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Fred Kaan

1929 - 2009 Author of "O God, Who Gave Humanity Its Name" in Chalice Hymnal Fred Kaan Hymn writer. His hymns include both original work and translations. He sought to address issues of peace and justice. He was born in Haarlem in the Netherlands in July 1929. He was baptised in St Bavo Cathedral but his family did not attend church regularly. He lived through the Nazi occupation, saw three of his grandparents die of starvation, and witnessed his parents deep involvement in the resistance movement. They took in a number of refugees. He became a pacifist and began attending church in his teens. Having become interested in British Congregationalism (later to become the United Reformed Church) through a friendship, he was attended Western College in Bristol. He was ordained in 1955 at the Windsor Road Congregational Church in Barry, Glamorgan. In 1963 he was called to be minister of the Pilgrim Church in Plymouth. It was in this congregation that he began to write hymns. The first edition of Pilgrim Praise was published in 1968, going into second and third editions in 1972 and 1975. He continued writing many more hymns throughout his life. Dianne Shapiro, from obituary written by Keith Forecast in Independent (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/fred-kaan-minister-and-celebrated-hymn-writer-1809481.html)

Frank von Christierson

1900 - 1996 Person Name: Frank von Christierson, 1900-1996 Author of "Eternal Spirit of the Living Christ" in Worship and Rejoice Frank von Christierson (1900-1996) was born near Helsinki, Finland. He attended San Jose (California) High School, Stanford University (BA, Psychology, 1923), and San Francisco Theological Seminary (BD 1929). In 1983 he was awarded the citation of distinguished alumnus, and became a Fellow of The Hymn Society. He has served as youth director at First Presbyterian Church, San Luis Obispo, and pastor at Calvary Presbyterian Church, Citrus Heights, California. He has published a hymnal collection entitled Make a Joyful Noise (1987) and is represented in many hymnals. Three of his hymn texts have been included in the new Hope hymnal Worship & Rejoice (2001). http://www.hopepublishing.com/html ========================= After serving for thirty-seven years as a minister of the United Presbyterian Church in Berkeley, North Hollywood and Sacramento, California, Rev. Frank con Christierson has retired to serve as "Interim minister" in the Central Area of the Synod of California. He has been moderator of San Francisco Presbytery and of Los Angeles Presbytery, and has just completed three years as chairman of radio and television for the Sacramento Area Council of Churches. Born in Finland, he was brought to America as a boy of four. He is a graduate of Stanford University and of San Francisco Theological Seminary. He has written five hymns published by the Hymn Society of America. --Fifteen New Bible Hymns, 1966. Used by permission.

Timothy Dudley-Smith

1926 - 2024 Person Name: Timothy Dudley-Smith (b. 1926) Author of "As in that upper room you left your seat" in Wonder, Love, and Praise Timothy Dudley-Smith (b. 1926) Educated at Pembroke College and Ridley Hall, Cambridge, Dudley-Smith has served the Church of England since his ordination in 1950. He has occupied a number of church positions, including parish priest in the diocese of Southwark (1953-1962), archdeacon of Norwich (1973-1981), and bishop of Thetford, Norfolk, from 1981 until his retirement in 1992. He also edited a Christian magazine, Crusade, which was founded after Billy Graham's 1955 London crusade. Dudley-Smith began writing comic verse while a student at Cambridge; he did not begin to write hymns until the 1960s. Many of his several hundred hymn texts have been collected in Lift Every Heart: Collected Hymns 1961-1983 (1984), Songs of Deliverance: Thirty-six New Hymns (1988), and A Voice of Singing (1993). The writer of Christian Literature and the Church (1963), Someone Who Beckons (1978), and Praying with the English Hymn Writers (1989), Dudley-Smith has also served on various editorial committees, including the committee that published Psalm Praise (1973). Bert Polman

