Tune: MERTHYR TYDFIL

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MERTHYR TYDFIL

Composer: Joseph Parry (1870)
Published in 18 hymnals

Printable scores: PDF, MusicXML
Audio files: MIDI, Recording

Composer: Joseph Parry

Joseph Parry (b. Merthyr Tydfil, Glamorganshire, Wales, 1841; d. Penarth, Glamorganshire, 1903) was born into a poor but musical family. Although he showed musical gifts at an early age, he was sent to work in the puddling furnaces of a steel mill at the age of nine. His family immigrated to a Welsh settlement in Danville, Pennsylvania in 1854, where Parry later started a music school. He traveled in the United States and in Wales, performing, studying, and composing music, and he won several Eisteddfodau (singing competition) prizes. Parry studied at the Royal Academy of Music and at Cambridge, where part of his tuition was paid by interested community people who were eager to encourage his talent. From 1873 to 1879 he was professor of mus… Go to person page >

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Tune Information

Title:	MERTHYR TYDFIL
Composer:	Joseph Parry (1870)
Meter:	8.8.8.8
Incipit:	51715 74512 32576
Key:	g minor
Copyright:	Public Domain

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Texts

The End of Things Created

All texts published with MERTHYR TYDFIL ^ top

Alternative Tunes

More tunes with meter 8.8.8.8 ^ top

Notes

Joseph Parry (PHH 18) composed MERTHYR TIDFIL (also called DIES IRAE), first published in Llyfr Tonau Cynulleidfaol Cenedlaethol Cymru (The Welsh National Book of Congregational Tunes), a collection of hymn tunes Parry compiled and published in several parts from 1887 to 1892. The tune is named after the town of Parry's birth and means "the martyr Tydfil." The similarities of lines 1, 2, and 4 find a fitting contrast and climax in line 3. The harmonization invites part singing, but the music must not be taken too slowly.

--Psalter Hymnal Handbook

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Timeline

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Arrangements

Arrangements

Harmonizations, Introductions, Descants, Intonations

150 Last Verse Harmonies: For Use with the Hymn Books of the Baptist, Methodist, United Reformed and Other Free Churches
Composer/Editor John Columba McCann
Published By: Kevin Mayhew Ltd. (2007) pp. 83
The Faber Books of Descants: Harmony Edition
Composer/Editor Leslie Russell
Published By: Faber Music Limited (1969) pp. 14
Thirty New Settings of Familiar Hymn Tunes: Pipe Organ and Hammond Registration
Composer/Editor Harald Rohlig
Published By: Abingdon Press (1963) pp. 28