When the King shall come again

Isaiah 35 is a chapter rich in the ‘Advent’ imagery of the desert blossoming as the rose, the eyes of blind people being opened, and the exiled nation returning home with songs of joy. This hymn was born (in Poplar, E London, 1975) of Christopher Idle’s desire to match a metrical version of this Scripture with the tune TEMPUS ADEST FLORIDUM. This had begun as springtime music, but was by now usually sung (if at all) to J M Neale’s excursion into legend with Good King Wenceslas. The words were therefore matched to the music, with an implicit Christian understanding. Some have wanted to insert the title ‘Christ’ to make this clearer. Several revisions have been made by the author over the years, the most significant being the tricky transformation of ‘the dumb’ and ‘the blind’ in stz 3, in response to a reasonable request from sensitive Canadian editors in 1989. The first books to publish the words with their intended tune were Church Family Worship and Carol Praise in 1986 and 1987, but American books such as Worship and Rejoice (2001) have followed suit. The text had first featured in HTC. A more recent approach to this chapter in Isaiah is found at 665.

The tune set here, AVE VIRGO VIRGINUM (‘Hail, virgin of virgins’), comes from Horn’s Gesangbuch of 1544, where it is set to a German Advent hymn. But in 15th-c Bohemian collections it accompanies Gaudeamus pariter, words which have also been used as the tune name. The Roman Catholic ‘Ave virgo’ text dates from a Cologne book of 1584. Various rhythms are currently in print; Come ye faithful, raise the strain (also by J M Neale) is often set to this tune.

b Bromley, Kent 1938. Eltham Coll, St Peter’s Coll Oxford (BA, English), Clifton Theol Coll Bristol; ordained in 1965 to a Barrow-in-Furness curacy. He spent 30 years in CofE parish ministry, some in rural Suffolk, mainly in inner London (Peckham, Poplar and Limehouse). Author of over 300 hymn texts, mainly Scripture based, collected in Light upon the River (1998) and Walking by the River (2008), Trees along the River (2018), and now appearing in some 300 books and other publications; see also the dedication of EP1 (p3) to his late wife Marjorie. He served on 5 editorial groups from Psalm Praise (1973) to Praise!; his writing includes ‘Grove’ booklets Hymns in Today’s Language (1982) and Real Hymns, Real Hymn Books (2000), and The Word we preach, the words we sing (Reform, 1998). He edited the quarterly News of Hymnody for 10 years, and briefly the Bulletin of the Hymn Society, on whose committee he served at various times between 1984 and 2006; and addressed British and American Hymn Socs. Until 1996 he often exchanged draft texts with Michael Perry (qv) for mutual criticism and encouragement. From 1995 he was engaged in educational work and writing from home in Peckham, SE London, until retirement in 2003; following his return to Bromley after a gap of 40 years, he has attended Holy Trinity Ch Bromley Common and Hayes Lane Baptist Ch. Owing much to the Proclamation Trust, he also belongs to the Anglican societies Crosslinks and Reform, together with CND and the Christian pacifist Fellowship of Reconciliation. A former governor of 4 primary schools, he has also written songs for school assemblies set to familiar tunes, and (in 2004) Grandpa’s Amazing Poems and Awful Pictures. His bungalow is smoke-free, alcohol-free, car-free, gun-free and TV-free. Nos.13, 18, 21, 23A, 24B, 27B, 28, 31, 35, 36, 37, 48, 50, 68, 78, 79, 80, 81, 83, 85, 89, 92, 95, 102, 108, 109, 114, 118, 119A, 121A, 125, 128, 131, 145B, 157, 176, 177, 193*, 313*, 333, 339, 388, 392, 420, 428, 450, 451, 463, 478, 506, 514, 537, 548, 551, 572, 594, 597, 620, 621, 622, 636, 668, 669, 693, 747, 763, 819, 914, 917, 920, 945, 954, 956, 968, 976, 1003, 1012, 1084, 1098, 1138, 1151, 1158, 1159, 1178, 1179, 1181, 1201, 1203, 1204, 1205, 1209, 1210, 1211, 1212, 1221, 1227, 1236, 1237, 1244, 1247, 5017, 5018, 5019, 5020.