Music

A safe stronghold

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A safe stronghold our God is still
A trusty shield and weapon;
He’ll help us clear from all the ill
That hath us now o’ertaken.
The ancient prince of hell
Hath risen with purpose fell;
Strong mail of craft and power
He weareth in this hour;
On earth is not his fellow.

With force of arms we nothing can,
Full soon were we downridden;
But for us fights the proper Man,
Whom God himself hath bidden.
Ask ye, who is this same?
Christ Jesus is his name.
The Lord Sabaoth’s Son;
He, and no other one,
Shall conquer in the battle

And were this world all devils o’er,
And watching to devour us,
We lay it not to heart so sore;
Nor they can overpower us.
And let the prince of ill
Look grim as e’er he will,
He harms us not a whit:
For why? his doom is writ;
A word shall quickly slay him.

God’s Word, for all their craft and force,
One moment shall not linger,
But, spite of hell, shall have its course;
‘Tis written by His finger,
and though they take our life,
Goods, honour, children, wife,
Yet is their profit small;
These things shall vanish all;
The city of God remaineth.

Words and music: Martin Luther 1483-†1546; Translation: Thomas Carlyle 1793-†1851; Harmony: JS Bach

Found on CPDL. Other versions of Ein feste Burg may also be found here and here.

Coco’s alternative set of words is here

A sure foundation

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This is Martin Luther’s melody,. Ein feste Burg, arranged with a harmony closely following Bach’s but without his passing notes, and newly written words.

A sure foundation God has laid
On which he builds the church of Christ.
The prophets and the apostles
His word have laid before us all.
His word declares the truth:
One man for us has come,
The real man of God
And God’s anointed one.
Jesus of this man is the name.

Jesus the great defender came
To claim his people as his own.
Once bound they were by sin’s strong power
He saves them in his darkest hour.
When Satan did his worst
On the cross was he cursed
To break the power of sin
And then to enter in
The kingdom which he had been given.

Jesus, the man, with troubled heart
Was vexed by Satan’s cunning art,
But Jesus failed not to perform
The task for which he had been born.
The Father saw the Son,
The obedient One,
With his work was he pleased
God’s wrath it was appeased,
His people then stood justified.

Jesus now sits at God’s right hand
From which he shall to judgement come.
He is the Lord of every man
Whate’er of ill or good they’ve done.
They all shall bow the knee;
Confess Jesus is Lord.
The righteous he shall take,
The wicked he forsake,
His justice seen on Jesus’s stake.

In Jesus Christ God’s glory shines
And shine it will for evermore.
His people a kingdom of priests
Shall sing his praise and him adore.
This is the gift of Christ
Who purchased by his blood,
The real Lamb of God
Who took away their sins,
The One Lord Jesus whom they love.

The sure foundation which God laid
Is where he builds his dwelling place.
His people safely gathered in
There offer him their songs of praise.
Nothing is there to harm
For all is peace and calm;
A world of love prepared
For those for whom he died,
And Jesus is their good Shepherd.

Found on CPDL. Other versions of Ein feste Burg may also be found here and here.

Thomas Carlyle’s translation Luther’s words is here.

Zacchaeus

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Now, Zacchaeus was a very little man,
and a very little man was he.
He climbed up into a sycamore tree,
for the Saviour he wanted to see.

And when the Saviour passed that way,
he looked up in the tree,
and said: Now Zacchaeus, you come down,
for I’m coming to your house for tea.

I am coming to your house for tea.
Yes, I am coming.
I am coming to your house today for tea.

Now Zacchaeus went a very little way
and a very little way went he;
and when he welcomed Jesus in,
some changes we would see.
‘I’ll split my goods in half’, he said;
‘Give one half to the poor;
I will pay back what I’ve cheated you
and times it all by four!”		Jesus said to him,
today salvation has come to your house
For the Son of man
Has come to seek and save the lost

Now, Zacchaeus was a very little man,
and a very little man was he.
but Jesus who was sent to us
came to die on the Roman tree
He came to look for those who were lost
to find and save them all;
and what he did for Zacchaeus
he can do for you and me

For God so loved the world
He gave his Son to come and save us,
So believe in him;
receive eternal life

You may have sung Zacchaeus to this tune once or twice before, but if not…

Words: Traditional/Unknown
Music Lambton Whorm Traditional/John Bull
The copyright of this arrangement of the music is held by Stuart Moffatt (© 2022).
The midi file was produced using Noteworthy Composer.
The mp3 was produced using Myriad software.
On NWC Scriptorium

Therefore

~ admin

Left

Therefore the redeemed of the Lord shall return
And come with singing unto Zion
And everlasting joy shall be
upon their heads. upon their heads.

