What's your favorite Hymn and why?

[Bo Diddley]

[All-American]

fify

[clackamascoug]

Ever since Taysom Hill took his first snap as a BYU QB, audibling a fourth and short into a play-action pass for an easy touchdown, we've all been a little gay.

I thought this was about Hymns - not hims.

[All-American]

I thought this was about Hymns - not hims.

It does add a new layer of meaning to the hymn "Praise to the Man," doesn't it.

[BigFatMeanie]

Boom, the first batch of new hymns has dropped. https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist...ve-of-13-songs

At the risk of being too critical, I must confess that I find this batch of new hymns, well... very underwhelming.

There are some well-known tunes/songs that are brought back: Come Thou Fount, It is Well with My Soul. His Eye is On the Sparrow. Those are generally fine although because they are well known they're not super interesting.

There are a couple of new Sacrament Songs: As Bread is Broken, Bread of Life Living Water. These seemed rather bland to me, but most sacrament songs are.

There is the addition of some old English and French hymns for Easter and Christmas: Hail the Day that Sees Him Rise, He Is Born the Divine Christ Child. These are fine.

But many of the new hymns are sappy Janice-Kapp-Perry-Primary-style songs with only a melody line, or a second singing part at most, that won't sound good on the organ: Gethsemane (way, wary oversung already), I Will Walk with Jesus (same as Gethsemane), Think a Sacred Song. The concept of a single hymnbook for Primary and full congregation may be great for saving on printing and distribution costs, but few primary hymns really work well in a congregation because of their style, so I doubt many congregations will really sing them.

In this batch there is nothing rousing, and not much in the way of four part traditional hymn harmonies.

Here's hoping for better in the next batch.

[All-American]

Boom, the first batch of new hymns has dropped. https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist...ve-of-13-songs

At the risk of being too critical, I must confess that I find this batch of new hymns, well... very underwhelming.

There are some well-known tunes/songs that are brought back: Come Thou Fount, It is Well with My Soul. His Eye is On the Sparrow. Those are generally fine although because they are well known they're not super interesting.

There are a couple of new Sacrament Songs: As Bread is Broken, Bread of Life Living Water. These seemed rather bland to me, but most sacrament songs are.

There is the addition of some old English and French hymns for Easter and Christmas: Hail the Day that Sees Him Rise, He Is Born the Divine Christ Child. These are fine.

But many of the new hymns are sappy Janice-Kapp-Perry-Primary-style songs with only a melody line, or a second singing part at most, that won't sound good on the organ: Gethsemane (way, wary oversung already), I Will Walk with Jesus (same as Gethsemane), Think a Sacred Song. The concept of a single hymnbook for Primary and full congregation may be great for saving on printing and distribution costs, but few primary hymns really work well in a congregation because of their style, so I doubt many congregations will really sing them.

In this batch there is nothing rousing, and not much in the way of four part traditional hymn harmonies.

Here's hoping for better in the next batch.

Ugh.

[Moliere]

Il est né le divin enfant!

[beefytee]

Anyone else Come Thou Fount today in sacrament meeting?

Related question: Do they have organs with built in touch screens yet to display music?

[Bo Diddley]

Anyone else Come Thou Fount today in sacrament meeting?

Related question: Do they have organs with built in touch screens yet to display music?

That was the closing song in the meeting I attended today.

[BigFatMeanie]

Anyone else Come Thou Fount today in sacrament meeting?

Related question: Do they have organs with built in touch screens yet to display music?

There are organs with built-in touch screens that control the stops (e.g. a Hauptwerk organ) but the church doesn't use these. Furthermore, users of these organs rarely use the touchscreens to display music. What many organists use these days for music is an iPad Pro running an app called forScore to display the music. forScore works really well and you can even turn pages using facial expressions (e.g. gesture with your lips). All of my music is on my iPad now and I plan to never go back to the old days of having to turn pages manually.

In this video you can see the organist playing on a Hauptwerk organ with touchscreens on both sides where you would normally have physical stops, as well as using his iPad for the music.

One of the problems in singing the new hymns with the congregation is getting them the music. We can put the words in the program but it's harder to put the music in the program unless you want to do a lot of printing and we don't even do a printed program any more. The words and music are in the church's Sacred Music app as well as in the Gospel Library app but it just doesn't go as well when everyone has to pull out their phones, navigate to the app, navigate to the music, find the hymn, and then sing it off their phone screen's tiny display. It especially won't go well for a hymn that nobody has ever sung before.

[Bo Diddley]

There are organs with built-in touch screens that control the stops (e.g. a Hauptwerk organ) but the church doesn't use these. Furthermore, users of these organs rarely use the touchscreens to display music. What many organists use these days for music is an iPad Pro running an app called forScore to display the music. forScore works really well and you can even turn pages using facial expressions (e.g. gesture with your lips). All of my music is on my iPad now and I plan to never go back to the old days of having to turn pages manually.

In this video you can see the organist playing on a Hauptwerk organ with touchscreens on both sides where you would normally have physical stops, as well as using his iPad for the music.

One of the problems in singing the new hymns with the congregation is getting them the music. We can put the words in the program but it's harder to put the music in the program unless you want to do a lot of printing and we don't even do a printed program any more. The words and music are in the church's Sacred Music app as well as in the Gospel Library app but it just doesn't go as well when everyone has to pull out their phones, navigate to the app, navigate to the music, find the hymn, and then sing it off their phone screen's tiny display. It especially won't go well for a hymn that nobody has ever sung before.

Really cool tech. I noticed our choir pianist would make notations on her music on her iPad to update what we were doing.

Today in the ward I attended, they still use a printed program and had the music printed on a half sheet inserted within.

[Lost Student]

We sang Come Thou Fount in ward council. It sounded pretty good.

So will there not be a physical copy once they roll out all the new hymns? I don't really like singing from my phone. Half the time when I try to scroll up it swipes to the next hymn.

[BigFatMeanie]

They will eventually produce a new book. Could be several years from now.

[beefytee]

The new hymnbook comes out in 2026. See the video about the 2-minute mark:

About This Collection: Hymns—For Home and Church (churchofjesuschrist.org)

[Copelius]

That was the closing song in the meeting I attended today.

Opening for us.