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See 'Zimbabwean hymnody#Abraham Dumisani Maraire'*
Africa Praise. This book, published in 1969 by the United Society for Christian Literature, is a good example of an early attempt to provide hymns for African schools that would recognise the importance of local cultures and the needs of independent African nations. It was edited by David G. Temple (words) and Arthur Morris Jones* (music). It was intended for schools in which English was the medium of instruction, and one of its aims was 'to discover as many African hymns as possible' (Preface,...
African hymnody. In this article, African hymnody will be considered under the headings 'Western Africa', 'Eastern Africa' and 'Southern Africa', preceded by a general introduction. Articles on individual countries and authors/composers will be found as separate entries.
Introduction
'Music might be considered as one of the best ways to educate Christian people. A beautiful hymn, well understood and lived, has the value of a good sermon' (Ntahokaja, 75). In this quotation, Father Ntahokaja...
BAILEY, Albert Edward. b. North Scituate, Massachusetts, 11 March 1871; d. Worchester, Massachusetts, 31 October 1951. Bailey, a foremost author and authority on art and religion, attended Scituate High School, Worchester Academy, and Harvard (BA, 1894; MAEd, 1916). He taught classics, religious education, and English at the Worchester Academy (1891-1910); was head master of the Allen English and Classical School, West Newton, Massachusetts (1900-07); lectured on Eastern-Mediterranean...
Amen Siakudumisa. Stephen Cuthbert Molefe*.
We know this composition of 1977 ('Amen, we praise your name') through the work of David Dargie*, who met Molefe in that year at a composition workshop and transcribed a number of his works into staff notation, in a wide variety of musical styles, 'Masithi-Amen' being among the simplest (see the score of this tune in African hymnody*). The original version of 'Amen Siakudumisa' was 'Sive-sithi Amen, siakudumisa' ('Hear us we say, Amen, we praise...
BETHKE, Andrew-John. b. Boksburg, Gauteng, South Africa, 8 May 1982.
Andrew-John (AJ) Bethke is a scholar, composer, conductor, and organist in the performance of sacred music and academic research in Anglican music, liturgy, and theology.
His father Anthony (b. 1945) is a Methodist minister (now retired), and his mother Erica (b. 1948) is a professional editor. Both sides of the family come from a long line of ordained clergy, ensuring a family strongly influenced by Methodist values. At the...
Augustine of Hippo (St) [Aurelius Augustinus]. b. Thagaste, 13 November 354; d. Hippo, 28 August 430. One of the most influential figures in the history of Christian thought, Augustine was born in Thagaste in North Africa. His father was a pagan, but his mother, St Monica, encouraged him towards Christianity even after he had lost his initial Christian faith. In 373, inspired by Cicero's Hortensius, he decided to pursue the life of a philosopher, becoming a Manichean and teaching the liberal...
TYAMZASHE, Benjamin John Peter. b. Kimberley, South Africa, 5 September 1890; d. East London, Republic of South Africa, 5 June 1978. Also known affectionately was B-ka-T, Tyamzashe was the son of a Congregational minister in South Africa and a prolific composer of over 200 works (Dargie, 1997). He followed John Knox Bokwe*'s footsteps in adding innovations to the makwaya* style of singing, a choral form often sung by large groups of people in church and civic settings.
Tyamzashe was educated at...
KYAMANYWA, Bernard. b. Kagera Region, Tanganyika (now Tanzania); 10 May 1938. A teacher, Lutheran pastor, and hymnwriter, Kyamanywa studied to be a schoolteacher at Kigarama Teacher's College (Bukoba, Tanzania) where he received his basic musical training. He continued his study at Lutheran Theological College (now Makumira University College) in Arusha (Diploma in Theology, 1968). He became known for his exceptional mastery of Hebrew, a skill that earned him the position as a representative of...
KWILLIA, Billema. b. ca. 1925. (also known as Belema Kwelea and Belema Kollia). Kwillia is a literacy teacher and evangelist from Liberia in West Africa. She is best known for the hymn 'Come, Let Us Eat' ('A va de laa mioo'), which has been included in several hymnals and ecumenical collections. Kwillia composed the hymn in the 1960s.
Margaret D. Miller (b. 1927), a missionary to Liberia from the United States who served in the Lutheran Literacy Centre in Wozi, transcribed this communion hymn...
