Tunes of Glory

Prepared in association with a conference to mark 150 years of the Baird Lectures, this paper outlines the three sets of lectures that took as their subject worship and/or music. First is W D Maxwell's A History of Worship in the Church of Scotland (1952) which put to rest many erroneous assumptions about Reformed practice. An account of G Wauchope Stewart's Music in Church Worship is prefaced by an account of the discussion conducted at the time (the period leading up to 1926), based on papers given to early Scottish Church Society conferences and other publications of the time including the first Archbishops' Commission of 1922. The lectures, which called for certain reforms, prefaced the publication of the Revised Church Hymnary (1927) and the Scottish Psalter of 1929. They also had value in respect of the contemporary scene. Ian Mackenzie's Music Magic Lost is placed in the context of the modern ferment in church music, to which the author had contributed, and offer a radical and idiosyncratic critique of church music practice today. That said, the distance between the two sets does not feel great some of the practical solutions are similar.