Well, I had about four responses to the questions posted a couple of weeks ago. Only one of them, Ben Green, actually attempted to look up the answers! Thank you, Ben. Anyway, here are the answers. I hope you find it interesting!
Pictured above are those attending the class. Mrs. Haacker was absent when the picture was taken.
1. When did Charles Wesley Live?
1707-1788
2. How Many Hymns & Sacred Poems did he write?
Over 6,000. Some sources say there could have even been as many as 9,000.
3. Did Charles write the text, music, or both?
Only the text. In fact, there isn't really any evidence that he had any real musical training at all. He had some sort of organ in his home (probably a reed pump organ), so it is assumed that he must have played it, and he played the flute a little. If you look in our hymnal, you will see at the bottom of the page that most of the tunes we sing these texts to were written about 100 years after Wesley wrote them. Most of them are fairly easy to set to existing tunes since he used common poetic meters, including iambic pentameter.
4. Did brother John write any hymns?
This one is sort of a trick question. You may notice that there are several hymns attributed to John in our hymnal. However, he did not actually write any of the texts. John simply took existing texts and either translated or altered them to fit a tune.
3 comments:
Brian,
I may not have looked for the answers but I checked out yours (smiling). The John Wesley I found didn't die in 1788 he died in 1791.
Both Marjorie and James probably knew that also but are a lot nicer than I am.
Get it straight organ-boy.
Peace,Todd
The question was when did Charles Wesley die not John. :)
Curses! I have been had by the Geek Squad. I best let this thread die before I bury myself any further.
Peace, Todd
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