MALGAS, Daniel. b. Eastern Cape, South Africa, ca.1853; d. Fort Beaufort, South Africa, March 1936. Malgas was an ordained Anglican priest, whose career was based in the eastern part of the Cape Colony near Kwa Maqoma (formerly Fort Beaufort). An official record of his exact birth date has not been found. It is possible that his birth was not registered because his parents converted to Christianity when Malgas was in his late teens. He began formal education in 1872 at St Luke's Mission....
DARGIE, David. b. 29 July 1938. David Dargie is one of South Africa's leading ethnomusicologists. He studied with Andrew Tracey at Rhodes University in Grahamstown, South Africa (on Andrew Tracey, see African hymnody*). Dargie is also a foremost encourager of compositions by Africans for the church. Of Scottish descent, Dargie is a third-generation South African raised in the coastal town of East London. Following seminary training in Pretoria and his ordination in 1964, he served in New...
TUTU, Desmond. b. Klerksdorp, North West Province, Republic of South Africa, 7 October 1931; d. Cape Town, RSA, 26 December 2021. After a short period as a teacher, he was ordained an Anglican priest in 1960. He went to Britain to pursue theological studies at King's College, London (1962-66). Returning to South Africa, he taught at UBLS (the University of Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland) before becoming Director of the Theological Education Fund for Africa (1972-75). He was Dean of St Mary's...
SONTONGA, Enoch Mankayi. b. ca. 1873; d. 18 April 1905. The short, but significant life of Enoch Sontonga, from the Mpinga clan (Xhosa), began in the Eastern Cape, South Africa, around 1873. Like Bokwe* and Soga*, he may have been educated as a teacher at the Lovedale Mission. He was then sent to a Methodist Mission school in Nancefield, near Johannnesburg, to teach. Working as a choirmaster, Sontonga wrote the text and the music of his most famous hymn and the best known hymn in all of Africa,...
This account of Ethiopian Hymnody is in two parts: Traditional Hymnody (Ralph Lee); New Songs (Lila Balisky)
Traditional Ethiopian Liturgical Music
Of all the ecclesiastical arts liturgical singing is the most important and jealously guarded in the Ethiopian Orthodox tradition. No external influences are permitted and the purity of the original tradition is uncompromisingly protected. Music creates the atmosphere of worship: Orthodox believers often comment on the spiritual quality and...
God sends us the Spirit. Tom Colvin* (1925-2000).
Written in Ghana during Colvin's period of missionary service, 1959-1964, and set to the melody of a Gonja folk song originally in praise of the tribe and its past leaders. The text was written, according to the author, for 'churches, particularly new churches, where the Spirit is experienced as a powerful presence'. It is included in several standard collections, and captures both the intimacy and the transformative power of the Holy Spirit....
SADOH, Godwin. b. Lagos State, Nigeria, 28 March 1965. An Anglican organist, composer, hymn writer, church musician, and professor of music, Godwin Sadoh received certificates in piano, theory, and general musicianship from the Royal School of Music, London (1982-1986), and degrees in piano and composition from Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria (BA, 1988); in African ethnomusicology from University of Pittsburgh (MA, 1998), in organ performance and church music from University of...
Goodness is stronger than evil. Desmond Tutu* (1931–2021).
The text for this poem, 'Victory is Ours', by Archbishop Desmond Tutu is from his An African Prayer Book (New York, 1995), a compilation of writings ranging from the Xhosa and Coptic traditions, to St Augustine and the worldwide African diaspora. This is one of only two prayers in the book written by him.
The prayer's compact structure, and its version as a one-stanza hymn, reflects the rhetorical style of paired opposites common...
He came down. Cameroon traditional.
In the mid 1980s, John Bell* officiated at a wedding in Frankfurt. 'He came down' was chosen for the ceremony by a couple from Cameroon. They requested that it be sung unaccompanied with the guests in a circle, reminiscent of the ring shout prevalent in the music of enslaved Africans in North America and the Caribbean (see 'Ring shout'*). First printed by Wild Goose Publications in Many and Great: Songs of the World Church (Glasgow, 1990), it was copyrighted...
OLSON, Howard. b. St Paul, Minnesota, 18 July 1922; d. Sun City Center, Florida, 1 July 2010. Howard Olson has a well-deserved reputation for his African hymns, such as 'Christ has arisen, Alleluia (Mfurahini, Haleluya)*, 'Neno lake Mungu' ('Listen, God Is Calling'), and 'Njoo kwetu, Roho mwema' ('Gracious Spirit, Heed Our Pleading'). They have have found their way into hymnals around the globe. Olson's Tumshangilie Mungu: Nyimbo za Kikristo za Kiafrika has gone through six successive...
