Hello everyone!

            Hope you’ve had a great week. This week I’ve posted another Canaan Hymn on my site; #208, “Our common hope of spreading the gospel.” The Canaan Hymns are a collection of Chinese Christian hymns that were written by one woman named Xiao Min. She single handedly wrote over 1000 hymns (music and lyrics) over the years, and it’s amazing that she couldn’t write down the music herself so someone gave her a tape recorder and she was not very educated because she was from a small rural area in China. Her hymns show how God can work through the most humble and unlikely people. I hope you enjoy this week’s Canaan hymn.

          Remember, this Friday the Dulcimer hymnal; Volume 2 can be ordered! It’s only 15 dollars, with three dollars shipping. You can check it out at http://www.thedulcimerhymnal.com/dulcimer-hymnal-volume2

God bless,

-Ben

Sheet Music

http://www.thedulcimerhymnal.com/dulcimer-sheet-music

Main Page

http://www.thedulcimerhymnal.com/

This Week’s hymn is a southern gospel hymn called “Farther Along”. The writer Rev. W. A. Fletcher made this song known just by being in the right place at the right time. Fletcher was travelling by train to the Indian Territories as a missionary. Fletcher’s wife was expecting a child very soon and he felt depressed he probably wouldn't be present for the occasion. Fletcher began to write some hymn lyrics to calm himself down on the train and to reflect on his trip’s purpose. Sitting next to him on the train was J. R. Baxter, a gospel music promoter who was quite taken with the lyrics that Fletcher was writing and offered him $2.00 for them. Mr. Baxter subsequently had them put to music and the song has been quite popular in the gospel music arena ever since.

I've been playing and reading China's "Canaan Hymns" lately, and this hymn reminded me of the words that Xiao Min (The Hymns' writer) wrote about being in prison. Her whole church in China was brought to prison for worshiping God. The prisoners asked "Why are you here, what have you done wrong?". Xio Min's church members took turns fasting and praying within the prison and even evangelized to some of the prisoners. Eventually they were set free. This hymn talks about believers being punished, yet people that are evil in this world are rewarded and are comfortable. Life is for Christ and life is in Christ. True comfort comes from the love of God. If we seek it come somewhere else, the water will always run dry and we'll have to constantly walk back and get more. With God, we are fulfilled. Hope you all enjoy the Hymn this week!

God bless,

-Ben

Sheet music

http://www.thedulcimerhymnal.com/dulcimer-sheet-music

Hello everyone,

                  This week's free dulcimer hymn arrangement isn't a hymn arrangement at all! I arranged Psalm 89 for the dulcimer this week. Before last week I never heard this tune, but I find it catching and of course I love the words. This tune is named "New Jerusalem" and can be found in most of the new Psalters today. I posted a small overview of how to play the psalm on Youtube and slower tempoed play along video will be added to Youtube shortly. I just wanted to say thank you for all the feed back and your shared love for hymns and psalms. I'll see you all next week!

God bless, 

-Ben

Sheet music (begginer and intermediate)

http://thedulcimerhymnal.com/dulcimer-sheet-music

Hello Everyone,

          Besides writing hymn arrangements and writing my books, I enjoy playing old American folk songs on my dulcimer. I added an arrangement of "Ellen Bayne" to my tab and sheet msic page because Stephen Foster is one of my favorite American composers. This piece of music was written in 1854. Hope you all enjoy the arrangement!

God bless,

-Ben

http://thedulcimerhymnal.com/dulcimer-sheet-music