Richard Hillert

1923 - 2010 Person Name: Richard W. Hillert, b. 1923 Arranger of "SURSUM CORDA" in Hymnal Supplement 98 Richard Hillert was born in Granton, Clark County, Wis., on March 14, 1923. There he attended parochial and public schools and later enrolled at Concordia Teachers College (now Concordia University Chicago), River Forest, where he received the Bachelor of Science degree in Education. He served as teacher and music director for parishes in St. Louis, Mo., Wausau, Wis., and Chicago and Westchester, Ill. He received both the Master of Music and the Doctor of Music degrees in composition from Northwestern University, Evanston, Ill. His teachers included Matthew Nathaniel Lundquist, Anthony Donato, Alan Stout, Arrand Parsons, Emil Nolte, and John Ohl. He studied composition with the Italian composer, Goffredo Petrassi, at Aaron Copland’s Berkshire Music Center, Tanglewood, Mass. Richard Hillert was a noted Lutheran composer. He was Distinguished Professor of Music Emeritus at Concordia University Chicago, River Forest, Ill. He was best known for his work as a composer and teacher of composition. Among his most frequently performed liturgical works for congregation is Worthy Is Christ, with its antiphon, “This is the Feast of Victory” which was written as an alternate Song of Praise for inclusion in Setting One of the Holy Communion in Lutheran Book of Worship (1978) and Lutheran Worship (1982). "This is the Feast" is now widely published in more than 20 recent worship books of many denominations, most recently in Lutheran Service Book (2006) and Evangelical Lutheran Worship (2006). Other major liturgical works include a setting of Evening Prayer (1984) and a Eucharistic Festival Liturgy (1983), which was first performed at Holy Name Cathedral in Chicago. He wrote liturgical pieces and hymns and served as music editor for Worship Supplement(1969) and Lutheran Book of Worship (1978). His compositions and publications include an array of pieces of liturgical music for congregation, choral motets, hymns and hymn anthems, psalm settings and organ works, concertatos, and cantatas, including settings of The Christmas Story According to Saint Luke and The Passion According to Saint John. He edited eleven volumes of the Concordia Hymn Prelude Series. Hillert's career as Professor of Music at Concordia (now Concordia University Chicago) spanned four decades, from 1959 to 1993. During this time he taught classes in music theory and composition, music literature, 20th century music, orchestration, keyboard instruction, comparative arts and liturgical worship. He served in various capacities in the music department, as chair in 1964-65 and from 1986–89, as coordinator of the Master of Church Music program, and as associate editor of the journal Church Music (1966–80). Non-liturgical compositions include symphonic works for orchestra (Symphony in Three Movements, Variations for Orchestra, Suite for Strings), chamber works for small orchestra and ensembles (Alternations for Seven Instruments, Divertimento I and II) as well as many works for keyboard, instrumental solos and songs. The latter include Sonata for Piano (1961), a violin sonata, and two sonatas for flute and keyboard. Major organ works include Prelude and Toccata, Ricercata, Passacaglia on Innocent Sounds, Partita on Picardy, and Partita on Atkinson. There are also concert works with sacred texts, such as Five Canticles from the Exodus (1958), Te Deum for two pianos, percussion, and wind instruments (1962), The Alleluiatic Sequence (1980), and Seven Psalms of Grace for baritone solo and chamber orchestra (1998). Extended choral works, many written for Concordia’s Kapelle conducted by Thomas Gieschen, include the Cantata: "May God Bestow on Us His Grace" (1964), "Motet for the Day of Pentecost" for choir, vibraphone, and prepared electronic tape (written for the round-the-world tour in 1969), "Motet for the Time of Easter" for double choir, percussion, and harp (1971), and "Agnus Dei" for three choirs and percussion instruments (1974). Richard Hillert authored numerous scholarly articles and reviews for the periodicals such as Church Music, CrossAccent, and Currents in Theology and Mission, and other professional books and journals. He received an honorary Doctor of Sacred Music degree from Valparaiso University, and honorary Doctor of Letters degrees from Concordia University at Seward, Nebraska, and Concordia Seminary, St. Louis. He was an honorary life member of the Association of Lutheran Church Musicians. His former students throughout the land have careers as practicing church musicians, elementary and secondary school teachers, teachers in higher education, music editors and publishers, and composers. Richard Hillert was married to Gloria Bonnin Hillert. They had three children: Kathryn Brewer, Virginia and Jonathan Hillert. --en.wikipedia.org

