Hymns to use for Presentation of the Lord
  • Since this feast will be falling on a Sunday in 2025, I’m interested to hear what any of you might have used in the past that I may be overlooking.

    Here are some serviceable hymns I’ve found:

    In His Temple Now Behold Him (ST. THOMAS)
    Now Let Your Servant Go in Peace (CONDITOR ALME SIDERUM)
    O Light of Gentile Nations (LLANGLOFFAN)


    Aaaaaaand…that’s all I got.
  • Richard MixRichard Mix
    Posts: 2,802
    I can't find the 2017 bulletin, and GIA's Catholic Community Hymnal is pretty lean: there's a mode viii Nunc with Lumen ad revelationem, and then one has to rely on this being historically a Marian feast or else look up "Light" in the index (shudder: "I want to walk", but, unindexed, "O radiant light" to Jesu dulcis memoria).
    The index to Evangelical Lutheran Worship has several paraphrases: "In peace and joy" MIT FRIED UND FREUD (should have stuck with the Brahms harmonization), "O Lord now let your servant" to the 7676D KUORTANE, and "Lord dismiss us with your blessing", a bit of a stretch I think. There's also "In his temple now behold him" to REGENT SQUARE.
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • When it last fell on a Sunday in 2020, we used Lift Up Your Heads, Ye Mighty Gates and Of the Father's Love Begotten. Not explicitly Presentation hymns, but they could tie the feast to the broader Christmas season. Also, Psalm 24 is the responsorial psalm for Presentation of which Lift Up Your Heads is a paraphrase.

    Hail to the Lord's Anointed and Songs of Thankfulness and Praise could be options too. Again, not explicitly Presentation, but can help tie the feast to Christmas, Baptism of the Lord, etc. If you are limited with what's in your hymnal, I feel like these could be options.
  • "Let Zion's bridal-room be clothed," Peter Abelard's hymn, Adorna Sion Thalamum, is an Office Hymn for the day. Translated by Kathleen Pluth.

    When morning gilds the skies.
    Christ be our light.
    Christ, whose glory fills the skies.

    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 2,326
    there's a mode viii Nunc with Lumen ad revelationem — right, from the distribution of candles.

    Lift Up Your Heads, Ye Mighty Gates: I'm such a fan. But as I mentioned in another post, I'm not a fan of TRURO! I prefer FREYLINGHAUSEN. It's a banger!
  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,193
    "Let Zion's bridal-room be clothed," Peter Abelard's hymn, Adorna Sion Thalamum, is an Office Hymn for the day. Translated by Kathleen Pluth.

    See: https://forum.musicasacra.com/forum/discussion/comment/57980#Comment_57980 where my alternatim (unison, SATB) setting is posted. For convenience, the PDF score with keyboard reduction (for rehearsal) is attached here.
    Giffen-Adorna, Sion, thalamum-kbd-corrected.pdf
    169K
  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,193
    "Hail to the Lord's Anointed" has been suggested above. Here is my adaptation of this hymn to the tune "Es flog ein kleins Waldvögelein" (expanding upon the Walford Davies harmonization).
    Giffen-Hail to the Lords anointed.pdf
    99K
    Giffen-Hail to the Lords anointed.mp3
    2M