The Musical Heritage of the Church Volume IV
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The Musical Heritage of the Church Volume IV Edited by Theodore Hoelty-Nickel Valparaiso, Indiana The Musical Heritage of the Lutheran Church Volume IV Table of Contents Editor‘s Preface Foreword Introduction Worship, Its Holiness, Spirit, and Truth M. Alfred Bichsel, Valparaiso University Church Music Reform Theo. Hoelty-Nickel, Valparaiso University Johann Gottfried Walther (1684–1748) Walter E. Buszin, Concordia Seminary, St. Louis The Editorial Practice of George Rhaw Leo Schrade, Yale University Heinrich Schütz and Johann S. Bach in the Protestant Liturgy Leo Schrade, Yale University Cultural Values of Church Music and Liturgical Worship Walter E. Buszin, Concordia Seminary, St. Louis Musicology in the Service of Church Music Hans Rosenwald, New York The Rise and Decline of English Church Music Donald N. Ferguson, Emeritus, University of Minnesota The Problem of Creating Suitable English Translations for the Great Masterpieces of Lutheran Choral Music Elmer Foelber, Editor, Concordia Publishing House The Musical Heritage in the Life of the Congregation Martin J. Bangert, Sheboygan, Wis. Toward the Future Carl Halter, Concordia Teachers College, River Forest, Ill. From The Musical Heritage of the Church, Volume IV (St. Louis, Mo.: Concordia Publishing House, 1954). Copyright Concordia Publishing House. Printed by permission. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of Concordia Publishing House. For personal use only. Page 2 The Musical Heritage of the Lutheran Church Volume IV Editor’s Preface The essays contained in this volume were presented at the Valparaiso Church Music Seminar during the summer sessions from 1947 to 1952. They are being published as Volume IV of the Musical Heritage Series. It has been our policy to publish this material as it was presented at our conferences. The opinions expressed are those of the writers and do not necessarily reflect our point of view. The editor wishes to extend his appreciation to Professor E. Foelber and his staff for many editorial suggestions. Also to Messrs. J. P. Miller, L. A. Miller, and C. I. Miller for the establishment of the J. P. Miller Church Music Foundation, which has made possible the continuation of these publications. Theo. Hoelty-Nickel Valparaiso University February 8, 1954 Foreword This volume marks the tenth anniversary of the Church Music Seminar of Valparaiso University. Begun in 1944 under the scholarly leadership of Professor Theo. Hoelty-Nickel, this annual gathering of leaders in the music of the Church has made lastingly significant contributions to an understanding of the magnificent musical heritage of the Lutheran Church. Nor has it neglected other strains of melody in the history of Christendom. Consistently it has sought and found and glorified the good, the true, the beautiful in the musical response of man to the fact of his redemption and the hope of his heaven. Surely few activities are more relevant in our dissonant time. A singing man—singing of faith and God and love—will probably be a believing man. His heart will know what the melodies say and, soon or late, that knowledge will be translated into life. Our colleagues in the Department of Music at Valparaiso University and their co-workers are therefore engaged in an important work. It is doubtful that any Church can argue its way out of the heresy and shoddiness and sentimentality of the twentieth century. Perhaps God will give us a day when we can sing and play our way out of the swampland of our time—returning by way of worship and song to the great truth of our redemption and the eternal verities of the living God. For such a day our musical and liturgical scholars are preparing. More power to them! O. P. Kretzmann The Feast of the Epiphany, 1954 From The Musical Heritage of the Church, Volume IV (St. Louis, Mo.: Concordia Publishing House, 1954). Copyright Concordia Publishing House. Printed by permission. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of Concordia Publishing House. For personal use only. Page 3 The Musical Heritage of the Lutheran Church Volume IV Introduction Church Music Seminars of Valparaiso University Undoubtedly one of the most important departures from the lackadaisical attitude of congregations towards church music is the recent movement initiated by Valparaiso University, Valparaiso, Indiana, which is affiliated with The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod. The movement has for its slogan, ―The Musical Heritage of the Church.