Five Minute Friday – Song

Five Minute Friday is when bloggers write for 5 minutes on a specified topic – this is my take on SONG:

My earliest memory of a song is my mum singing to me as a child. If I couldn’t get to sleep, or had a nightmare, my mum would stroke my forehead and gently sing Psalm 23 “The Lord’s My Shepherd”.

She would stay by me for the first verse, then leave slowly and quietly, continuing to sing. As she went down the stairs she would continue to sing, getting quieter and quieter – finishing the final verse at the bottom of the stairs.

The combination of the comforting words and beautiful tune helped me settle back to sleep.

I managed to find a clip of it HERE

Growing up as part of the Reformed Presyterian Church, we had a split-leaf Psalter (hymn book of just Psalms which we sung in church – unaccompanied). So as well as announcing which Psalm we were about to sing, the tune we were going to sing would be announced too. So with Psalm 23 my Mum used to sing it to the tune of Crimmond.  Hearing it again immediately takes me back to my childhood.

This is a picture of an older Psalter I own, dating back to 1880, so it doesn’t actually have Crimond in it!

And here is a little about the composer of the tune Crimond, and the origin of it’s name. (You can read the article in full HERE

In the Church of Scotland, there is a strong tradition for worship songs to be sung without musical accompaniment. This is still in eveidence today, particularly in the Free Church of Scotland and some Reformed Presbyterian Churches. In 1650, the Church of Scotland published it’s metrical psalter – a collection of 150 psalms for unaccompanied singing. Originally, psalm 23 was sung to the “Wiltshire” melody. However, by the 1930’s, the “Crimond” tune had become the most popular setting to this Psalm. 
 The Crimond melody was originally composed by Jessie Seymour Irvine, from Scotland. It is said that she originally wrote the melody as an exercise for her organ lessons. Initially, a David Grant was credited with writing the work. However, it later emerged that Grant only devised a piano accompaniment for the Crimond melody. In 1929, the Scottish Psalter corrects cites Jessie Seymour as writer of this famous hymn. Irvine was the daughter of a Church of Scotland minister. For a period of time, the family lived in Crimond in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, hence the title of this famous hymn tune.

My other song memory from my childhood is my Dad singing “Some Enchanted Evening” from the musical South Pacific…..but only under certain situations – when my brothers and I were squabbling! Whatever the reason for our fighting, it was all forgotten as we united in pleading with Dad to stop singing ….. worked every time.

So …… do you have a song or two from your childhood which brings back particular memories?

Do share – either below in comments, on my Facebook page, or even by email – all welcome!

Finally, to see what other bloggers have written on the topic of “Song” visit the lovely Lisa-Jo and tell her I said “hi”!

Have a lovely weekend, wherever you are.

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