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Stuart Revercomb

Stuart Revercomb is a marketing consultant and joyously married father of four children. He seems to remember someone once telling him he ought to be a writer. "The Unseen Here and Now" -- Thursdays.

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September 06, 2001

Hymn Singing 101

Singing in Church always seemed a little strange to me. From the first moment I stood next to my parents looking up as they crooned, (I'm putting that nicely, especially for my beloved mother who while being just that, couldn't carry a tune in the proverbial bucket), I realized that what I was hearing was something other than music. It was a hymn.

The experience was overwhelming really. There, in the front of the church were these giant brass tubes from which all manner of foreboding notes would emanate, and after a couple of bars were played, the congregation, including my poor mother, would try to match the octaves that this infernal machine was producing.

From down there low in the pews it didn't sound so much like something having to do with praise and worship, as the cacophony that might result if a variety of train horns were played in a room full of large waterfowl under great duress. If making a "joyful noise before the Lord" was our goal, we were in trouble. We had him on the run to be sure.

But as I grew in my faith, (i.e. I was no longer allowed to doodle, but rather required to participate in the singing of the Hymn), I realized that this was simply the way hymns were performed. It didn't matter whether I attended a friend's church or my own, hymn singing demanded that people who clearly could not sing, make every effort to do so.

And so I did as well - until one day while closely monitoring the efforts of my 2 older brothers I realized that neither of them were singing at all. They were moving their lips all right, but no more sound was coming from them than the Pinochio puppets in our basement at home. Mom never had a clue. Within a couple of weeks I had perfected my own lip synching technique as well. Milly Vanilly would have been proud.

But somewhere along the way I started singing again, not loud like the people who can really sing sing, but at least audible enough that I could hear myself. I also began to notice that there were a great many others who sang just as I did, and who seemed to be equally happy that the giant air breathing monster up front was loud enough to drown them out as well. Our sins were plenty in number already - no need adding our less than melodious voices to the list.

But then I met one George Charles Anderson - a man of many gifts to be sure, but not a single one of them having anything to do with the offering of what most of us would define as a "joyful noise." This fact was first bourne out when the good Reverend Anderson submitted a tape as part of his application for the position of Senior Minister at Second Presbyterian Church in Roanoke.

When the tape arrived, I found a note on it offering a disclaimer and apology. Apparently the sound man had forgotten to mute George's microphone during the hymn in one of the services he was submitting, and thus a very up close and personal and exceedingly LOUD recording of his voice had been rendered that "no human ear should ever be required to hear." His note went on to suggest that perhaps the listener would be best served by proceeding directly to the sermon, bypassing the hymn that would be sung before it , "because the truth of the matter is that I really can not sing."

My fellow search committee member Broaddus Fitzpatrick and I smiled at each other. Neither of us having matured substantially since the third grade, we went directly to the hymn. Sitting back in our chairs we listened as the first strained bars of an as yet recognizable hymn began to play softly in the background. It was barely audible. Broaddus reached over and turned the volume up to a more appropriate level - "I wouldn't do that if I were...." I began to say...

"ALL THINGS BRIGHT AND BEAUTIFUL...ALL CREATURES GREAT AND SMALL..."

Anderson's voice boomed through the house. Broaddus dove for the volume knob and turned it down. We listened a moment longer to see if the reduction in volume would help. It didn't. The dog got up and left the room.

If mom needed a bucket, this guy needed a backhoe.

Broaddus looked at me smiling, "Well, one things for sure - he's honest."

That he was. We giggled like school girls. "It was brave of him to send it," I said, "I don't care how good the sermon is - I think I'd have left that one in the drawer."

But as it turned out the sermon was extraordinary and so was he, and almost 2 years and 200 applications later we wound up calling him to Second Church as our Senior Minister.

And a short time later he taught me how to sing.

It was during our first "Presbytery Meeting" at which his "call" was going to be approved by the governing body responsible for such things, that we first rose to sing together. It was a full house and 3 of us, (it may have been Fitzpatrick joining Anderson and I ), gathered around one hymnal to sing. I remember thinking that if, "All Things Bright and Beautiful" had been chosen I would have had to leave the building. But it was some other fairly common hymn, and as we all began to sing the first line, it was Anderson who was singing by far the loudest.

Except this time it wasn't that bad. It wasn't that good either - but it wasn't bad. What it was, was real - sung with an unabashed and uncompromising heart that would make the most joyful noise of which it was capable. It was a "damn the torpedoes" sort of good that said, "here I am as God made me, and be that what it may, I shall return such praise as I can with what I have been given."

He didn't say that, of course - but that's what his singing said to me.

And I've been singing like I mean it ever since.

I bet you didn't know that George.

Thanks.