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Lowell Mason

1792 - 1872 Person Name: Dr. L. Mason Hymnal Number: 171 Composer of "[And can I yet delay]" in Crowning Glory No. 1 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 1869. 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). Biography of Gospel Song and Hymn Writers. New York: Fleming H. Revell Company.

William T. Sleeper

1819 - 1904 Person Name: Rev. W. T. Sleeper Hymnal Number: 137 Author of "Ye Must be Born Again" in Crowning Glory No. 1 Sleeper, W. T. is given in I. D. Sankey’s Sacred Songs & Solos, 1881, as the author of “A ruler once came to Jesus by night” (Need for the New Birth). --John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology, Appendix, Part II (1907) =============== William T. Sleeper (1819-1904)] Born: February 9, 1819, Danbury, New Hampshire. Died: September 24, 1904, Wellesley, Massachusetts. Sleeper attended Phillips-Exeter Academy, the University of Vermont, and the Andover Theological Seminary. After ordination, he conducted home ministry work in Massachusetts and Maine. He later became pastor of the Summer Street Congregational Church in Worcester, Massachusetts, where he served over 30 years. His works include: The Rejected King, and Hymns of Jesus, 1883. -- www.hymntime.com

Thomas Shepherd

1665 - 1739 Person Name: Thomas Shehperd Hymnal Number: 194 Author of "Cross and Crown" in Crowning Glory No. 1 Shepherd, Thomas, son of William Shepherd, sometime Vicar of Tilbrook, Bedfordshire, and subsequently a Nonconformist Minister at Oundle, and at Kettering, was born in 1665. Taking Holy Orders he held for some time preferment in Huntingdonshire, and in Buckinghamshire. Seceding from the Church of England, he became, in 1694, pastor of the Castle Hill Meeting House (Independent), Nottingham, of which Dr. Doddridge was subsequently pastor. In 1700 he removed to Bocking, near Braintree, Essex, where he began his work in a barn. A chapel was erected for his congregation in 1707. He died Jan. 29, 1739. His publications consisted chiefly of Sermons, His Penitential Cries were a continuance of those by John Mason, who wrote the first six and the version of Ps. 86, and were published with Mason's Songs of Praise in 1693. It must be noted that in D. Sedgwick's reprint of the Songs, and the Penitential Cries, in 1859, Mason's Cries are under the head of Songs, &c, pp. 49-61, and those under Penitential Cries, are all by Shepherd. Some of these Cries are still in common use including, "My God, my God, my Light, my Love " (Longing for God) ; and "When wilt Thou come unto me, Lord" (Communion with God desired). -- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)

