Popular Hymns

[CarolinaGetaway]

I am new to the South. We had some of our new friends over. They saw the guitars and wanted to sing. I figured out Amazing Grace on the fly but then I was stumped. Don't know that music at all. What are some popular hymns that I should learn? This is not a question about religion. It is about being neighborly.

[gr81dorn]

It is well with my soul
blessed assurance
great is thy faithfulness
how great thou art
tis so sweet to trust in jesus
I surrender all
Doxology
Be Thou my vision
I saw the light
I'll fly away

[Bob Womack]

That's a good list from gr81dorn.

There are two streams of hymnody to learn from: the great Fundamentalist (or revivalist) hymns from the Wesleyan tradition and the Reformed hymns. Both are in the South but probably the Fundamentalist hymns are more known generally.

Here are some examples. The asterisks mark ones I've transcribed to fingerstyle.

Fundamentalist:
*How Great Thou Art
Amazing Grace
*Great is Thy Faithfulness
*My Faith Looks Up To Thee

Reformed:
*We Gather Together (For Thanksgiving)
*Oh God, Our Help in Ages Past
A Mighty Fortress Is Our God
For the Beauty of the Earth

Christmas:
*It Came Upon a Midnight Clear
*Silent Night
*Angels We Have Heard on High

Bob

[Glennwillow]

Doug Young, who contributes to this forum often, has two books out on fingerstyle arrangements for basic hymns. I have them and they are very good with very accessible guitar arrangements. Here is his book section of his website: https://dougyoungguitar.com/books

- Glenn

[CarolinaGetaway]

Thank you everyone. You have pointed me in the right direction

[rllink]

Amazing Grace to the tune of House of the Rising Sun. That's always a good one.

[ljguitar]

Originally Posted by CarolinaGetaway

I am new to the South. We had some of our new friends over. They saw the guitars and wanted to sing. I figured out Amazing Grace on the fly but then I was stumped. Don't know that music at all. What are some popular hymns that I should learn? This is not a question about religion. It is about being neighborly.

Hi CG
My wife and I are 75 yrs old and belong to a contemporary church (where I play synth, electric backing and lead guitar) for mostly modern worship music team.

For the past 8 years, she & I host a monthly gathering at our church called "Folks Like Us" where we are the average age of the people who attend. It's a mid-week noon potluck where we eat, and then pass out the hymnals and they pick 'em and I play acoustic and lead them. We average 12-18 songs per meeting over ½ hour. We probably rotate through about 50-70 hymn titles during the 8 months a year we meet.

We recently held a meeting at a person's home where 25 people showed up.

List for that meeting was…

• Old Rugged Cross
• In The Garden
• Holy Holy Holy
• To God Be The Glory
• Great Is Thy Faithfulness
• It Is Well
• Onward Christian Soldiers
• Amazing Grace
• Because He Lives
• How Great Thou Art
• Victory In Jesus
• Power In The Blood
• Softly & Tenderly
• I Surrender All

I suggest asking your friends "What is your favorite hymn?" and then do the homework. Don't just look at chord charts on YouTube or google…

A weakness of many modern players is we don't know (have never heard and analyzed) the old hymns' actual chord structures, so chords are simplified or left out.

Traditional Hymns have a family of often inserted altered chords (II⁷ - III⁷ - VI⁷ and half diminished chords). They also use dominant 7th chords a lot.

Hymns don't sound 'proper' if those chord are changed or eliminated.

Some of my friends who play on conservative church music teams 'hate' traditional hymns because they can't follow the chord structure when improvising and playing along with congregations (especially when they capo because pianists in church favor keys of F - Bb - Eb - Ab) . Hymnals mostly do not have chords, and if they do, we still don't like to play in Flat keys.

Common complaints of guitarists are…
- Too many chords
- Unusual rhythm patterns
- Unfamiliar keys, not designed to play easily on guitar
- Range is too high to sing easily

When I lead the group singing at our gatherings I always have a capo handy, and change keys to fit the group. Old hymns often have an octave and a half range, and the highest note will be above most people's ability to sing easily.

Have fun learning and adapting, and it's nice of you to ask them and fit with things they know, so it can lead to a two-way-street (things you know which they don't).

