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Shirley Erena Murray
1931 - 2020 Person Name: Shirley Erena Murray, b. 1931 Author of "Sing a Happy Alleluia" in Worship (4th ed.) Shirley Erena Murray (b. Invercargill, New Zealand, 1931) studied music as an undergraduate but received a master’s degree (with honors) in classics and French from Otago University. Her upbringing was Methodist, but she became a Presbyterian when she married the Reverend John Stewart Murray, who was a moderator of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand. Shirley began her career as a teacher of languages, but she became more active in Amnesty International, and for eight years she served the Labor Party Research Unit of Parliament. Her involvement in these organizations has enriched her writing of hymns, which address human rights, women’s concerns, justice, peace, the integrity of creation, and the unity of the church. Many of her hymns have been performed in CCA and WCC assemblies. In recognition for her service as a writer of hymns, the New Zealand government honored her as a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit on the Queen’s birthday on 3 June 2001. Through Hope Publishing House, Murray has published three collections of her hymns: In Every Corner Sing (eighty-four hymns, 1992), Everyday in Your Spirit (forty-one hymns, 1996), and Faith Makes the Song (fifty hymns, 2002). The New Zealand Hymnbook Trust, for which she worked for a long time, has also published many of her texts (cf. back cover, Faith Makes the Song). In 2009, Otaga University conferred on her an honorary doctorate in literature for her contribution to the art of hymn writing.
I-to Loh, Hymnal Companion to “Sound the Bamboo”: Asian Hymns in Their Cultural and Liturgical Context, p. 468, ©2011 GIA Publications, Inc., Chicago
Shirley Erena Murray
John L. Bell
b. 1949 Person Name: John L. Bell, b. 1949 Author of "Christ Has Risen" in Worship (4th ed.) John Bell (b. 1949) was born in the Scottish town of Kilmarnock in Ayrshire, intending to be a music teacher when he felt the call to the ministry. But in frustration with his classes, he did volunteer work in a deprived neighborhood in London for a time and also served for two years as an associate pastor at the English Reformed Church in Amsterdam. After graduating he worked for five years as a youth pastor for the Church of Scotland, serving a large region that included about 500 churches. He then took a similar position with the Iona Community, and with his colleague Graham Maule, began to broaden the youth ministry to focus on renewal of the church’s worship. His approach soon turned to composing songs within the identifiable traditions of hymnody that began to address concerns missing from the current Scottish hymnal:
"I discovered that seldom did our hymns represent the plight of poor people to God. There was nothing that dealt with unemployment, nothing that dealt with living in a multicultural society and feeling disenfranchised. There was nothing about child abuse…,that reflected concern for the developing world, nothing that helped see ourselves as brothers and sisters to those who are suffering from poverty or persecution." [from an interview in Reformed Worship (March 1993)]
That concern not only led to writing many songs, but increasingly to introducing them internationally in many conferences, while also gathering songs from around the world. He was convener for the fourth edition of the Church of Scotland’s Church Hymnary (2005), a very different collection from the previous 1973 edition. His books, The Singing Thing and The Singing Thing Too, as well as the many collections of songs and worship resources produced by John Bell—some together with other members of the Iona Community’s “Wild Goose Resource Group,” —are available in North America from GIA Publications.
Emily Brink
John L. Bell
Robert Brown-Borthwick
1840 - 1894 Person Name: R. Brown-Borthwick Composer of "MISERERE DOMINE" in Sunday-School Book Brown-Borthwick, Robert, born at Aberdeen, May 18, 1840, and educated at St. Mary Hall, Oxford. Taking Holy Orders in 1865, he has been Curate of Sudeley (and Chaplain of the Winchcombs Union), Gloucestershire, 1865-6, and Evesham, 1866-8; Assistant Minister of Quebec Chapel, London, 1868-9; and Incumbent of Holy Trinity, Grange, near Keswick, 1869. He is now (1886) Vicar of All Saints, Scarborough. His publications, in addition to his prose works, are:— Supplemental Hymn and Tune Book, 1867 (4th edition, 1871); Sixteen Hymns for Church and Home, 1870; Select Hymns for Church and Home, 1871; and various Kyries, Hymn Tunes, Chants, &c. In addition he has rendered good service as one of the four Editors of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge Church Hymns. In this last work three of his best hymns are found: “Come, O Jesu, to Thy Table"; "O Holy Jesu, Prince of Peace”; "Let us raise our grateful voices." Canon Westcott in his Paragraph Psalter acknowledges Mr. Brown-Borthwick's assistance in preparing that work for the press as of great value thereto. He died March 17, 1894.
Of Mr. Brown-Borthwick's hymns the following appeared in his Sixteen Hymns, &c, 1870:—
1. Come, O Jesus, to Thy Table. Holy Communion.
2. Lord, in the watches of the night. Midnight.
3. O Holy Jesu, Prince of Peace. Holy Communion. The author's note to this hymn is, "This is not a congregational hymn, but a meditation, to be read while non-communicants are retiring, or to be sung by the choir alone, anthem-wise, kneeling."
These hymns were repeated in his Select Hymns, &c, 1871-85. The following is also in that collection:—
4. Let us raise our grateful [gladsome] voices . Flower Services, or Thanksgiving. "Written in Borrowdale, on a summer morning in 1870," and published in the S. P. C. K. Church Hymns, 1871, &c.
-- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)
Robert Brown-Borthwick
