How great these are

In a new series which starts next week, contributors will argue the case for their favourite hymns. This week, an expert reviews our readers? nominations

THE IMMINENT demise of the hymn, and the hymn-book, has been predicted for some time by those who feel that this particular form of congregational worship has been overtaken and superseded by the worship song or chorus displayed on an overhead projector.

Yet as the Tablet poll on the opposite page shows, traditional hymnody is far from dead. It is not just that old favourites like Dear Lord and Father, My song is love unknown and Praise to the Holiest in the height continue to be high in the popularity stakes. The Tablet top 20 also includes the work of a number of contemporary writers who are continuing to write hymns in a recognisably traditional style.

The boundary between the hymn and worship song is difficult to define precisely. On the whole, the former is longer, cast in strophic and metrical form, often with a more objective theological perspective and generally written for accompaniment by organ or piano rather than by praise band. On this definition, many of the recently written items that have scored highly in the Tablet poll are very much hymns rather than worship songs. Indeed, they exemplify the considerable renaissance of hymnody in recent decades across the world.

How great Thou art, which tops both the Tablet and the latest BBC Songs of Praise poll and stands as the most popular hymn in the UK, perfectly demonstrates the international flavour of many modern hymns, being the result of a double translation from Swedish into English via Russian. First published in English in 1949, it is one of a number of hymns (Blessed Assurance is another) which owe much of their popularity to promotion by Billy Graham in his crusades during the 1950s and 1960s. To that extent, it belongs very much to the Protestant evangelical stable and it is perhaps surprising to see it coming out top in a Catholic poll. But then hymnody has been one of the great successes and products of the ecumenical movement and the English text of How great Thou art, like its Swedish folk melody, has a broad sweep and appeal that transcends any denominational or theological boundaries.

Graham Kendrick, who can reasonably claim to be the best known contemporary hymn writer in Britain, also comes from the Protestant evangelical stable. This laureate of the charismatic movement is the son of a Baptist minister and closely involved with one of the major independent house churches, the Ichthus Fellowship. Kendrick represents the relatively modern phenomenon of the professional Christian singer/songwriter who earns most of his money by writing and performing songs. While some of his work, such as Shine, Jesus, shine belongs distinctly in the worship song-camp, others are much more hymn-like. The Servant King with its wonderful couplet: ?Hands that flung stars into space/ to cruel nails surrendered? stands alongside the great evangelical poetic classics of Watts and Wesley.

If the rise of the evangelical and charismatic movements has spawned many new hymns and worship songs, Catholicism has also been a potent force in contemporary hymnody on both sides of the Atlantic. In Britain, James Quinn, the Edinburgh-based Jesuit priest, has been influenced by the Irish and Celtic traditions in texts such as The seed is Christ?s</> and Sing to God with gladness all creation, and Bernadette Farrell has established a wide following for her liturgical settings and paraphrases of the Psalms. In the United States, the St Louis Jesuits have produced a number of highly popular modern hymns and worship songs ? notably Bob Dufford with Be not afraid and Daniel Schutte with I the Lord of sea and sky ? a remarkable dialogue between God and a disciple which seems to belong to the Andrew Lloyd Webber school of church music but is as much a hymn as a worship song in its metrical structure. The wonderfully inclusive hymns of the North American Lutheran writer Marty Haugan, such as All are welcome and Gather us in, have also been extensively taken up in Roman Catholic churches on both sides of the Atlantic.

The established Churches of England and Scotland both have well-established hymn-writing clergy in their ranks. The leading Anglican authors include Timothy Dudley- Smith, a retired Anglican bishop best known for his paraphrase of the Magnificat, Tell out, my soul, the greatness of the Lord, and Michael Saward, who wrote Christ Triumphant, ever reigning. From the Church of Scotland, John Bell of the Iona Community has written numerous grittily incarnational hymns of which the best known are probably Will you come and follow me and A Touching Place, both set to traditional Scottish folk tunes. Bell also wages an international crusade against the performance ethic, which is threatening to turn hymnody into a passive spectator sport. He is a champion of unaccompanied congregational singing.