Humbly in your sight we come together, Lord. J.P. Chirwa (d. 1940), translated by Tom Colvin* (1925-2000).
This is a translation of 'Tiza Pantazi Pinu', a hymn in Tumbuka, a Bantu language spoken in northern Malawi and some neighbouring countries. The first line appears as above in Colvin's Fill us with your love (1983), and then in Songs of God's People (1988), World Praise (1993), Glory to God (1994), and Sing Glory (1999). In Colvin's last book, Come, let us walk this road together (1997),...
See 'Kneels at the feet of his friends'*
Jesu, Son of Mary. Edmund Stuart Palmer* (1856-1931).
This touching funeral hymn was originally written in Swahili sometime before 1901, during Palmer's first period in Africa. It was written for the Requiem of a colleague in the UMCA (Universities' Mission to Central Africa). According to Frost (1962, p. 381) it was included in the Mission's Swahili Hymn Book, but it is not in Kitabu cha Sala za Kanuni ilivyo desturi ya kanisa la unguja (Swahili Zanzibar prayer and hymns) (SPCK, 1950).
The...
See 'Zimbabwean hymnody#John Kaemmer'*
BOKWE, John Knox. b. 15 March 1855; d. 21 July 1922. Bokwe studied with William Kolbe Ntsikana, grandson of Ntsikana Gaga* (or 'Gaba'), and was ordained a Presbyterian minister in Scotland (1906). He was a member of the Ngqika Mbamba clan (Xhosa), born at Ntselamanzi near Lovedale, the Presbyterian mission. Bokwe was the first to adapt John Curwen's Tonic Sol-fa* system to Xhosa music. Bokwe's transcriptions of Ntsikana's songs, published in 1878, conveyed in notation aspects of the oral...
Before the Second Vatican Council, Western hymns in translation and settings of the ordinary of the mass were the primary sources of congregational music among the mainline colonial churches in Eastern Africa, including in Kenya. For Protestants, the spread of Pentecostal songs provided an impetus for change. Oral-tradition adaptations of Western hymns also flourished in African Independent (Initiated) Churches. Nathan J. Corbitt, a missionary ethnomusicologist in Kenya during the early 1980s,...
Kneels at the feet of his friends. Tom Colvin* (1925-2000).
Often known by the first line of its refrain, 'Jesu, Jesu, fill us with your love', this song was written in Ghana during Colvin's period of missionary service, 1959-64, and set to an indigenous love-song melody collected at Chereponi in northern Ghana. The text, based on John 13: 12-16, had its birth during a lay training course for evangelists, where the curriculum also included agricultural and community development, reflecting the...
STEAD, Louisa M.R. b. Dover, England, 1 February 1846; d. Penkridge (now Mutare), near Umtali, Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), 18 January 1917. Louisa immigrated to the United States as a young woman, ca. 1871, where she resided with friends in Cincinnati, Ohio. At a camp meeting revival in Urbana, Ohio, Louisa committed herself to missionary service, but was unable to fulfill her vow owing to poor health. After marrying George Stead in 1873, she gave birth to their only child, Louise...
'Makwaya', coming from a Xhosa pronunciation of the English words 'my choir', represents a synthesis of African group singing styles and European choral music. John Knox Bokwe* (1855-1922), a Xhosa ordained in the Presbyterian Church in Scotland, had a strong interest in the music of Ntsikana* and was part of a rising nationalism concerned about cultural advancement among black South Africans. He developed 'makwaya' as a choral style that blended African music with choral singing as a way to...
The ethnomusicologist and missionary, A. M. Jones, states that African Christian music was first used in worship by the Church of Scotland in the late 1800s among the Ngoni people of what was then Nyasaland (now Malawi), as an exceptional occurrence. While he provides no details, his observation indicates the possibility of attempts to produce indigenous hymnody that preceded most other places in Africa with the exception of the hymns of the Xhosa prophet Ntsikana* in South Africa (Jones,...
HATCHETT, Marion Josiah. b. Monroe, South Carolina, 19 July 1927: d. Sewanee, Tennessee, 7 August 2009. Son of a United Methodist Church minister, he was confirmed as a member of the Episcopal Church while a student at Wofford College, Spartanburg, South Carolina (AB 1947). He continued his studies at The School of Theology, University of the South, Sewanee, Tennessee (BD, 1951, STM, 1967), and General Theological Seminary, New York City (THD, 1972).
