Born in song

Born in song. Brian Richard Hoare* (1935- ). The words and music of this lyrical hymn were written together, on a train journey from London to Chesterfield in 1978. The first three words (and therefore its title) are deliberately taken from the pithy, much-quoted and sometimes questioned opening sentence of the preface to the 1933 MHB: ‘Methodism was born in song’. This referred to the Wesley brothers’ love of hymn-singing, which pre-dated, accompanied, and confirmed their 1738 evangelical conversion, and was in turn immeasurably enriched by it. Hoare was at that time the New Testament tutor at Cliff College, Derbyshire; he planned what became his best-known text for the bicentenary...

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