"Praise, my soul, the King of heaven" is a Christian hymn. Its text, which draws from Psalm 103, was written by Anglican divine (clergyman)

Henry Francis Lyte Henry Francis Lyte (1 June 1793 – 20 November 1847) was an Anglican divine, hymnodist, and poet. Biography Youth and education Henry Francis Lyte was the second son of Thomas and Anna Maria (née Oliver) Lyte, whose family came originally fr ...

. First published in 1834, it endures in modern hymnals to a setting written by John Goss in 1868, and remains one of the most popular hymns in English-speaking denominations.

History

The text of the hymn was first published in Lyte's ''The Spirit of the Psalms'' (1834), a publication intended for the use of his own congregation in southern England. It appeared in multiple influential publications, such as '' Hymns Ancient and Modern'' (1861) and '' The English Hymnal'' (1906). It remains extremely popular and John Richard Watson notes that "it is hard to find a major hymnbook that does not include it". The hymn is frequently sung in the United Kingdom and was used in the 1947 royal wedding of Princess Elizabeth, later Queen Elizabeth II, and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. It was also used as the opening hymn at the 2018 funeral of former U.S. President

George H. W. Bush George Herbert Walker BushSince around 2000, he has been usually called George H. W. Bush, Bush Senior, Bush 41 or Bush the Elder to distinguish him from his eldest son, George W. Bush, who served as the 43rd president from 2001 to 2009; pr ...

Text

The text is a free paraphrase of Psalm 103. While, in the mid-nineteenth century, hymn writers usually kept their metrical settings of psalm texts as close as possible to the original, Lyte instead decided to maintain the spirit of the words while freely paraphrasing them. The result speaks, in an imaginative fashion, with "beautiful imagery and thoughtful prose", of themes such as the Love of God, healing and forgiveness, including the repeated exclamations "Praise Him!", in what is a spectacular rhetorical statement of praise. In modern versions, Lyte's text has been frequently altered. One common variant, which originates in the 1861 '' Hymns Ancient and Modern'' collection, is replacing the line "Praise Him! Praise Him!" with "Alleluia!". The original fourth stanza ("Frail as summer's flower"), corresponding with verses 15–17 of the Psalm, was marked for optional omission in the original printing and many modern hymnals therefore do not include it. The text of the omitted stanza shares a "valedictory but hopeful tone" with the other well known hymn by Lyte, "

Abide with me "Abide with Me" is a Christian hymn by Scottish Anglican cleric Henry Francis Lyte. A prayer for God to stay with the speaker throughout life and in death, it was written by Lyte in 1847 as he was dying from tuberculosis. It is most often sung ...

". Other more modern changes, including more gender-neutral language, are relatively minor. An alternate text, written as part of the 1980s and 1990s attempts to reduce the omnipresence of masculine metaphors for God and published as a variant in the ''Presbyterian Hymnal'', begins "Praise my soul, the God of heaven".

Tune

The hymn is most commonly sung to the tune "" ("Praise, my soul"), written as a setting for Lyte's words by John Goss in 1868, and first published in Robert Brown-Borthwick's ''Supplemental Hymn and Tune Book'' (Third edition, 1869). This was an instant success, a report in the 1869 ''

Musical Times ''The Musical Times'' is an academic journal of classical music edited and produced in the United Kingdom and currently the oldest such journal still being published in the country. It was originally created by Joseph Mainzer in 1842 as ''Mainze ...

'' stating that "it is at once the most beautiful and dignified hymn tune which has lately come under our notice". Paul Westermeyer notes that it has "been praised as one of the finest" hymn tunes from the Victorian period and remains much a favourite of congregations. The original setting by Goss is in D major. The first stanza is marked to be sung in unison with harmonies from the organ. The second is in

four-part harmony The term "four-part harmony" refers to music written for four voices, or for some other musical medium—four musical instruments or a single keyboard instrument, for example—for which the various musical parts can give a different note for ...

(transcribed below), while the remaining stanzas are again in unison. A version in

F-sharp minor F-sharp minor is a minor scale based on F, consisting of the pitches F, G, A, B, C, D, and E. Its key signature has three sharps. Its relative major is A major and its parallel major is F-sharp major (or enharmonically G-flat major). T ...

was also composed for the original fourth stanza (now regularly omitted) in November 1868. << << \new Staff \new Lyrics \lyricmode \new Staff >> >> \layout \midi An alternative tune is "Regent Square", originally written by

Henry Smart Henry Thomas Smart (26 October 1813 – 6 July 1879) was an English organist and composer. Biography Smart was born in London, a nephew of the conductor Sir George Smart and son of a music publisher, orchestra director and accomplished violi ...

for "Glory be to God the Father" by Horatius Bonar.

Notes

References

English Christian hymns 19th-century hymns Psalm settings

External links

*, sung by the Kampen Boys Choir {{Hymns and songs based on Psalms