Speed our republic, O Father on high!There are some records of this tune being played on ceremonial occasions (search at Making of America).
M. Keller, the author of Keller's American hymn, is an adopted citizen of the United
States. During the war for the Union a prize was offered for a national hymn, and
he felt a strong desire to produce such a composition for his adopted country. It
was first sung in New York, but awakened no interest.* Mr. Keller went to Boston,
gave his hymn to the bands to play, and it soon became a favorite in that city, and
was sung on all patriotic occasions where a large chorus was employed. It was sung
at the Peace Jubilee, at the reception of the battle flags at the Statehouse, by the
request of Gov. Andrew, and by an adopted custom is the first piece played on the
Common by bands on Independence days.
Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote "Angel of Peace" to this tune. See The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes (at the end of vol. 3):
A HYMN OF PEACE"Angel of Peace" is also in Albert Christ-Janer et al.'s American Hymns Old and New, vol. 1 (Columbia UP, 1980, p. 290), which says: "Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote his poem for AMERICAN HYMN by Matthias Keller, who had composed it for his own text, 'Speed Our Republic, O father on High.' Text and music were published together with other choral numbers in Music To Be Performed at the Grand National Peace Jubilee (Boston, 1869)" (Notes, p. 13). This poem is sometimes erroneously attributed to Keller.
SUNG AT THE "JUBILEE," JUNE 15, 1869,
TO THE MUSIC OF SELLER'S[sic] "AMERICAN HYMN"
ANGEL of Peace, thou hast wandered too long!
Spread thy white wings to the sunshine of love!
Come while our voices are blended in song,--
Fly to our ark like the storm-beaten dove!
Fly to our ark on the wings of the dove,--
Speed o'er the far-sounding billows of song,
Crowned with thine olive-leaf garland of love,--
Angel of Peace, thou hast waited too long!
Joyous we meet, on this altar of thine
Mingling the gifts we have gathered for thee,
Sweet with the odors of myrtle and pine,
Breeze of the prairie and breath of the sea,--
Meadow and mountain and forest and sea!
Sweet is the fragrance of myrtle and pine,
Sweeter the incense we offer to thee,
Brothers once more round this altar of thine!
Angels of Bethlehem, answer the strain!
Hark! a new birth-song is filling the sky!-
Loud as the storm-wind that tumbles the main
Bid the full breath of the organ reply,--
Let the loud tempest of voices reply,--
Roll its long surge like the-earth-shaking main!
Swell the vast song till it mounts to the sky!
Angels of Bethlehem, echo the strain!
When the Japanese Ministry of Education started music teaching at the country's public schools, it published three school songbooks in 1881-84, with the help of Luther Whiting Mason (supervisor of music, Boston public schools). In the second volume (1882, No. 48), this song was included as "Taihei no Kyoku" [Music of Peace] with a newly written set of words. Mason is believed to have been responsible for the selection. It ceased to be a school song, but the tune is still used as a hymn in Japan Evangelical Lutheran Church's Kyookai Sanbika [Church Hymnal] (1974, No. 159) as "Misakae to Chikara wa" (text: translation of Horatius Bonar's "Blessing and honour, and glory").
As a school song ("American Hymn", with Keller's text), it appeared in James M. McLaughlin, W. W. Gilchrist and George A. Veazie's The New Educational Music Course: Fourth Music Reader (Boston: Ginn & Company, 1905, 1906, pp. 102-103).
Here is Masato's scan from the Japanese texts.
-Joe Offer-
