| The Massachusetts Collection of Psalmody |
| The Massachusetts Collection of Psalmody; by the Boston Handel and Haydn Society: consisting of the most approved Psalm and Hymn Tunes, Anthems, Sentences, Chants, &c. together with many Original Pieces, and others selected from the works of distinguished composers, never before published in this country. Intended for public worship or for private devotion. Edited by George James Webb, President of the Society. Boston: J. H. Wilkins and R. B. Carter, 1840. |
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| Mr. George James Webb, his wife and daughters, circa 1845 |
| How could I forbear to present you with this splendid image of a distinguished Bostonian organist and composer in the prime of his life, in his family circle? How magnificent his profile! How dashing his coiffure! How resigned his spouse, already entered into the cap-wearing time of life.... |
| George James Webb (1803-1887) was an Englishman who made his way to the United States, to Boston, in 1830. Within three years he had acclimated thoroughly enough to form the Boston Academy of Music with Lowell Mason. Two years or so after that he and Mason prepared the first edition of The Boston Academy Collection. Webb had already brought out one of his own independent collections, Scripture Worship, in 1834, and while he and Mason were associated in at least ten sacred and secular collections, he published a string of tune books and pedagogical texts on his own that I feel confident deserve the attention of singers and scholars--and singing scholars. |
| But such being the fickle vagaries of fame even among sacred composers, all of Webb's prolific output has disappeared from present-day hymnals--except for one tune, usually titled Webb, and set to the words "Stand up, stand up for Jesus!" which originally appeared in his secular 1837 collection The Odeon, with other words. |
| Most ironic, because of how little it hints at Webb's range and tastes, as indicated in The Massachusetts Collection. In an age and a place unabashedly in love with England and English culture, Webb provided his students and tunebook consumers with a copious supply of music filtered through a contemporary English consciousness. Whereas Lowell Mason by this time had chosen to push Continental composers to the fore in his books, Webb drew on his own background as a young organist in Falmouth, and as an expatriate Briton still deeply aware of developments in contemporary English choral writing. He offers numerous tunes by the two Samuel Webbes, father and son, by John Randall (Cambridge is present, as in many other books of the period, including The Sacred Harp,) by Dr. Arnold, by Dr. Green, by Reverend Ralph Harrison; the already-ancient tunes like Aylesbury, Wells, Irish, Angel Hymn and others make their appearance, with tasteful and interesting arrangements by the editor; Webb accepts his consumers' taste for regional favorites and thus includes tunes by Billings (Jordan and Lebanon, for instance) and Read (even Windham, to my surprise) but present also are recent tunes by Samuel Wesley, Vincent Novello, and--I think significantly--Henry John Gauntlett, who will contribute to Hymns Ancient and Modern so importantly twenty years later. Webb himself contributed 99 tunes to the main section of the book, and seems to have set himself the task of composing something for each of the meters included. |
| It has been my practice to recommend starting-point tunes for each of the books present in these pages. For the MCP, I urge you to begin with Webb's tune New College, quite unlike "Stand up! Stand up for Jesus." The text he used was Watts's setting of Psalm 87, "God in his earthly temple, lays/ Foundations for eternal praise." Gauntlett's Reading gives "Joy to the world!" a distinctively proto-Victorian sound. Webb's revision of Aylesbury provides a good example of his approach to the old tunes--not simplifying them, nor thoroughly "modernizing" them, but attempting to "revision" them in "an effort made to impart strength and variety to the base [sic], and, as far as possible, a melodious character to the tenor and alto. The principal melody, or air, has in no case been altered." [Webb's emphasis. If the treble, or soprano part carries the main melody, it is still printed as the lowest treble clef line in the score, which I routinely assign to the clarinet--my choice for the tenor voice.] |