George Washington Doane

1799 - 1859 Person Name: G. W. Doane Hymnal Number: 144 Author of "Softly Now the Light of Day" in Crowning Glory No. 1 Doane, George Washington, D.D. Bishop Doane was born at Trenton, New Jersey, May 27, 1799, and graduated at Union College, Schenectady, New York. Ordained in 1821, he was Assistant Minister at Trinity Church, New York, till 1824. In 1824 he became a Professor at Trinity College, Hartford, Conn.; in 1828 Rector of Trinity Church, Boston; and, in 1832, Bishop of New Jersey. He founded St. Mary's Hall, Burlington, 1837, and Burlington College, Burlington, 1846. Died April 27, 1859. Bishop Doane's exceptional talents, learning, and force of character, made him one of the great prelates of his time. His warmth of heart secured devoted friends, who still cherish his memory with revering affection. He passed through many and severe troubles, which left their mark upon his later verse. He was no mean poet, and a few of his lyrics are among our best. His Works, in 4 volumes with Memoir by his son, were published in 1860. He issued in 1824 Songs by the Way, a small volume of great merit and interest. This edition is now rare. A second edition, much enlarged, appeared after his death, in 1859, and a third, in small 4to, in 1875. These include much matter of a private nature, such as he would not himself have given to the world, and by no means equal to his graver and more careful lyrics, on which alone his poetic fame must rest.The edition of 1824 contains several important hymns, some of which have often circulated without his name. Two of these are universally known as his, having been adopted by the American Prayer Book Collection, 1826:-- 1. Softly now the light of day. Evening. This, in addition to its use in American hymnals, is also found in the English Collections, including Snepp's Songs of Grace & Glory. Written in 1824. 2. Thou art the way, to Thee alone. Christ the Way. This, in the judgment of many, is the first of American hymns, and one of the most admirable and useful in the English language. In the United States its use is most extensive, and since its introduction into the English Collections by Bickersteth in 1833, Hall in his Mitre, in 1836, and others, it has grown in favour until it ranks with the most popular of the great English hymns. Near in merit to the foregoing stands a companion piece in the same work, which deserves to be better known :— 3. Lord, should we leave Thy hallowed feet. The next three have been overlooked at home, but have obtained considerable circulation in English Collections. 4. Father of mercies hear, Thy pardon we implore. Ash Wednesday or Lent. A translation of "Audi, benigne Conditor" q.v.), published in his Songs by the Way, 1824, together with several other translations, thus anticipating by twelve years the great English movement in that direction. Original translation in his Songs by the Way, 1875Miller (S. & S., p. 12) attributes this translation to Dr. Neale in error. 5. Return and come to God. Invitation. In his Songs, &c, 1824. It is found in Hall’s Mitre, 1836; the Baptist Hymnal, 1879, and several others. 6. To thee, 0 Lord, with dawning light. Morning. This hymn is attributed to Heber by Miller (S. & S. , p. 381) in error. It is included in the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge Hymns, 1852; in Windle and others. It is from the Songs, &c, 1824. His later hymns, the dates of which are generally preserved in the last edition of his Songs by the Way, include the following, which are more or less in use :— 7. Beloved, it is well. All well in Christ. This is entitled "To my wife"; is dated Mar. 12, 1833, and was written in a copy of Dr. Bedell's "It is well." It is given in Kennedy, 1863. 8. Broken-hearted, weep no more. Assurance of Peace. The date of this hymn is not preserved. It is found as early as 1829, when it appeared in the 2nd edition of Cleland's (Baptist) Hymns. 9. Fling out the banner, let it float. Missions, Home & Foreign. This hymn, sometimes dated 1824 in error, was written at Riverside, 2nd Sunday in Advent, 1848, and is one of the author's latest effusions. It is in extensive use both in Great Britain and America. 10. He came not with His heavenly crown. The two Advents. In his Songs by the Way, edition 1875, this poem is dated Dec. 1827. In Dale's English Hymnbook, 1879, it is given with the omission of stanza iii., and in the American Protestant Episcopal Hymnal, 1871, it begins with stanza iv., "Once more, O Lord, Thy sign shall be." Full text in Lyra Sac. Amer., p. 92. 11. Lift not thou the wailing voice. Burial. A funeral hymn, adopted by the Anglican Hymnbook, but dated 1826 in error, for 1830. 12. What is that, mother? The lark, my child. This is not a hymn, but a familiar and long popular song. 13. "When darkness erst [once] at God's command. Israel in Egypt. In Kennedy, 1863, No. 722. 14. Young and happy while thou art. Youth for Christ. A favourite piece in many juvenile collections. It is dated Sept., 1827, and is given in Songs by the Way, 1875. The Lyra Sacra Americana also contains the following:— 15. Brightness of the Father's glory. Morning. A tr. of "Consors Paterni luminis " (q.v.). It is from the Songs, &c, 1824. 16. Child that kneelest meekly there. Child at Prayer. Suggested by a cast from a piece of sculpture by Greenough representing a child at prayer. 17. Grant me, Lord, Thy graces three. Faith, Hope, and Charity desired. 18. Perfect through suffering may it be. Uses of suffering. Dated in Songs by the Way, "The Breakers, June 1, 1853." 19. Yes, it is a faithful saying. Redemption. In his Songs, &c, 1824. [Rev. F. M. Bird, M.A.] -- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)

