Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing is still my fave.

Sorry, but if there's no Vaughan Williams, that means my favorite hymns aren't in there! :-D

You know, from the get-go, this whole project has seemed weird to me. So there are 13 common hymns... what about all the uncommon hymns? The point of our hymnody surely isn't to have a 'favorite hymn' - it's to give shared voice to the congregation's responses to the day, to the lections, to the world, to the numinous. We have about a thousand to choose from now in TEC, which seems about right to me.

This list of 'common' hymns seems to me to contain an unusually large proportion of hymns on the theme of Jesus is going to be the boss of everybody! I have to say that I don't think these hymns are aging well. On occasion, when they are sung, I have discovered an urgent need to go outside and look quietly at the trees.

Pamela Grenfell Smith
Bloomington, Indiana

I answered the poll but I admit, none of my favorites are there. These are just the hymns held in common by a number of denominational hymnals.

As an Episcopalian, I spent a few years singing in a Methodist choir. Drove me crazy that they sang many of the same hymns but to the tunes that belonged to other hymns, which were also in the hymnal, themselves sung to the "wrong" tunes! (Like it mattered!)

Lois and others raise an interesting point. The connection between hymn tunes and texts should be very powerful and complimentary. For some, it is impossible to separate the two, whether the tune is good or not, and whether the text is good or not.

As a former cathedral organist-choirmaster before being ordained, I used to threaten the clergy with taking scissors to their sermon texts if they insisted on cutting out verses of hymns. Text and tune are both important.

We Americans IMHO have a much more narrow repertoire of hymns in common usage than the C of E where I assisted for many years. [Hymn singing is also a much more popular experience.] I discovered the frequent delight in hearing familiar texts sung to different tunes from TEC experience. This past week I was revising my funeral plans and being a strong devotee of Wesleyan hymnody, I chose to use 'Love divine, all loves excelling' to the dominant UK tune usage: 'Braenwern'. I think it more successfully enhances that text than any of the tunes used in the USA. Researching it I discovered that Billy Graham had used the tune with 'What a friend we have in Jesus", which opened up a whole new appreciation to me of that text. Likewise, the tune 'Repton' to the text 'Dear Lord and Father of mankind', happily copied in the 1982 hymnal from UK usage us another such example.

Bottom line for me, any hymn text should enjoy the best possible marriage with a tune which strengthens the author's intent. - Of course much of this is subjective, but I believe that there is much objective criteria for this textually and musically.

Speaking of funerals, this is what I want sung at mine:

All my Hope on God is Founded, to the tune Michael (Herbert Howells).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gio2pec2vLA&feature=related

Words:
http://www.oremus.org/hymnal/a/a133.html

"All my hope on God is founded" is also on my list, along with: "God is love" [Abbot's Leigh], "O thou who cames from above' [Hereford], the hymnal version of the "Kontakion", and "Come thou traveler, unknown" to a new tune by Daniel Kallman, commissioned by my last parish as a retirement gift, tune and place - [Coconut Grove].
I did say that I have a special affection for Wesleyan texts...

It's not just that they're held in common; it's also that they are old enough.

As a layman who has been around for a while, I don't hesitate to speak for others. Most laypeople in the pews are not musical professionals nor are they liturgical specialists. They do, however, have a strong preference for familiar hymns set to familiar music and are generally turned off by the unfamiliar. This is even more true, if possible, of an inquiring visitor from any other Christian tradition.

Herb Gray

Unfortunately, the link to the "results" only takes you to a spreadsheet with each vote - no totals showing which hymns are leading. I guess that's because the survey is still open. For the record, as of this moment, the top five are (1) Love divine, all loves excelling, (2) Glorious things of thee are spoken, (3) Crown him with many crowns, (4) Holy, holy, holy, and (5) All hail the power of Jesus' Name. BTW, General Convention approves only the TEXT of hymns and never the tunes used. Perhaps that's why we have so much of a love/hate relationship with certain hymns.