Therefore the redeemed of the Lord shall return
And come with singing unto Zion
And everlasting joy shall be
upon their heads. upon their heads.

They shall obtain They shall obtain
gladness and joy gladness and joy
And sorrow and sighing
shall flee away. shall flee away.

Therefore the redeemed of the Lord shall return
And come with singing unto Zion
And everlasting joy shall be
upon their heads. upon their heads.

Right

Therefore the redeemed of the Lord shall return
And come with singing unto Zion
And everlasting joy shall be
upon their heads.

Therefore the redeemed of the Lord shall return
And come with singing unto Zion
And everlasting joy shall be
upon their heads.

They shall obtain
gladness and joy
And sorrow and sighing
shall flee away.

Therefore the redeemed of the Lord shall return
And come with singing unto Zion
And everlasting joy shall be
upon their heads.

Music: Ruth Lake Words: Ruth Lake © 1972
The copyright of this arrangement of music a cappella is held by Stuart Moffatt (© 2022).
If you wish to perform it then to be safe you are likely to need a CCLI licence or hard copies of Scripture in Song, or another book containing this work, though the writer remembers learning the song from another who merely had a guitar and a voice, and seems to think that that might have been before 1972, but then the song may have been in circulation before it appeared in print.
For the avoidance of doubt, the version here is for educational purposes to illustrate the use of a close coupled group of female voices to bring to life a gospel song.
The midi file was produced using Noteworthy Composer.
The mp3 was produced using Myriad software.
Also on NWC Scriptorium

An auspicious date

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Nothing happened

The day has arrived*; the dragons are unleashed. How excited are you? Two bank holidays and a weekend, and still it is May the twenty second for some. It is time to reveal the finale, having come across Lambton Worm, a tale about a young squire who went fishing on a Sunday morn when he should not have done with terrible consequences for the people who lived on both sides of the Wear, Coco thought Coco would paraphrase some of it with another dragon tale about a different young squire (young ‘un) in a not so proper dialect sung in an awful Geordie accent.

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Lambton Worm

~ admin

Coco came across the Lambton Worm recently, in proper dialect sung in a wonnerful Geordie accent. It is a tale about a young squire who went fishing on a Sunday morning when he should not have done with terrible consequences for the people who lived on both sides of the Wear.

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Jubilate

~ admin

To honour a lady

Âðm I – ciphered

Pásh deeth awm pléatward bong
Máng moth awm láygum bong
Pásh deeth wa bong
Dénsh vore thob soónd add
Vikko inch plúno add
Máng saw kneel aýthan udd
Pásh deeth awm bong

Coco hopes you have been able to celebrate May 20th 2022 JC well. 69 years since the coronation of our Queen who is now in the seventy first year of her reign. Coco thought (oh no, you say, please do not think just write/right) to offer a little something also. It was about fifty one years ago that Coco was introduced to a J Longdon, a philosopher so he understood, by one of his school friends, Ray Tester, with whom he had spent many happy hours drinking jasmine tea, listening to Beethoven string quartets and discussing everything from Plato to Teilhard de Chardin passing through forbidden German territory on the way. Ray thought it was time Coco met a real philosopher. Among other things the said JL was working on an equation of the universe, a representation of which was noted in his diary, but the untidy scrawl renders it now illegible, and phonetic substitution as a ciphering technique.

Coco has long since lost touch with the two gentlemen, and has no idea who holds, if anyone, copyright on the words, rather phonemes written above, but as it is likely that if there is copyright it is on the far larger tome (have you ever known a philosopher who writes smaller tomes?) of which it is a part, and therefore this small extract is fair use, and serves to advertise the larger work, if only Coco knew what that was.

It is left to you dear reader to decipher the phonetic substitution, but if you need help it may be found here.

The copyright of this performance is held by Stuart Moffatt (© 1971).
The midi file was produced using Noteworthy Composer.
The mp3/ogg were produced using Myriad software.

Dragons

~ admin

A suitably English dragon

Dragons as you will well know are not just part of Chinese culture, but very much here in the British Isles. There is of course the Welsh dragon, the dragon that lives in the Ness, St George and the dragon, and another English dragon to which I shall come shortly; if you know of other Scottish and Irish dragons, please do make a report here. There are dragons of course, which cannot be seen. They are the dragons of which we truly are afraid. We do not wish to hear of them, nor to speak of them. They may be part of our history which we wish to forget, but others wish to remember.

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