Ordained in the Episcopal Church (deacon...
BALLANTA, Nicholas George Julius. b. Kissy, Sierra Leone, 14 March 1893; d. Sierra Leone(?), 1961(?). Ballanta was an ethnomusicologist, hymnist, and composer, known especially for his collection, Saint Helena Island Spirituals (1925), which included the first musical setting of 'Let us break bread together on our knees'*.
At the time of Ballanta's birth, Sierra Leone was a British colony, and independence from Great Britain was not won until 1961 — the year that Ballanta is thought to have...
Night has fallen. Malawian, translated by Tom Colvin* (1925-2000).
The original was written by a Scottish missionary, probably Clement Scott, about 1885, to a melody collected by him from boatmen on the Zambezi river, and which had become established as a Malawi evening hymn. Colvin made the translation while himself serving in Malawi. The melody is believed to be the remnant of a song about the Virgin Mary introduced by Jesuits some two or three centuries earlier. In performance, the hymn is...
Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika. South African national anthem. See Enoch Mankayi Sontonga*.
NTSIKANA Gaga/Gaba. b. ca. 1780; d. 1821. He seems to be known in two forms, as 'Gaga' and 'Gaba'. The hymns of the prophet Ntsikana are the prototype of church music in a traditional Xhosa style. David Dargie* (1982) describes the prophet as
an attractively mysterious figure in Xhosa history. A Cirha, and son of a councillor of the famous chief Ngqika, he was the first Xhosa Christian. It was probably as a herd-boy that he heard the preaching of the first missionary among the Xhosa, Dr. J. T....
OLUDE, (A. T.) Olajida. b. 16 July 1908; d. c. 1986. A Nigerian Methodist minister, Olude was educated at Wesley College, Ibadan, and at the Mindola training school. He was awarded the Order of Niger and, from the University of Nigeria, the Mus.D. degree (Young, 808).
A.M. Jones describes Olude as 'profoundly upset by the way European-type hymns murdered his language' (Jones, 1976). Jones also notes that Olude built up a collection of at least 77 hymns whose melodies followed precisely the...
See 'Zimbabwean hymnody#Olof Axelsson'*
MATSIKENYIRI, Patrick. b. Biriri, Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), 27 July 1937; d. Mutare, Zimbabwe, 15 January 2021. Patrick Matsikenyiri's career included virtually all aspects of church music—singing, choral directing, composition, hymnal editor, festival leader, professor, and enlivener of global songs in venues worldwide. In the spirit of a Shona proverb—'If you can talk, you can sing. If you can walk, you can dance'—he believed music was for everyone.
After serving as a headmaster for...
CARMICHAEL, Ralph. b. Quincy, Illinois, 28 May 1927; d. Carmillo, California, 18 October 2021. A pioneer in the Contemporary Christian Music industry, Carmichael is a prolific composer of Christian songs, whose experiments in popular musical styles have garnered him recognition by some as the 'Father of Contemporary Christian Music'. Carmichael, fostered by musician parents, early on took violin, trumpet, and piano lessons. He attended Southern California Bible College (now Vanguard University,...
See 'Greek hymns, archaeology'*
See 'Zimbabwean hymnody#Robert Kauffman'*
TEMPLE, Sebastian. b. Pretoria, Transvaal, South Africa, 12 February 1928; d. Tucson, Arizona, 16 December 1997. He was raised by his grandparents. At the age of 16 he wrote a romantic novel, and using its royalties moved to Italy. In 1951 he moved to London and prepared BBC news broadcasts relating to South Africa. Temple went to the United States in 1958, lived in Washington DC, was a Scientologist for ten years, converted to Catholicism and became a Secular Franciscan.
He was a student of...
See 'We are marching in the light of God'*
The anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa captured the attention of the world during the 1980s. News reports from CNN often included singing black South Africans and their supporters singing songs of freedom. These songs were disseminated to the Western world in the mid-1980s largely through the work of Anders Nyberg* (1955- ) under the sponsorship of the Church of Sweden Mission (Lutheran). Nyberg took choirs to South Africa who, in turn, learned songs from South African choirs. Many of...
