Yesterday on our way to town for Ganache’s 4 month immunizations, we finally stopped to check our mail. It had been a whole week! Our mailbox is 15 miles from our house. We only check it when we are going to town – once, maybe twice, a week. It’s kind of a bummer especially when we know there are packages coming.
I was expecting a package and sure enough it was waiting for me!
Brownie opened it up and put it in the CD player. She noticed the first song was the same tune and piano accompaniment to a song she had sung in choir last year, only the words being sung by Daniel Beck were completely different. I’m not sure which came first ** The Water is Wide (what Brownie sang with the choir) or When I Survey the Wondrous Cross (which Daniel Beck sang) but both are hauntingly beautiful.
Our family first became acquainted with Daniel Beck’s amazing voice in the oratorios Lamb of God and Joseph Smith the Prophet. We compare him to Josh Groban – Daniel is that good. In his latest CD Abide With Me, Daniel Beck sings beautifully arranged hymns: “Lead, Kindly Light,” “I Love the Lord,” “Abide With Me; Tis Eventide” to name a few. I love when a singer’s voice is showcased with, but not overpowered by, the instruments. The piano, guitar, cello and woodwinds used in the accompaniment are gentle, moving, and soothing. They create the perfect backdrop for Daniel’s voice. Listen to samples of the CD here to see hear what I mean!
By the time we finished our errands in town the weather had turned sour. The wind was blowing fiercely. The sky was dark and snow was barreling down. Visibility was almost nil. I could feel my stress levels beginning to rise and panic was setting in because we still had over a half an hour ride home! And our van does not have four-wheel drive. And we have to travel on dirt road for 13 miles. And it goes up and over a mountain.
Scary.
I said a little prayer for safety and comfort, turned the CD up louder and almost instantly felt a calming influence surround me.
“Lead, kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom.
Lead thou me on.
The night is dark, and I am far from home.
Lead thou me on.”
A tender mercy!
Sure, we’ve only had the CD for one day. Already it holds a special place in my heart.
GIVEAWAY: I have an extra CD of Daniel Beck’s Abide With Me! To enter just leave a comment telling me your favorite hymn. Is there a story surrounding it? Please share!
Mine? I Stand All Amazed. It was the catalyst for my searching and pondering and developing my own personal testimony of Jesus Christ.
Giveaway will end Monday, November 21st at 6pm PST. Open to everyone!
You can buy Abide With Me and other albums at Positive Music and Downloads. Or listen to their online radio station 24/7 at YourLDSRadio. They just celebrated their three year anniversary!
** After some research it looks like “The Water Is Wide” is older by just a few years. It came about in the 1600’s while “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross” was written in 1707.
© 2007-2011 Chocolate on my Cranium, LLC all rights reserved
I heard Daniel Beck sing for the first time this summer at Education Week, loved him! So many great hymns… I LOVE to sing If You Could High to Kolob, specifically the last 2 versus. They are so powerful as you realize how grand and everlasting our blessings are!
My favorite hymn is “O My Father” because when I was a child, my dad would sing it to me before bed. I love my dad’s rich baratone voice.
I also got to see Daniel Beck live at BYU Education week this year. He is amazing! I didn’t have the money for a CD so I would love to get this! Maybe for Christmas… if I don’t win.
I love the song “O My Father” because it reminds me of my time in the City of Joseph pageant in Nauvoo. It was song during a scene that I had a change to sit backstage during & listen to. It was peaceful & lovely!
Love his voice and would love one of his CDs! My favorite hymn is “I Know that My Redeemer Lives”
How do you choose ONE favorite hymn?!? One that I hold dear to my heart is Lead, Kindly Light. When serving a mission in Germany, a group of were invited to sing this in an old cathederal. The acoustics were fabulous and the Spirit was so strong! Great memories.
I love Abide with Me. I love it since it’s the first hymn I learned how to play, and that it speaks to me to have the Savior abide with me.
Ok. I know this isn’t in the green hymn book, but my favorite is “Consider the Lilies”. One of my mission companions was in the Tabernacle choir. She died unexpectedly at a young age and at her funeral, the whole choir came and sang that song. It was her favorite. The stake center wasn’t big enough for the choir to sit up front so they stood all around the room and in the aisles. I always think of that whenever I hear that song. 🙂
My favorite hymn is “Master, the tempest is raging” It calms my soul. A good bishop I once had introduced it to me at a time of great need in my life, and I have loved it ever since.
