Hymn Of The Week: July 27, 2020

How Can I Keep from Singing?# 821 in Glory to God Hymnal

Text and Music Robert Lowry 1869

How Can I Keep From Singing?

My life flows on in endless song, above earth’s lamentation
I hear the real, though far off song, that hails a new creation.
No storm can shake my inmost calm while to that Rock I’m clingin’.
If love is Lord of Heaven and earth, how can I keep from singin’?

What though the tempest round me roars I hear the truth, it liveth
What though the darkness round me close, songs in the night it giveth
No storm can shake my inmost calm while to that Rock I’m clinging.
If love is Lord of Heaven and earth, how can I keep from singin’?

Through all the tumult and the strife I hear the music ringin’
It sounds and echoes in my soul How Can I Keep from singin’?
No storm can shake my inmost calm while to that Rock I’m clinging.
If love is Lord of Heaven and earth, how can I keep from singing?

Verse four that is not included in this arrangement but is in our hymnal:

The peace of Christ makes fresh my heart, a fountain ever springin’
All things are mine since I am his! How can I keep from singin’?
No storm can shake my inmost calm while to that Rock I’m clinging.
If love is Lord of Heaven and earth, how can I keep from singing?

This hymn has many variations in origin stories. Our Glory to God Hymnal states that:

In the New York Observer of August 7, 1868, this text was titled “Always Rejoicing,” and was attributed to a “Pauline T.” This may well be where the Baptist pastor and musician to whom it is usually credited encountered the words that he later published with his tune.

Supposedly, a woman by the name of Doris Plenn knew the song from hearing her Grandmother sing it. Because of that, she believed it came from the early Quaker church which is ironic because the Quakers do not sing in their services. Pete Seeger then took up the song and added a verse that Doris Plenn had sung which goes as follows:

When tyrants tremble sick with fear, and hear their death knell ringin’
When friends rejoice both far and near, How Can I keep from singin’?

Pete Seeger, based on the Doris Plenn story, decided that it was indeed a Quaker hymn, although now we think it’s lyrics have come from many sources, both known and anonymous.

Fast forward to 1990 and the Irish recording artist Enya and her album Shepherd Moons.

She took the lyric; What tho my joys and comforts die, the Lord my Savior liveth. This became, in Enya’s version, What tho’ the tempest round me roars, I hear the truth it liveth.

As you can see, this hymn has many various verses used in a plethora of ways. From Pete Seeger to Enya to the beautiful and haunting arrangement you hear in the attached YouTube link.

This arrangement is by the composer James Primosch who studied composition with the great contemporary composer John Harbison. In his arrangement, you will hear the way the piano part flows as our lives do. There are meter changes and musical lines that fly at times independently of the voice part. Enjoy the myriad of colors singer and composer create.

Special thanks to Karen Bovenizer, soprano for sharing her gifts with us!