Great British Hymnwriters Songs of Praise


Great British Hymnwriters

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Prepare yourselves for a musical treat,

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as we tell the stories behind some of our best-loved hymns,

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old and new. And talk to the modern hymn writers,

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following in the footsteps of the greats.

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Welcome to Songs Of Praise.

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This week's programme is all about hymnody, the art of hymn writing.

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And I meet one of Britain's

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greatest modern hymn writers, Graham Kendrick.

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Really, I suppose, my main influences

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are the Baptist hymn book and the Beatles.

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Pam Rhodes talks to Roman Catholic hymn writer Bernadette Farrell.

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The hymns have to challenge us,

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because to express the gospel in song

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means then we carry it with us into our lives.

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And we have some favourite hymns,

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including many from this magnificent building,

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the Royal Albert Hall in London.

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We begin with one by Isaac Watts,

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the man known as the father of English hymnody.

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Now, the great Charles Wesley is reported to have said

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he would've given up all of his own work

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just to have written this one piece we're about to hear now,

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sung by the 5,000-strong congregation

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at the Royal Albert Hall.

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I'm about to meet the modern hymn writer

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who changed the course of Christian music in the UK.

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Graham Kendrick was a trailblazer in the 1970s and '80s,

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but his own hymn-writing hero is from the 1800s,

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which is why I've come to Wesley's Chapel

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and the Museum of Methodism to meet Graham,

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whose music is sung by Christians all over the world.

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Whose work do you admire, in terms of hymn writers?

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Charles Wesley, I think, really, comes out for me, on top.

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They are outstanding, you know, hymns.

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Where would Christmas be without Hark The Herald Angels Sing?

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You know, these amazing... O For A Thousand Tongues To Sing.

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They still resonate with us today.

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And I think the reason is because it's the same experience.

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You know, this man who lived several hundred years ago,

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had his experience of God,

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and people are still having that experience

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of meeting God for themselves and coming to faith.

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And it was said of Wesley, that when you sang one of his hymns,

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he was able to have you step into the story.

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So you were there with Jesus and the disciples,

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in Galilee, with the fishermen on the lake.

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He kind of, with his poetic gift, he could take you into the story,

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and make you feel like you were there, it was your experience.

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Now, we're about to hear Love Divine.

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What does that mean to you?

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Well, of course, many memories

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of weddings and even funerals where it's sung.

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It has that kind of classic, timeless feel about it.

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I particularly love the way it ends.

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In fact, I have here my very own Baptist Church Hymnal

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which I had when I was a child.

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It was given to me when I was seven years old.

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-It's in great condition.

-Yes.

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-You've been using it a lot?

-Probably should've been used more, I don't know.

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But I love the way the hymn lands on these words.

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"Changed from glory into glory, till in heaven we take our place,

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"Till we cast our crowns before thee,

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"Lost in wonder, love and praise."

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I think in many ways,

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it sums up what I'm trying to do as a songwriter,

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and what Charles Wesley did a thousand times better than me,

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to just get us caught up in the wonder of God's love,

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and the wonder of who Christ is.

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Catholic hymn writer Bernadette Farrell began composing in the 1970s

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to try to bridge the gap between traditional hymns

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and the changing tastes of modern, young Christians like herself.

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And as Pam Rhodes has been finding out,

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young people continue to inspire her.

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PAM RHODES: Bernadette's hymns often reflect modern challenges,

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such as the protection of the environment and social justice.

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And she's a big admirer of

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the achievements of this inner-city school in South London.

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The word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

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It's a wonderful, diverse community

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of about 600 girls.

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There are nearly 50 languages spoken.

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And prayer is part of the rhythm of the community

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here in the school and also for big services over at the cathedral.

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# Share God's spirit today. #

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You write both the words and the music. How does that work for you?

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It's an interesting process and it varies a lot.

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Sometimes it takes a long time.

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Other times, you know, you're walking out of the door

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and you get an idea and have to write it down as quick as anything.

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Some people use computer programmes, but I find by the time I've switched

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it on, I've lost the idea,

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so I'm back in he Dark Ages with pencil and paper.

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I think, I reflect on the Scriptures,

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sometimes a melody will come,

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but I'm never satisfied until the text will stand alone

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without the melody.

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# There is nowhere on Earth... #

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What are you feeling as you write, is it spiritual?