Michael D. Schultz

Person Name: Michael D. Schultz, b. 1963 Author of "From High Atop the Mount" in Christian Worship

Shirley Erena Murray

1931 - 2020 Person Name: Shirley Erena Murray, 1931- Author of "O Christ Who by a Cross" in Community of Christ Sings Shirley Erena Murray (b. Invercargill, New Zealand, 1931) studied music as an undergraduate but received a master’s degree (with honors) in classics and French from Otago University. Her upbringing was Methodist, but she became a Presbyterian when she married the Reverend John Stewart Murray, who was a moderator of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand. Shirley began her career as a teacher of languages, but she became more active in Amnesty International, and for eight years she served the Labor Party Research Unit of Parliament. Her involvement in these organizations has enriched her writing of hymns, which address human rights, women’s concerns, justice, peace, the integrity of creation, and the unity of the church. Many of her hymns have been performed in CCA and WCC assemblies. In recognition for her service as a writer of hymns, the New Zealand government honored her as a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit on the Queen’s birthday on 3 June 2001. Through Hope Publishing House, Murray has published three collections of her hymns: In Every Corner Sing (eighty-four hymns, 1992), Everyday in Your Spirit (forty-one hymns, 1996), and Faith Makes the Song (fifty hymns, 2002). The New Zealand Hymnbook Trust, for which she worked for a long time, has also published many of her texts (cf. back cover, Faith Makes the Song). In 2009, Otaga University conferred on her an honorary doctorate in literature for her contribution to the art of hymn writing. I-to Loh, Hymnal Companion to “Sound the Bamboo”: Asian Hymns in Their Cultural and Liturgical Context, p. 468, ©2011 GIA Publications, Inc., Chicago

Walter C. Riess

Person Name: Walter C. Riess, 1925- Author of "O Lord of Love, Whose Truth Our Lives Adorn" in Worship Supplement

Rabindranath Tagore

1861 - 1941 Person Name: Rabindranath Tagore, 1861-1941 Author of "Now I Recall My Childhood" in Singing the Living Tradition Bengali poet, novelist, musician, and playwright. Tagore was the first Asian to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, which was awarded to him in 1913..

Alan Gaunt

1935 - 2023 Person Name: Alan Gaunt (1935-) Versifier of "People Draw Near to God in Their Distress" in Common Praise (1998)

Carl P. Daw Jr.

b. 1944 Person Name: Ian Pitt-Watson, 1923-1995 Paraphraser of "You are before me, Lord" in The Book of Praise Carl P. Daw, Jr. (b. Louisville, KY, 1944) is the son of a Baptist minister. He holds a PhD degree in English (University of Virginia) and taught English from 1970-1979 at the College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, Virginia. As an Episcopal priest (MDiv, 1981, University of the South, Sewanee, Tennesee) he served several congregations in Virginia, Connecticut and Pennsylvania. From 1996-2009 he served as the Executive Director of The Hymn Society in the United States and Canada. Carl Daw began to write hymns as a consultant member of the Text committee for The Hymnal 1982, and his many texts often appeared first in several small collections, including A Year of Grace: Hymns for the Church Year (1990); To Sing God’s Praise (1992), New Psalms and Hymns and Spiritual Songs (1996), Gathered for Worship (2006). Other publications include A Hymntune Psalter (2 volumes, 1988-1989) and Breaking the Word: Essays on the Liturgical Dimensions of Preaching (1994, for which he served as editor and contributed two essays. In 2002 a collection of 25 of his hymns in Japanese was published by the United Church of Christ in Japan. He wrote Glory to God: A Companion (2016) for the 2013 hymnal of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). Emily Brink