If old-stagers from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (and even from the seventeenth century in the case of My song is love unknown) are holding their own in the hymnological hit parade, what seem to be disappearing are many of the once popular hymns and songs from the mid-twentieth century. Sydney Carter, who died earlier this year, would have found his way into every top 20 list not so long ago with Lord of the Dance and One more step. Perhaps the tide is turning against these and other products of the 1960s folksong revival. Hymns from the same era written by liberal Protestants such as Brian Wren and Fred Kaan have never really achieved mass popularity, perhaps being too worthy and theologically challenging.

While contemporary writers are still producing hymns, Churches are still producing traditional hymn-books in defiance of the widespread trend towards overhead displays, specially printed orders of service and disposable and one-off liturgies. My own denomination, the Church of Scotland, is bringing out a new hymn-book later this year. It will be the fourth edition of the Church Hymnary to appear in a little over a century and will include more than 650 items, including much from the contemporary world Church, especially from Africa, Asia and Latin America.

Those of us who have been beavering away on the hymnal committee for nearly ten years have been impressed by the vitality of hymn writing across the world. We are particularly taken by the work of the New Zealander, Shirley Murray, who has written many ecologically conscious hymns, and by a modern Mexican hymn which translates as Lord, you have come to the lakeside.

If all of this suggests that the hymn is far from being an endangered species, it is true that fewer and fewer young people are being brought up on a diet of hymnody in the way that their parents and grandparents were. It is noticeable how show songs and pop songs are increasingly being requested at funerals and weddings and I wonder whether these are going to be the hymns of the future. Already, You?ll never walk alone from Carousel is in many hymn-books. Will ?My heart will go on? from Titanic, ?Bring him home? from Les Mis?rables and similar uplifting songs also cross over from stage and screen to sanctuary?

Meanwhile we are also returning to more primitive forms of singing in church. Compact discs of Gregorian chant regularly top the classical best-seller charts and the simple unaccompanied chants of the Taiz? community have been widely taken up. Maybe amid the cacophony of so much modern church music there is a longing for simplicity and silence.

Ian Bradley is the author of several books on hymnody, including The Penguin Book of Hymns. His latest work, You?ve Got to Have a Dream: the message of the musical, is published by SCM Press in September.

OUR READERS' TOP 20 HYMNS

How great thou art, Carl Boberg
(1850-1940) trans. Stuart K. Hine

Dear Lord and Father of mankind,
John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-92)

My song is love unknown,
Samuel Crossman (1624-83)

Praise to the Holiest in the height,
John Henry Newman (1801-90)

Amazing grace, John Newton (1725-1807)

Be still, for the presence of the Lord, David J. Evans (b. 1957)

Be thou my vision, Irish (c. eighth century)
trans. Mary Byrne (1880-1931) and Eleanor Hull (1860-1935)

Abide with me, John Henry Newman (1801-90)

Christ be our light, Bernadette Farrell (b. 1957)

He who would valiant be, Percy Dearmer (1867-1936)
after John Bunyan (1628-88)

When I survey the wondrous cross, Isaac Watts (1674-1748)

Guide me, O Thou great Redeemer, William Williams (1717-91),
Peter Williams (1727-96) and others

Hail, Queen of Heav?n, John Lingard (1771-1851)

I, the Lord of sea and sky, Daniel L. Schutte SJ (b. 1947)

Immortal, invisible, W. Chalmers Smith (1825-1908)

Let all mortal flesh keep silence, Liturgy of St James, trans. G. Moultrie (1829-85)

Soul of my Saviour (anon)

Shine Jesus shine, Graham Kendrick (b. 1950)

Now the green blade riseth, J.M.C. Crum (1872-1958)

Thine be the glory, Edmond Budry (1854-1932), trans. by Richard Birch Hoyle (1875-1939)

See Our Final Top 10 ? voted for by you