November 10, 1999

Church music ending century
on a similar note to its start
___By Mark Wingfield
___Managing Editor
___In the eyes of one church leader, the situation was dire. Hymns were being replaced in Baptist churches by more popular, contemporary tunes, and the use of the traditional hymnal was fading.
___So this church leader wrote: "For some years it has been apparent that the rage for novelties in singing ... has been driving out the use of the old, precious, standard hymns. They are not memorized as of old. They are scarcely sung at all. They are not contained in the non-denominational song books, which in many churches have usurped the places of our old hymnbooks. We cannot afford to lose these old hymns. ... But the young people today are unfamiliar with them and will seldom hear any of them if the present tendency goes on untouched."
___Although it sounds like 1999, the year actually was 1891, and the writer was Basil Manly Jr., a founding professor of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.
___Manly's lament was published in the preface to his own hymnal, called "The Choice: A Selection of Approved Hymns for Baptist Churches."
___The target of Manly's frustration was the so-called "gospel song," which began gaining influence in the late 19th century. These simple and popular songs grew out of the Sunday School movement, the camp meeting revivalist movement and folk song traditions.
___Those who wrote and taught these gospel songs never intended them to replace hymns in church worship, explained Paul Richardson, professor of church music at Samford University in Birmingham, Ala.
___"Many of the people who wrote gospel songs said very clearly that this was not intended to be the main music for worship in the church," he said. "It was intended to serve an outreach function. I think that tends to be true of most of the popular styles that come

BILL REYNOLDS displays a variety of hymnals used by Baptists in the 20th century. The books range from non-denominational gospel song books to collections of denominational hymnody.

