Tag Archives: Queen Elizabeth II

Uncategorized

Princess Elizabeth Gave Us the Hymn of Psalm 23

1 Comment

I heard recently that after the Civil War, Americans began using Psalm 23 in funerals and it took on nostalgia for many people. Believers were in the habit of singing psalms back then and were moving toward hymns.

When you think of a traditional melody for Psalm 23, what do you think of? Is this Crimond? The wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Philip Mountbatten in 1947 put that tune on the world stage. Donald Keddie writes:

The music director of the Royal Wedding, William McKie (1901–1984), visited Balmoral in Scotland and heard one of Princess Elizabeth’s ladies-in-waiting, Lady Margaret Egerton, singing a descant of Psalm 23 to CRIMOND, accompanied by Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret. McKie wanted to include something Scottish in the Royal Wedding, and Psalm 23’s pastoral imagery fit the bill perfectly.

Unable to find the music for the descant and with two days to go to the wedding, McKie wrote down the music himself shorthand and taught it to the Abbey Choir. The composer of the descant, William Baird Ross (1871–1950), was later surprised to hear his arrangement on the radio broadcast.

The fame of the Royal Wedding made Psalm 23 to CRIMOND a Christian pop song of its era. The brighter, more joyful tune gave new life to the psalm. As a result, American Protestants of all denominations began singing Psalm 23 to this tune, and American Presbyterians embraced a metrical psalm from their own tradition again.

Uncategorized

Death and decline in England

2 Comments
The late queen.

As you’ve no doubt heard by now, Queen Elizabeth II, by the grace of God Queen of England, died today at the age of 96. She was the longest reigning monarch in English history, and the second-longest reigning in any country that we know of. Old and full of days, as the Bible says.

It’s yet another melancholy landmark in the lives of us oldlings. I was alive before Elizabeth reigned, just as I was alive during the Truman administration, but I remember neither. I recall being a child, and never having known a president other than Eisenhower. Today, in my dotage, I have no memory of a world without Queen Elizabeth.

What do I think of monarchy? I’ve flirted with monarchism as a political cause from time to time in my life, but I wouldn’t want it for the US. However, I’m an anglophile and a Norgephile (I don’t think that’s an actual word, but I mean a lover of Norway), and they’re both monarchies.

There’s an old conservative argument that monarchy is a stabilizing institution, one that binds a country to its traditions.

But I’m leery of what the new generation of monarchs will do.

Ah well, it’s all in the hands of God.

Speaking of England, everybody’s talking about the new Rings of Power TV series on Amazon Plus. I’m surprised, honestly, at the number of my Facebook friends who speak highly of it, so far.

Will I watch it? No, I don’t think so.

Here’s why.

I’m willing to watch a Middle Earth movie that’s based directly on a Tolkien story. I’ll give the producers the benefit of the doubt until I learn better (as you may recall, I liked the LOTR trilogy, did not like the Hobbit movies).

But if what I understand is correct, this series is based only on general outlines of events in the Silmarillion. That – in my view – grants the filmmakers too much freedom to pursue their own agendas.

Let’s not forget, Tolkien was a Catholic writer. His whole purpose in creating Middle Earth was to recreate a lost English mythology. Because he believed that mythology prefigured Christian truth (C. S. Lewis was converted on this argument), he believed that a faithful mythology would lead hearts to the Christian faith. He and Lewis invented the concept of “mythopoeia” for that very purpose.

The Amazon Plus series has not been conceived for that purpose. Therefore, in my view, it cannot be faithful to the author’s vision.

I’ll be happy to be proved wrong.