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That varies enormously.

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Sometimes it's just sheer frustration!

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Other times, it's very much a focus on the community that I'm serving,

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and that I'm writing for.

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And I think if I can write for the local situation,

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then perhaps that will strike a chord occasionally

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with other people.

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# For you... #

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You write very singable melodies,

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but often the words are quite gritty, quite challenging.

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Should our hymns challenge us?

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The hymns have to challenge us

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because we're called as a community and we sing together.

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So, to express the gospel in song

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means then we carry it with us into our lives.

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How much does the reaction of people who sing your hymns matter to you?

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It's very humbling to hear from people

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who have connected with a hymn,

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or who have found that a song

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helps them through a particular journey in their lives.

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Just a few days ago, I heard from a friend

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who's a chaplain in a high-security jail

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and he leads the worship there.

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And he called to tell me that the first time he'd really heard the men

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singing out loud was in Christ Be Our Light.

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And I found that incredibly moving that people who've lost everything

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could still find a way to express their hope.

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And that's what it's about for me,

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that we can share and express our Christian hope.

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Our next hymn combines the poetry of William Blake

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with the uplifting music of Sir Hubert Parry.

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First performed in 1916,

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it was later adopted by the Suffragette movement.

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And in 1924, it became the anthem of the Women's Institute.

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Our next British hymn writer was awarded an OBE

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for services to hymnody, and his work is universally known.

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But as Pam Rhodes found out, he claims to be totally unmusical.

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Did you always want to be a hymn writer?

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No, because I thought it was a closed book to me.

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I love poetry and still do,

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but we were a very unmusical family.

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So, when I became a Christian, I would love to have written hymns,

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but thought it was a closed book to me because I had no music.

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So what did you do about providing music

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for the many texts you went on to write?

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Well, I owe a great deal to various people.

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To Michael Baughan, in particular,

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who wrote tunes for some of my early hymns.

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Hymns often read like prayers, don't they?

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Are they prayers, are they forms of worship?

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They're certainly forms of worship.

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I think it's the Roman Catholics who had a great saying,

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"The family that prays together stays together."

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And I say, "The family that sings together clings together."

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People sometimes say they learn more of their faith through their hymns

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than from what they hear in church.

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I don't really believe that, not if the preaching's any good,

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but I do think that because hymns are memorable,

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they can stick in the memory

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and come to people's mind when they need them.

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What is the first hymn that you ever wrote?

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I was reading a review copy of the new English Bible,

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I was editing a Christian magazine.

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And in that, reading Mary's song, the Magnificat, we have,

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"Tell out, my soul, the greatness of the Lord!"

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"Oh," I said, "That's verse."

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So I wrote a few verses on it, almost, you could say, for fun.

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A few weeks later, a friend of mine - who was beginning work on what was

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to become the Anglican Hymn Book, a brand-new hymn book -

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said to me, "Timothy, you're a literary sort of chap,

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"have you written any hymns?" So I explained, "No."

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Again, that could've been the end of it.

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But he went on and said,

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"Have you written any verse that might make a hymn?"

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"Well," I said, "I did write four little verses from the Magnificat,

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"I think I could find them."

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So, anyway, cutting a long story short, I found them, I showed them,

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he took them, they put them into their new book,

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and that was the beginning when I began to think that

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this might be a door that God was opening for me.

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So now, let's hear the hymn

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that launched Timothy's career as a great British hymn writer.

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Earlier this month, Christians came together

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for a weekend of workshops, seminars and services

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at City Gates Pentecostal Church in Ilford.

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Budding hymn writers were given tips

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by leading worship leaders from across the country.

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And you may recognise one or two familiar faces.

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We need to fill them with truth

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and we need to have a heart for the people of God.

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There's lots of things, really, that you could say

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that could help you write.

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Practise how to write phrases, practise how to be creative,

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so, practise how to describe things that you see.

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Think about how they sound, they smell, they taste,

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and just do that on a different piece of paper.

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And then as you begin to develop those skills,

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they can come in to you when you're writing.

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Your desire to develop musically has to be so strong

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that when you're doing it, it would override everything else.

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Pitfalls I found, and I fell into as well,

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trying to be like someone else.

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Sometimes, you don't realise.

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And speaking to so many writers myself on my journey,

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one of the things they do, they write what they feel.

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And then you try and copy them, and you can't.

