The Hymn of the Week

Our Hymn of the Week for this week is O Day of Peace, which was written in 1982 by Carl P. Daw, who has composed many contemporary hymns, and for many years ran an outfit called The Hymn Society, which I suppose only makes sense.

The hymn is based broadly on Isaiah 11, and the promise that there will come a day when wolf shall lie down with the lamb, and the world will know perfect peace and justice. Which is a lovely sentiment, and Daw adapts Isaiah well, but, inspiring and comforting a Daw's words might be, its really the hymn's tune that's the star of the show here.

That tune is called "Jerusalem" and was originally composed by the Victorian composer Sir Charles Hubert Hastings Parry in 1916 for a church anthem version of a poem by William Blake of the same name. Well, Parry's anthem took England by storm, and it wasn't long before people started singing it as a hymn. (And not just in church, either; for years Jerusalem has been the official hymn of Britain's Labor Party.) It remains enduring popular "over there" and today is one of the UK's three unofficial national anthems, along with Rule Britannia and Land of Hope and Glory.

And Parry's tune has been almost as popular on this side of the Atlantic, although not without an important complication. The words of Blakes poem are VERY England-specific, with the result that the English hymn really doesn't fit here in America (I mean, unless your church is hosting the King, or something like that). And that means that for over a century Parry's tune has been sort of adrift here in America, hoping that someday someone will come up with a set of words as good as the music. And O Dy of Peace is Carl P. Daw's swing at doing just that.