“Let Us Oft Speak Kind Words” because it reminds me of my grandmother.
My fav is constantly changing, but my hubby’s is “Be Still My Soul”. My depends on my mood.
I love the song, “As Now We Take the Sacrament.” These words speak much peace to my heart:
For courage to accept thy will,
To listen and obey.
We love thee, Lord; our hearts are full.
We’ll walk thy chosen way.
I first heard the hymn Adam ondi Ahman when I was there at adam ondi ahman. so beautiful. When my husband was YSA bishop the choir would often sing O my Father but to the music for ‘come thou font’ love all those.
I used to have one favorite, I Know That My Redeemer Lives. But I’ve been memorizing hymns for a long time now. And so many are special for different reasons. The one just mentioned changed my life as a young woman, when I realized that Jesus lives for me personally. Lead Kindly Light is special, because my daughter Emily and I went to see the musical Polly for her Christmas present. In the musical Polly sings that song among others. Emily sang it various times in church and such and most recently at her grandmothers funeral in June. Be Still My Soul, Abide With Me, This is My Father’s World, Amazing Grace, I Am A Child Of God, Where Can I Turn For Peace, I Believe In Christ….How can I choose just one.
I really enjoy Come Thou Fount. First, it reminds me how indebted to the Lord I am and that without him I would wander. And second, the melody is just simple and beautiful. A song that you remember with an uplifting message. I agree with many of the other comments though, How can you pick just one?
We learned of Danial Beck while watching the Liken the Scriptures series. He does have an amazing voice.
Favorite hymn…Abide with Me.
So many hymns, so many favorites 🙂
I love all those already listed, as well as We Are All Enlisted and Have I Done Any Good?. And there’s nothing quite like hearing all the elders in the MTC sing Ye Elders of Israel.
Because I Have Been Given Much, because I have been given so much.
Be Still my soul is my favorite hymn. It is the hymn I sang with my institute class right after watching The twin towers be fit and fall on September 11th. It brought great peace to me at a hard time.
My favorite is “Our Savior’s Love” after playing an arrangement of it in the orchestra at Ricks College.
Oh, I have so many “favorite” hymns, but the one that is always at the top of my list is “Be Still My Soul.” It always touches me and I love hearing different arrangements of it.
My husband wants some new uplifting CD’s for Christmas, this one is now on my list!
Favorite hymn? I cry over almost all of them! 🙂 “Amazing Grace” while not in our hymnal is one that touches me. “Abide with me”, “families can be together forever”, “I Believe In Christ” and “I Stand All Amazed” are my favorites in our hymnal. I can’t sing any of them without being touched so much by the Holy Ghost that I can’t sing another word.
I am going right now to see if iTunes has these. 🙂
My favorite hymn is “Lead, Kindly Light”.
How firm a foundation is one favorite because that is how I received an answer I was supposed to marry my husband- or rather I knew that’s what I wanted, and the Lord approved. Where can I turn for peace is my fallback when either internally or externally I do not feel peace- and it brings the spirit every time.
I really love the early hymns that were either written or sung during the restoration period. W.W. Phelps hymns are, of course, favorites for this reason. Lately I have been searching out versions of Adam-ondi-Ahmen so I guess that is my current favorite. 🙂 There are so any great hymns and songs from that time period, and not just the ones found in an LDS Hymn book.
I love Lead Kindly Light. My husband introduced me to this great hymn.
I remember singing The Water is Wide with the children’s symphony chorus many !! years ago. It was fabulous then, done in pure children’s tones, and is still beautiful.
Thank you for the chance to win this cd. I think my favorite hymn is Be Still My Soul. It’s beautiful and the third verse especially reminds me of my daughter, who is an angel in heaven. It reminds me that although we have this pain and sorrow here on earth, one day “we shall meet at last” and be united together eternally.
I think the Lord is my Light has been a favorite of mine and then Come Thou Fount from the old hymn book!!
both are inspiring
My favorite hymn is ‘Our Saviors Love”. I love how the peaceful message reminds us of our true mission and goals.
