This is one of my favourite English hymns, so many thanks for uploading this recording, James: bravo. You may be interested to know a little of the tune's backstory . . . Kingsfold is a small hamlet situated in West Sussex in the parish of Warnham. It has a fine old pub now called 'The Owl', but its original name was 'The Wheatsheaf'. In 1904, shortly before Christmas, Vaughan Williams visited The Wheatsheaf in Kingsfold and heard a folk-song being sung by a Mr Booker. The melody that Mr Booker sang is very old, in fact a folk tune that is set to multiple texts in England and Ireland and is believed by some scholars to date back to the middle ages. The words that Vaughan Williams first heard were 'The Ballad of Maria Martin', which tells the true story of a grisly murder that happened in Suffolk in 1827! Maria Martin was a young woman who lived with her father and her stepmother. She planned to marry her lover, William Corder, and he persuaded her that they had to travel in secret to Ipswich to tie the knot. Maria had an illegitimate child by a previous lover, and Corder said the local constable had a warrant for her arrest because of this. They arranged to meet in secret at a location near where she lived known as the 'Red Barn'. Some weeks later, Maria's father started to receive letters from William Corder telling him news of his wedding to Maria and of their new life on the Isle of Wight. But Maria's stepmother started to have nightmares, and eventually persuaded her husband to search the Red Barn. There he saw a patch of earth that looked as if it had been disturbed more recently than the rest. With the help of some friends, he dug into this earth and found Maria's body. She had been shot! William Corder hanged for the murder of Maria Martin. The case became famous, and soon it was being used as subject-matter for plays, pamphlets and ballads. It was one such ballad that Vaughan Williams heard in Kingsfold, in 'The Wheatsheaf', that became the inspiration tune for a great hymn! Earlier in that same year, Vaughan Williams had agreed to become music editor of 'The English Hymnal'. Many of the tunes he used in that book were adaptations of folk-songs that he or his fellow enthusiasts had collected. The tune he heard in Kingsfold was used for the hymn sung in St Matthew's in this recording: "I heard the voice of Jesus say".
Muitooooo Lindoooooooooooo❤❤❤
Angola agradece.
Thank you for uploading these recordings.
You are very welcome.
Really lovely hymn, Phil Lehenbauer's composition come to mind.
Thank you friend!
I love this. 😍🎶😍
Thank you very much, Phil
This is one of my favourite English hymns, so many thanks for uploading this recording, James: bravo.
You may be interested to know a little of the tune's backstory . . .
Kingsfold is a small hamlet situated in West Sussex in the parish of Warnham. It has a fine old pub now called 'The Owl', but its original name was 'The Wheatsheaf'. In 1904, shortly before Christmas, Vaughan Williams visited The Wheatsheaf in Kingsfold and heard a folk-song being sung by a Mr Booker. The melody that Mr Booker sang is very old, in fact a folk tune that is set to multiple texts in England and Ireland and is believed by some scholars to date back to the middle ages. The words that Vaughan Williams first heard were 'The Ballad of Maria Martin', which tells the true story of a grisly murder that happened in Suffolk in 1827!
Maria Martin was a young woman who lived with her father and her stepmother. She planned to marry her lover, William Corder, and he persuaded her that they had to travel in secret to Ipswich to tie the knot. Maria had an illegitimate child by a previous lover, and Corder said the local constable had a warrant for her arrest because of this. They arranged to meet in secret at a location near where she lived known as the 'Red Barn'.
Some weeks later, Maria's father started to receive letters from William Corder telling him news of his wedding to Maria and of their new life on the Isle of Wight. But Maria's stepmother started to have nightmares, and eventually persuaded her husband to search the Red Barn. There he saw a patch of earth that looked as if it had been disturbed more recently than the rest. With the help of some friends, he dug into this earth and found Maria's body. She had been shot! William Corder hanged for the murder of Maria Martin. The case became famous, and soon it was being used as subject-matter for plays, pamphlets and ballads. It was one such ballad that Vaughan Williams heard in Kingsfold, in 'The Wheatsheaf', that became the inspiration tune for a great hymn!
Earlier in that same year, Vaughan Williams had agreed to become music editor of 'The English Hymnal'. Many of the tunes he used in that book were adaptations of folk-songs that he or his fellow enthusiasts had collected. The tune he heard in Kingsfold was used for the hymn sung in St Matthew's in this recording: "I heard the voice of Jesus say".
Wow, what a tragic story! But thank you for the historical background. Now I will think of that every time I play Kingsfold 😅