lutheran church musicians will profit greatly by reading and considering carefully Ludwig’s thoughts on the Book of Psalms. __________________________________________

Josquin des Prez, Missa Ave maris stella: Celebrating the Annunciation in Renaissance Rome (Cappella Pratensis)

Logia 23 (Holy Trinity 2014): 11–19.

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[2014, Challenge Classics CC 72632]

Martin Luther memorably praised Josquin des Prez (ca. 1450-55–1521) by stating “God has preached the gospel through music too, as may be seen in Josquin. . . .” (LW 54: 129–30). Luther’s high praise for Josquin has been echoed down through the centuries, Josquin being considered the finest composer of the musical Renaissance, the composer who essentially sets the musical language for the sixteenth century. In addition to recognizing the finest art music of his time, by composers such as Josquin and Ludwig Senfl, Luther also wished to retain Latin chant, stating on one occasion late in his life (Table Talk, 25 June 1539): “It would be good to keep the whole liturgy with its music, omitting only the canon” (LW 54: 361). In addition to the superb singing of Cappella Pratensis (eight male singers), this recording of Josquin’s Missa Ave maris stella, one of the most frequently recorded of Josquin’s settings of the Mass Ordinary, also includes a complete plainchant Mass Proper, here for the Saturday Mass for the Blessed Virgin during Advent, as observed in the Sistine Chapel in Rome (Josquin became a singer in the papal choir in 1489). Thus, this recording provides us a taste of the musical world that Luther inherited and wished to perpetuate—the genius of Josquin’s polyphony, and the beauty of the church’s long tradition of Latin chant. __________________________________________

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Reading and Listening continued Dieterich Buxtehude, Opera Omnia: Vocal Works, 8: Sacred Concertos, Arias, and Miscellaneous Pieces

(Ton Koopman) [2013, Challenge Classics CC 72257]

In the previous issue of this newsletter I noted volume seven in Ton Koopman’s complete traversal of Dieterich Buxtehude’s (ca. 1637–1707) sacred vocal music. Here in volume eight (2 CDs) he completes this project, giving us both Latin- and German-texted settings, sixteen in all. Buxtehude’s “Gen Himmel zu dem Vater mein” is a vocal concerto—scored modestly for solo soprano, violin, viola da gamba, and continuo—that sets the last two stanzas of Luther’s “Nun freut euch, lieben Christen gmein” (“Dear Christians, One and All, Rejoice,” LSB 556). Buxtehude quotes brief portions of the chorale tune—sufficient to make it recognizable to twenty-first-century Lutheran singers and listeners.

Other chorale texts set by Buxtehude in volume eight include “Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme” (LSB 516) and “Wie soll ich dich empfangen” (LSB 334). As was true for the first seven volumes in this series, this recording captures fine performances of music originally heard by our seventeenth-century Lutheran forebears in the north German city of Lübeck, music that is infrequently heard today. __________________________________________

Georg Philipp Telemann, Luther Cantatas (Bach Consort Leipzig,

Sächsisches Barockorchester, Gotthold Schwarz) [2013, cpo 777 753-2] Gotthold Schwarz and his musicians present five sacred cantatas by Georg Philipp Telemann (1681– 1767), four of them with texts by the Hamburg poet and Lutheran pastor Erdmann Neumeister (1671– 1756). The cantata “Es wollt uns Gott genädig sein” takes as its point of departure Luther’s chorale text, a paraphrase of Psalm 67 in three stanzas (LSB 823). But the cantata text is Neumeister’s reinterpretation of Luther’s chorale, stanzas one and two each heard twice in Telemann’s cantata— first as a straightforward setting of the chorale melody for chorus, then in newly composed duet versions of that same Neumeister text. Thus, what fascinates here is, on the one hand, continuity—the use of the sixteenth-century chorale melody by the chorus, and, on the other hand, transformation— Neumeister’s poetic reinterpretation of Luther’s text, and, in the duets, Telemann’s music, which always seems to look ahead a bit to the newer galant style of the second third of the eighteenth century, this cantata coming from Telemann’s 1742– 1743 cantata cycle. In sum, this recording allows us to sample a fascinating part of the Lutheran vocal repertory, contemporaneous with that of J. S. Bach (who knew Telemann and chose him as baptismal sponsor for his son Carl Philipp Emanuel), but in an emerging newer musical style. __________________________________________ Arkiv Music www.arkiv.com Challenge Classics www.challengerecords.com cpo www.jpc.de/jpcng/cpo/home/ Oxford University Press global.oup.com

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