South African Hymnody. Though the first mission station in South Africa was begun by the Moravians in 1737, it was not until 1800 that a variety of mission societies and denominations pursued the evangelization of this region in earnest. By the end of the 19th century, JJ provided information of the remarkable developments in hymnody in South Africa (referred to as 'Kafirland' or 'Kaffaria') in the 'Foreign Missions' entry. The article noted that Untsikana (Ntsikana Gaga*), generally thought to...
MOLEFE, Stephen Cuthbert. b.1917; d.1987. Molefe was born in the Transkei area of the Eastern Cape Province, South Africa, of Sotho descent. He worked with David Dargie* in composition workshops for the Lumko Institute throughout southern Africa in the 1970s and 1980s, and was a prolific musician.
Molefe served as a choirmaster at the Catholic Church in Vosloorus. He was not only a skilled musician (writing music in Tonic Sol-fa* rather than staff notation) but also fluent in a variety of South...
See 'Tanzanian hymnody#Stephen Mbunga'*
Tanzania is a particularly fertile location for the development of indigenous hymnody because of the work of a leading African priest, Stephen Mbunga, and the ministry of a Protestant missionary, Howard Olson*, that spanned four decades. Together they offer insight into a process of cultivating congregational song, a pattern followed in other areas of the continent.
Precursors
The Moravian diaspora resulted in their first mission station in colonial German East Africa in 1891 by Theodor Meyer...
That boy-child of Mary. Tom Colvin* (1925-2000).
Written in Malawi to a traditional dance tune. The theme of naming reflects the fact that in Africa generally the name given is carefully chosen to express the hopes the family has for the child or to record the events associated with his/her birth. Here, through the naming of Jesus and the circumstances of his birth, the meaning of the Incarnation is simply and tellingly expressed. The song is shared between a soloist and a wider group.
Douglas...
PHILLIPS, Thomas King Ekundayo, b. Ondo State, Nigeria, 8 March 1884; d. Lagos, Nigeria, 10 July 1969. Born into the family of Bishop Charles Samuel Phillips of the Anglican Communion, he was the father of five children. Phillips graduated from Trinity College of Music, London (1914), majoring in organ and violin. He was the second Nigerian to receive a bachelor's degree in music from this institution. Phillips was appointed in 1914 to the position of Organist and Master of the Music at the...
SOGA, Tiyo. b. 1829; d. 12 August 1871. Soga was born in Gwali, Tyumie Valley, South Africa and died in Tutura, South Africa. JJ noted that 'The Rev. Tiyo Soga, a gifted Kafir missionary educated by the United Presbyterian Church, and early removed by death, compiled a book of hymns, which was printed in Scotland' (p.757). A more recent account by J. A. Millard indicates that Soga was the first Xhosa ordained in the United Presbyterian Church. Though his training at the Lovedale Mission was...
COLVIN, Thomas Stevenson ('Tom'). b. Glasgow, 16 April 1925; d. Edinburgh, 24 February 2000. He was educated at Allan Glen's School, Glasgow and at Glasgow Technical College where he trained as a mining engineer (1945-48). After National Service in Burma and Singapore with the Royal Engineers, he returned to Trinity College, University of Glasgow, to prepare for ministry in the Church of Scotland. He was ordained in 1954 in Blantyre, Nyasaland (now Malawi) as a missionary. This was followed by...
We are marching in the light of God. South African Freedom song, translated by Anders Nyberg* (1955- ).
In 1978 Nyberg led a Swedish worship group called 'Fjedur' to South Africa, then under an apartheid regime. After the return to Sweden, ca. 1980, 'Fjedur' published the freedom songs of the black churches (see South African freedom songs*). These were then edited by Nyberg, who provided English translations, and published with the title Freedom is Coming (Church of Sweden Mission, 1984)....
HARRIS, William Wadé. b. 1860 (?); d. April 1929. Born in Liberia, Harris joined the Methodist Church at the age of twelve, although he subsequently worked as a teacher for the Protestant Episcopal Church. He was an early advocate of independence from the Americo-Liberian colonial rule, and was arrested for treason and twice imprisoned by the administration in Liberia over a two-year period, 1909-1910. During his second imprisonment he had a vision of the Archangel Gabriel, who declared him a...
Zimbabwean hymnody
In Zimbabwe the interaction between missionaries and African musicians has yielded hymnody that captures the spirit of the country's churches. The southern region of Africa has a long history of interaction between missionaries and indigenous tribes. As African independence movements (See African hymnody*) spread throughout the 1960s, the development of hymnody conceived by Africans was influenced by the rise of African Independent (Initiated) Churches free from the influence...