along. They're really intended to be used for outreach rather than nourishing people in the church."
___Manly, who came from the more formal Charleston tradition in Southern Baptist life, preferred the classic 18th and 19th century hymns for worship. So did many other church leaders. But the people in the pew, many of whom had come to faith through revival meetings where gospel songs were the norm, favored the newer music for sentimental as well and practical reasons.
___"There was the influence of people attending the revival meetings and wanting to go home and experience the same kind of emotional catharsis in their churches," added David Music, professor of church music at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. "The gospel song started out as para-church. ... They weren't trying to start a movement, but it happened through example."
___Fast forward 100 years, and the same divergent opinions about proper church music seem to remain. Only the names of the players and the musical styles have changed, so that the battle today is over hymns versus praise choruses.
___In regard to church music among Baptists, the 20th century is ending much the same as it began, according to a variety of music historians.
___"Choruses and contemporary Christian music may be the gospel song of today," Music said.
___"One of the things I find interesting is that the gospel song relied on the popular music of the day, like the march or the waltz," he explained. "It was basically the musical style of Stephen Foster. Now with the praise chorus and contemporary Christian music, we're doing the same thing--it's just a different style."
___This notion of beginning and ending the century at almost the same place is more true of Southern Baptists than other Protestant denominations in the United States, Music said.
___That's in part because a major influence on Southern Baptists throughout the century has been revivalism, he said. "You can see that reflected in the fact that gospel songs ... continued to be popular with Southern Baptists when most other denominations moved on to something else."
___Even B.B. McKinney, Southern Baptists' best-known and most prolific hymn writer of the 20th century, "wrote pretty much in 19th century gospel song style," he explained.
___The similarities in church music issues between the beginning of the century and the close reach beyond conflicts over musical styles, the historians all pointed out.
___Consider hymnals. At the beginning of the century, Southern Baptists had nothing resembling a common hymnal. Hymnals, or song books, varied widely from one church to the next, and many Baptist churches used hymnals from non-denominational publishers.
___It was not until after World War II, and approaching mid-century, that you could walk into most any Southern Baptist church and find the same hymnal as in your home church, said Bill Reynolds, distinguished professor of church music at Southwestern Seminary and editor of the 1975 Baptist Hymnal.
___The Broadman Hymnal, published by the Southern Baptist Convention's Sunday School Board in 1940, and the 1956 Baptist Hymnal achieved an unprecedented uniformity in hymnody among Southern Baptists, Reynolds said.
___The Broadman Hymnal "probably shaped Southern Baptist worship more than any other book except the Bible," church historian Leon McBeth wrote in the centennial history of the Baptist General Convention of Texas.
___Yet that newfound uniformity was to be short-lived. By the time the SBC again published a hymnal--which was not until 1975--the Baptist church music scene was beginning to feel the influences of the Jesus movement, the charismatic movement and a return to folk music influences. A wide variety of hymnals and song books were available to churches from a variety of publishers, and churches began once again to make individual decisions based more on their own worship styles than on denominational identity.
___The old became new again.
___Yet in between these similar starting and ending points, much change occurred. During the 20th century--and more precisely during the last two-thirds of the century--music became an institutional presence in Southern Baptist churches, the historians explained.
___The trend of churches hiring music ministers started during this period, as did the idea of adult choirs, youth choirs and children's choirs. Seminaries saw the need to train church musicians, with Southwestern Seminary being the first to open a school of gospel music.
___The Sunday School Board created its church music department in 1935, an action that had a ripple effect through churches and state conventions. Ten years later, the BGCT established its own church music department.
___Musical training blossomed in Baptist churches, with training for young and old alike. This influence fed the youth choir bonanza of the 1960s and 1970s, as well as the growth of large adult choirs in Baptist churches today, said Sam Prestidge, retired music director for the BGCT.
___Prestidge said he is amazed at the level of musical difficulty church choirs routinely tackle today, a feat made possible by years of music education.
___"When I went to Baylor in 1946, we spent all fall working on the 'Messiah.' Now churches do it in two or three weeks. ... It's amazing what choirs are doing nowadays, and the size of some of them."
___Some church music leaders fear this advancement may prove to be short-lived.
___The impetus for serious church music education and a greater understanding of music in worship "had its zenith and decline in the same century," said Don Hustad, distinguished professor of church music at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky.
___What the future holds, no one seems willing to speculate.
___In Baptist congregations across the nation, virtual battle lines have been drawn over worship styles. Some churches market themselves like radio stations--all contemporary all the time or all oldies all the time.
___"At the end of the century, music has become the determining feature of worship," Hustad noted. "Music is the prime feature of worship in our day. Some have said it is the new denominationalism--we choose our church according to its music."
___In the seminaries, church music educators struggle to know how to respond.
___"Our church music schools are really wrestling with the question of how they're going to attract students and when they get there what they're going to teach them," Hustad said.
___In denominational offices, leaders also are searching for answers, even questioning whether it would be wise to publish a printed-and-hardbound hymnal the next time around.
___It's been nearly a decade since the SBC's last hymnal project, and officials at LifeWay Christian Resources are beginning to think about what comes next, said Mark Blankenship, LifeWay's church music director.
___But it's premature to write off hymns and traditional liturgy forever, Blankenship insisted.
___While the majority of young people in churches today are leaning toward contemporary praise and worship music, "there is a group that is holding on to a style of music that is more traditional," he said.
___"I personally think we're going to see in the next 30 to 40 years the development of a new hymnody. I think there is going to be the development of a lot of hymnic, gospel song and hymn material that is in a different musical style."
___Music agreed, noting the number of new hymns already being written could make the late 20th century the "second golden age of English hymnody."
___That's ironic, he admitted, given the parallel trend toward choruses. Perhaps the only way to explain the dichotomy is through a phrase coined by another scholar, he said. That author talks about "convergence worship."
___Some churches are finding they can "follow the Christian year and sing choruses," Music said. "Whether that will be the wave of the future or die out, who knows?"

OTHER CHURCH MUSIC STORIES:

• Key figures in church music in 20th century
• Talk about 'our' worship rather than 'my' worship, Greer advises
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