‖ Preachers, choirmasters, organists, and other music lovers have united in this movement in order to awaken the Lutheran congregations of America from indifference and to demonstrate to them the greatness and the beauty of the tradition of the Lutheran Church in the field of musical composition. The head of this aggressive circle, which believes in invigorated religious thinking and invigorated church music culture, is Prof. Theodore Hoelty-Nickel, a practitioner of music who has a scholarly outlook on matters musical and under whose guidance the project has made noteworthy progress. The sessions of the church music seminars in Valparaiso are centered in such topics as the Protestant chorale, organ music in the 17th and 18th centuries, a cappella singing, and other topics stressing the relationship of the liturgy and religious thought to music. But the movement is by no means an academic one; on the contrary, Professor Hoelty-Nickel believes that the ―Heritage of the Church‖ is a concept which can be made clear to congregations generally by professional and amateur ensembles combining their efforts to give practical demonstrations of old choral and organ music, both in the services and apart from the services. From the very outset the Valparaiso program has emphasized the necessity of applied scholarship. The principle is explained as the combined activity of scholars and practitioners for the purpose of effecting a restoration of Lutheran church music written between Luther and Bach. This movement should have a decided influence upon all American Protestant Churches. An important contribution to date is the publication of several volumes of lectures delivered at the Church Music Institute and printed by Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis, Mo., which has recently begun to specialize in the publication of the musical heritage of the Church. While until a few years ago church music literature of the 16th to the 18th century was available practically only in esoteric scholarly editions, most of which had to be imported from Germany, we now have in America also a series of good church music of the masters edited for practical purposes in editions which reveal a scholarly attitude and an understanding of style. The writer of this article is happy to report that the music-pioneering Lutherans at Valparaiso University have shown a deep understanding of the strictly musicological issues. As the first musicologist to participate in the program, he was indeed gratified to learn that the members of the movement included in their deliberations, lectures, and discussions leading scholars of the world. To name but a few: Paul Henry Lang, Professor of Musicology at Columbia University, New York; Leo Schrade, Professor of Musicology at Yale; Paul Nettl, Professor of Musicology at Indiana University; and Professor Donald Ferguson, Professor of Music at the University of Minnesota. In formal and informal addresses, these and others have discussed questions concerning Luther, the chorale, the organ music of the Baroque, the performance of old masterworks in general. From The Musical Heritage of the Church, Volume IV (St. Louis, Mo.: Concordia Publishing House, 1954). Copyright Concordia Publishing House. Printed by permission. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of Concordia Publishing House. For personal use only. Page 4 The Musical Heritage of the Lutheran Church Volume IV Most gratifying of all—in addition to the fact that these seminars have attracted musicians from all over America to a little college town in America‘s Midwest—is the enthusiasm which has persisted after the meetings. If congregations on the whole have become more responsive to the better things in choral and organ literature, it is to no small extent due to the vigor of these conferences. Furthermore, the project has increased the demand for special training courses and even special training institutions in which prospective church musicians would acquire the musical experience and the artistic and scholarly knowledge necessary for the understanding of the musical treasure of the past. This demand is now being met. There are available now in the Midwest opportunities for musicians to acquaint themselves with the music of Luther‘s time, with the works of such men as Buxtehude, Pachelbel, Boehm, Kuhnau, and others. More specifically, it can be said that already the interest in the cantatas of Bach and his contemporaries has risen throughout the country largely as a result of the inquiries and investigations by these devotees of church music. Few conferences on music in the past decade have been either as wholesome or as productive as the Valparaiso meetings. Here is one of the few places where today music scholars and artists sit down together to discuss vital issues which in turn will benefit Christian congregations everywhere. The man who has made this situation possible is Theodore Hoelty-Nickel. And one of the few universities which thus far have shown an understanding of the sad state of church music in America and taken definite steps to provide a remedy is Valparaiso University.