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You're just not going to sound the same.

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If there's anything I would say, any advice I would give to new writers

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is just be yourself.

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If you find that you've hit a wall,

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or you find that people don't like a particular thing that you've done,

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you can stay down there or you can get up and try again.

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Make every syllable, every word count.

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And if people don't enjoy singing the song, just write a stronger one.

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Shared experience is massive, in terms of songwriting.

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And that's probably one of the things that we look to most,

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is not to write on your own, but to write together.

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And we love the co-write, it seems very popular at the minute,

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whether it's in the pop charts or whether it's in Christian music.

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It does mean you're less likely

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to end up with something that people don't like.

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Our next hymn is a famously successful collaboration

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from hymn writers, Stuart Townend and Keith Getty.

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It was the first song they wrote together over 15 years ago,

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and remains their most popular.

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# Worship Christ, the Lord... #

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Earlier, modern hymn writer Graham Kendrick

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revealed how he was inspired by the work of Charles Wesley.

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Now, he gives us an insight into his own hymn writing

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including his modern classic, Shine, Jesus, Shine.

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I'm trying to take the ancient gospel and put it in songs,

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mixing experience and poetry and theology,

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and putting it in people's mouths,

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so they can sing the truth.

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You know, really, I suppose

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my main influences are the Baptist Hymn Book and the Beatles.

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And it was more that Beatles era,

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where I started to want to sing my faith.

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And I was discovering there was much more to worship

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than just standing up and singing hymns.

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There was more to be known in the spirit,

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there was more heart and passion and experience.

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I didn't feel I had much personal experience of God, you know.

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Well, I found...

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that personal experience in a much deeper way.

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And that was a trigger for songs

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which you would much more say, "That's a worship song.

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"That's not a song about God, that's a song to God."

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So, this is the '70s and '80s.

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What was happening in the church at the time?

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The '70s was a time of great sort of innovation in the church.

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People were experimenting with community,

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there was a lot of talk about

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experiencing God through the Holy Spirit,

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being filled with the Holy Spirits.

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# Gave your life to set me free... #

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Shine, Jesus, Shine - what do you remember about writing that?

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It was one of many songs. I certainly didn't spot

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there was anything special about it at the time.

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It was just three verses - it didn't have a chorus.

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And I remember trying it out, and getting very kind of... "Hmm..."

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But the chorus is the key part, isn't it?

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Exactly. It was underwhelming!

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You know, at that time, there was a great mood of a kind of rising hope,

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and a sense that, as Christians,

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we could really make a difference in the world.

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It was a sense of moving out.

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And so, I guess, the chorus just sort of fell together, you know.

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The phrase "Shine, Jesus, shine," I don't know where it came from,

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but it arrived at the right moment.

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And, you know, the chorus unfolded

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probably in quite a short period of time.

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The verses probably took me hours and hours, but the chorus

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came together quite quickly, and there it was.

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It wasn't until I started to use it that I noticed how people

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were kind responding to it, as a prayer.

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"Shine, Jesus, shine," so it's like a verb.

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You know, "Jesus - the light of the world."

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Then, it's all about action.

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"Fill this land with the Father's glory.

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"Blaze, Spirit, blaze, set our hearts on fire.

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"Flow, river, flow, flood the nation..."

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Not just the nation, but "the nations, with grace and mercy.

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"Send forth your word and let there be light."

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It's all about action.

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And that was where we were at at the time.

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And so, it became an anthem for the rising church movements.

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# Storms of life may brew... #

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We'll hear Shine, Jesus, Shine in a moment,

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but first an update on a brand-new hymn writer

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we featured on Songs Of Praise before Christmas.

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Andrew Gardiner is a Baptist minister from Plymouth

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and has been writing his first hymns while battling cancer.

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Andrew's most recent worship song is I Am Held By You.

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# It's the only place to be

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# What I once knew by faith... #

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And the good news is,

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this month it reached the top of the religious UK iTunes chart.

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Next week, the Reverend Kate Bottley brushes up on her first aid skills

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with St John Ambulance,

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and discovers their origins in the ancient religious order of St John.

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And JB Gill meets a remarkable Good Samaritan.

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But now, we return to the Royal Albert Hall

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and the Big Sing orchestra raising the roof

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with Graham Kendrick's wonderful hymn Shine, Jesus, Shine.

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CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

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