[Robin, Wales]

The bluegrass gospel songs go great on guitar/vocals Here are 3 easy ones:

Angel Band
Gospel Ship
Will the Circle

You can find bluegrass gospel radio stations on the Internet. They will give you some more ideas.

[lpa53]

Here's a great one: "Be Thou My Vision", just posted today by Guitar Salon International!

[Glennwillow]

Originally Posted by lpa53

Here's a great one: "Be Thou My Vision", just posted today by Guitar Salon International!

Hi Paul,

Gee, that was a lovely arrangement! And beautifully played by Wesley Park. I really appreciated that!

- Glenn

[Brent Hahn]

When I was about 13 I decided to get better at reading music. To that end I "borrowed" a hymnal from the Westminster Presbyterian Church in Springfield, Illinois, which I still intend to return. In that hymnal I discovered that "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God," for the most part, has a different chord for every syllable. Most of them are easy cowboy chords. It's a hoot done at a bluegrass tempo, if you're not concerned that you'll get yourself a smiting from on high.

[Bob Womack]

Originally Posted by Brent Hahn

In that hymnal I discovered that "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God," for the most part, has a different chord for every syllable. Most of them are easy cowboy chords.

Yep. If you want exercise in comping chords, this is a great way to start. Basically the chords are set to be four-on-the-floor with passing tones, unless the hymn is in 3/4.

It should be noted that the traditional settings of the hymns are usually set in SATB (Soprano, Alto, Tenor, Bass) so that there is always a part that each person in the congregation can fit into without sounding like either a tweeting bird or a grumbling frog. By the way, that is one thing that the hymns have over modern praise and worship, which is largely based around monophonic solo lines. The historic church abandoned monophonic plainsong centuries ago because any single line that is chosen excludes at least one of the four voices, maybe two, by placing that line in a pitch range that causes strain and makes those excluded voices sound ridiculous. My wife and I look at each other and roll our eyes and shrug our shoulders quite often during modern P&W. I am a baritone and she is a lyric soprano I. I can cover most bass lines but not tenor lines. She has a half octave or more above most first sopranos. My choice is often to rag out my voice trying to hit the tinny line or sound like what what Leo Kottke described as "geese farts on a muggy day" when referring to his own voice. My wife gets driven down to the soprano II range, which is below her range and requires a shift in octave to cover the melody, which is where she starts tweeting and feels like a distraction to those around her.

Bob

[difalkner]

Shout to the Lord
Jesus Paid It All

[Glennwillow]

Originally Posted by Brent Hahn

When I was about 13 I decided to get better at reading music. To that end I "borrowed" a hymnal from the Westminster Presbyterian Church in Springfield, Illinois, which I still intend to return. In that hymnal I discovered that "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God," for the most part, has a different chord for every syllable. Most of them are easy cowboy chords. It's a hoot done at a bluegrass tempo, if you're not concerned that you'll get yourself a smiting from on high.

A lot of church hymns require changing chords on almost every note, often at every beat in a 4/4 measure. Many Christmas carols are that way, too.

Paul Simon's song, "American Tune," is based at least partly on a Bach piece of the past, “O Sacred Head, Now Wounded” from his St. Matthew Passion. I know from playing "American Tune" that there is a chord change on almost every note. It takes some practice to get used to this kind of accompaniment.

- Glenn

[Brent Hutto]

Originally Posted by Glennwillow

A lot of church hymns require changing chords on almost every note, often at every beat in a 4/4 measure. Many Christmas carols are that way, too.

Paul Simon's song, "American Tune," is based at least partly on a Bach piece of the past, “O Sacred Head, Now Wounded” from his St. Matthew Passion. I know from playing "American Tune" that there is a chord change on almost every note. It takes some practice to get used to this kind of accompaniment.

- Glenn

I have a soft spot for that sort of tune, with the multiple chord changes per measure and typically a "church hymn" type feel to the voice leading between the chords.

When I was a kid, a couple times a year our church would have an evening service that was entirely hymn singing. No sermon, no choir, just singing. For me, those evenings were probably the most worshipful experiences I can ever recall.