Lewis speaker

Lewis Henry Orator (born December 15, 1831 in Philadelphia , Pennsylvania , † August 29, 1908 in Atlantic City , New Jersey ) was an American organist and composer . His most famous song is the St. Louis Christmas carol , known as O Little Town of Bethlehem .

biography

Lewis Henry Redner worked in the Philadelphia real estate business. He was an organist on a voluntary basis and served in four parishes throughout his life. For 19 years he was organist at the Church of the Holy Trinity, Philadelphia . In 1868 the Pastor Phillips Brooks asked him to set a poem to music that presented his memories of a pilgrimage to Bethlehem . The hymn was to be sung in Sunday school on Christmas Eve . Speaker later reported that he had initially postponed this assignment, but on Sunday night, for which he had promised the tune, an angel appeared to him in his sleep and had given him the notes. The song was also made famous by a choral setting by Ralph Vaughan Williams , which is based on a different melody.

Speaker never married. He was very active in charities. Among other things, he was on the committee of the Sunday Breakfast Rescue Mission , a homeless shelter with a soup kitchen.

He died on August 29, 1908 in the "Hotel Marlborough" in Atlantic City , New Jersey and was buried in Woodlands Cemetery in Philadelphia.

Individual evidence

^ Carlton A. Young: Companion to the United Methodist Hymnals. Abingdon Press 1993, p. 519: As Christmas of 1868 approached, Mr. Brooks told me that he had written a simple little carol for the Christmas Sunday school service, and he asked me to write the tune to it. The simple music was written in great haste and under great pressure. We were to practice it on the following Sunday. Mr. Brooks came to me on Friday, and said, 'Redner, have you ground out that music yet to “O Little Town of Bethlehem”?' I replied, 'No,' but that he should have it by Sunday. On the Saturday night previous my brain was all confused about the tune. I thought more about my Sunday school lesson than I did about the music. But I was roused from sleep late in the night hearing an angel-strain whispering in my ear, and seizing a piece of music paper I jotted down the treble of the tune as we now have it, and on Sunday morning before going to church I filled in the harmony. Neither Mr. Brooks nor I ever thought the carol or the music to it would live beyond that Christmas of 1868. (After the correspondence between Louis F. Benson and the speaker from 1901)
↑ Harold E. Pickersgill: A Biographical Album of Prominent Pennsylvanians Volume 3. In: eBooks Read. eBooks Read, accessed July 14, 2015 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME	Speaker, Lewis
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Speaker, Lewis Henry (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	American organist and composer
DATE OF BIRTH	December 15, 1831
PLACE OF BIRTH	Philadelphia , Pennsylvania
DATE OF DEATH	August 29, 1908
Place of death	Atlantic City , New Jersey

[1] Carlton A. Young: Companion to the United Methodist Hymnals. Abingdon Press 1993, p. 519: As Christmas of 1868 approached, Mr. Brooks told me that he had written a simple little carol for the Christmas Sunday school service, and he asked me to write the tune to it. The simple music was written in great haste and under great pressure. We were to practice it on the following Sunday. Mr. Brooks came to me on Friday, and said, 'Redner, have you ground out that music yet to “O Little Town of Bethlehem”?' I replied, 'No,' but that he should have it by Sunday. On the Saturday night previous my brain was all confused about the tune. I thought more about my Sunday school lesson than I did about the music. But I was roused from sleep late in the night hearing an angel-strain whispering in my ear, and seizing a piece of music paper I jotted down the treble of the tune as we now have it, and on Sunday morning before going to church I filled in the harmony. Neither Mr. Brooks nor I ever thought the carol or the music to it would live beyond that Christmas of 1868. (After the correspondence between Louis F. Benson and the speaker from 1901)

[2] Harold E. Pickersgill: A Biographical Album of Prominent Pennsylvanians Volume 3. In: eBooks Read. eBooks Read, accessed July 14, 2015 .