Tune Req: Borrowed melody for Hymn 8 May16

Subject: Tune Req: Borrowed melody for Hymn 8May16
From: JHW
Date: 08 May 16 - 04:59 AM

On BBC Radio 4 Sunday Worship I just heard the melody of 'The Unquiet Grave' used for a hymn. (Why indeed should the Devil have all the best tunes?)
I'm beat to recognise a further melody used later, not unlike the 'Unquiet Grave'. Perhaps I will remember by the time someone comes back with it!
Sunday Worship AM 8May16
Melody I can't pin down is at 27minutes30 soloist Alexandra Fraser.
(Unquiet Grave melody is at 17minutes03)

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Borrowed melody for Hymn 8May16
From: Snuffy
Date: 08 May 16 - 05:31 AM

The second tune is commonly used with the Irish "Foggy Dew" - see the recent Songs of the 1916 Easter Rising thread.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Borrowed melody for Hymn 8May16
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 08 May 16 - 05:52 AM

Agreed.

The one you attribute to "Unquiet Grave" is surely the widely used air also used for 'Star Of The County Down', 'Dives & Lazarus', &c?

≈M≈

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Borrowed melody for Hymn 8May16
From: The Doctor
Date: 08 May 16 - 06:15 AM

The first tune is the one Vaughan Williams used in his Variations on Dives and Lazarus, and as such is in the Oxford Book of Carols, no.57, though that says it more properly belongs to no.60, Job. VW adapted it when he edited the English Hymnal, called in Kingsfold and set it to 'I heard the voice of Jesus say'. Nic Jones, among others, sang D & L, and recorded it.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Borrowed melody for Hymn 8May16
From: JHW
Date: 11 May 16 - 05:00 AM

Thanks to all and the link. Out walking later I realised 'Foggy Dew' when I wasn't thinking about it, then wondered whether the melody might even predate 'Foggy Dew'.
Now I'll have to think where I got my 'Unquiet Grave' from decades ago.
They did indeed announce and sing 'I heard the voice of Jesus say' in the programme when I re-listened. Also I listened to Nic Jones Dives and Lazarus.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Borrowed melody for Hymn 8May16
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 12 May 16 - 04:40 AM

According to another website and a thread on here, the oldest song which uses that tune (County Down/Dives and Lazarus) is Gilderoy, which goes back to Allan Ramsay in the early 1700s.
I know of at least 5 songs to that same tune, most if which are listed on a Wikipedia page about Dives and Lazarus, and include Unquiet Grave. Not on that list is Van Diemen's Land (Gallant Poachers).
The first version of Unquiet Grave that I heard was Joan Baez's recording, but it uses a totally different tune.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Borrowed melody for Hymn 8May16
From: JHW
Date: 13 May 16 - 03:40 PM

Ah yes, I do a Gallant Poachers, faster paced, without realising it is much the same melody

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Borrowed melody for Hymn 8 May16
From: Joe Offer
Date: 13 May 16 - 04:18 PM

Hymnary.org has excellent information about the history of hymns and their melodies. It says the lyrics for "I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say" were written by Horatius Bonar in 1846. The melody most often used for the song is called KINGSFOLD.

Here's what hymnary.org says about the melody:

Thought by some scholars to date back to the Middle Ages, KINGSFOLD is a folk tune set to a variety of texts in England and Ireland. The tune was published in English Country Songs (1893), an anthology compiled by Lucy E. Broadwood and J. A. Fuller Maitland. After having heard the tune in Kingsfold, Sussex, England (thus its name), Ralph Vaughan Williams (PHH 316) introduced it as a hymn tune in The English Hymnal (1906) as a setting for Horatius Bonar's "I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say" (488).
Shaped in classic rounded bar form (AABA), KINGSFOLD has modal character and is both dignified and strong. It is well suited to either unison or harmony singing. Use bright organ tone. Try playing on two manuals and pedal on the middle stanzas.
--Psalter Hymnal Handbook

There's background information about Bonar and his hymn here:

http://www.challies.com/articles/hymn-stories-i-heard-the-voice-of-jesus-say