Hattie E. Buell

1834 - 1910 Hymnal Number: 67 Author of "The Child of a King!" in Crowning Glory No. 1 Hattie (Katie) Eugenia Peck Buell USA 1834-1910. Born in Cazenovia, NY, she lived in Manlius, NY, until 1898, then moved to Washington, D.C., but maintained a summer residence at Thousand Island Park, NY. She married Willard Barnes Buell, and they had two sons. Her husband died in 1905. She wrote poems to the Northern Christian Advocate in Syracuse, NY. John Perry

William G. Tomer

1833 - 1896 Person Name: W. G. Tomer Hymnal Number: 112 Composer of "[God be with you till we meet again]" in Crowning Glory No. 1 Born: October 5, 1833, New Jersey. Died: September 26, 1896, New Jersey. Buried: Union Cemetery, Finesville, New Jersey. Tomer studied singing and sang in the choir in Finesville, New Jersey, and began teaching school at age 17. He served in the Union army during the American civil war, then worked as a clerk in Washington, DC, served as music director for Grace Methodist Episcopal Church, and taught school in New Carpentersville and Greenwich, New Jersey. He was living in Greenwich as of 1880. --www.cyberhymnal.org/

Julia H. Johnston

1849 - 1919 Person Name: Miss J. H. Johnston Hymnal Number: 93 Author of "What Time I am Afraid" in Crowning Glory No. 1 Julia Harriet Johnston, who was born on Jan. 21, 1849, at Salineville, OH, in Columbiana County. Her father was a minister and he mother was a poet. She began writing when she was nine years old but really started writing verse in high school. She lived in Peoria, Ill. Dianne Shapiro, from "The Singers and Their Songs: sketches of living gospel hymn writers" by Charles Hutchinson Gabriel (Chicago: The Rodeheaver Company, 1916)

J. B. Atchinson

1840 - 1882 Person Name: Rev. J. B. Atchinson Hymnal Number: 77 Author of "Let the Savior In" in Crowning Glory No. 1 Atchinson, Jonathan Bush, born at Wilson, New York, Feb. 17, 1840, and "licensed as a Methodist Preacher," Sept. 6, 1874. Of his hymns the following are the best known:— 1. Behold the stone is rolled away. [Easter.] This was Mr. Atchinson's first hymn. It appeared in the Sunday School Times, Dec. 1874. It is not in use in Great Britain. 2. Fully persuaded, Lord, I believe. [Faith.] Written in 1874 or 1875, and first published in Gospel Hymns, No. 1. It is given in I. D. Sankey's Sacred Songs & Solos, No. 149, with music by W. F. Sherwin. 3. I have read of a beautiful city. [Heaven.] Written about the same time as the former, and published in Gospel Hymns. It is given in I. D. Sankey's Sacred Songs & Solos, No. 403, with music by O. F. Presbrey. 4. O crown of rejoicing that's waiting for me. [The Reward .] This hymn is also in I. D. Sankey's Sacred Songs & Solos, No. 174, where it is set to music by P. Bliss. [Rev. F. M. Bird, M.A.] -- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)

C. E. Leslie

Hymnal Number: 157 Composer of "[When my work is finished!]" in Crowning Glory No. 1

William Ellsworth Witter

1854 - 1954 Person Name: W. E. Witter Hymnal Number: 140 Author of "While Jesus whispers" in Crowning Glory No. 1 Witter, Will Ellsworth, was born Dec. 9, 1854, near La Grange, New York, and educated at the Genessee State Normal School, New York, and the University of Rochester. From the latter he passed in 1880 to the Rochester Baptist Theological Seminary, and in 1884 he entered the Baptist Ministry. He has written several songs and poems, one of which:— While Jesus whispers to you (The Divine Call) has come into somewhat prominent use. It was written in July 1878, and originated mainly in the great anxiety of the author respecting two of his pupils. In 1878 it was set to music by H. R. Palmer, and included in his Book of Anthems, 1878: from whence it passed into Good as Gold, and I. D. Sankey's Sacred Songs and Solos, London 1881. -- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)