I love “Lead Kindly Light”. I am sure it sounded amazing while driving home in a storm.
Ooh, I’m loving the samples of his songs! I would love to have some of his music!
There is no way I could pick just one favorite hymn. Music has always been such a huge part of my life and so many hymns have touched my life in amazing ways. I have sung Each Life That Touches Ours For Good at a friend’s funeral and O My Father to the tune of Come Thou Fount as a solo for both of my grandfathers’ funerals. Singing The Spirit of God (and all the other songs) in the Oakland CA Temple Pageant was just awesome and testimony-building. As I crossed the Sea of Galilee on a boat I sang Master the Tempest is Raging, Nearer My God to Thee, Be Still My Soul….etc The version of Have I Done Any Good that I got to sing with the BYU combined choirs in General Conference was my favorite version of that song – truly beautiful….
I could go on for hours. 😉 It is neat to sit down and think of all the amazing moments I’ve had with the hymns! Wow! I think this calls for some journal time. 😉
MY favorite hymn is, “Where Can I Turn for Peace?” I like the message, but I love the fact it’s asked as a question in the title. Doesn’t everyone feel that way from time to time?
How Firm a Foundation has gotten me through many difficult times. I always feel comfort when I sing it.
My favorite hymn is I Believe in Christ followed closely by O My Father. Beautiful music soothes the soul. It’s also a great way to share testimony and worship. Thanks for your post.
i love “I stand all amazed” also. But I also Love “Lord, I would follow thee” because the third verse is the BYU nursing major theme. It brings so much more meaning to being a nurse. “To the wounded and the weary I would show a gentle heart” I love being a nurse because of that song.
Seriously? you want me to pick ONE? Are you CRAZY? It’s unpossible. But one that hasn’t been mentioned that I saw was Brightly Beams Our Father’s Mercy. It is an amazing song.
Amazing Grace brings me to tears almost every time
There is Sunshine in My Soul Today always cheers me up when I’m down for any reason and I love to sing it!!!
So many hymns are my “favorite”, but I really love “Love at Home”. As a teenager (coming from a *very* less active home) this hymn taught me about love and family in a way I had never known. We sing this hymn every week at FHE. When my kids occasionally complain about it, I remind them of what Sis. Beck’s father used to say, “when you’ve learned lesson one we’ll move on to lesson two.” 🙂
Thank you so much for having this give away.
My favorite Hymn is, “A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief”, followed by “There is a Green Hill Far Away”.
How do you stop at just one?
“I Know that My Redeemer Lives”,
“I believe in Christ”,
“Because I Have Been Given Much”
Here’s one that hasn’t been mentioned yet and is one of my very favorites: For the Beauty of the Earth! It is all wrapped up in my testimony and I had all the members of my family and my husband’s family sing it together at our wedding reception. But I especially love it now as it makes a lovely lullaby, which I sing to my babies all the time.
My favorite hymn is Count Your Many Blessings because it has brought comfort to me many times when we’ve had struggles in our family. Once my brother was far from home and was very ill and we thought we would lose him. AS a family we prayed at a designated hour for him to get well and the words to this hymn came to my mind, bringing comfort and an assurance that he would be all right. When trials come, as they often do, I count my many blessings! Your blog is one of those blessings, too. Thanks.
Mine is most certainly Abide With Me. So often, I must look for the comfort of the Spirit, not only amidst life’s trials, but in times when I just yearn to feel closer to my Savior. Singing this hymn reminds me that He is always there to be my companion in this mortal test of life.
My favorite hymn is “There is Sunshine in My Soul” because I am a speech language pathologist and I love the story of the little girl who couldn’t speak but she was able to express that she loved this hymn because of the words that “Jesus Listening Can Hear the Words I Can not sing” and this helps me to have perspective as I’m working with nonverbal children and helps me to remember that Jesus knows what they want to say.
I haven’t heard him before but I LOVE Josh Groban so I’m sure I will love him. My fav hymn is How Great Thou Art. I saw a movie about how the songwriter was inspired to write the song and it was so powerful it stuck with me.
My favorite hymn is If You Could Hie to Kolob.I love the message of this song. It brings peace when the day is endless or especially hectic.
D.E.
For me it would have to be, “I know that my Redeemer Lives” I love to sing this on just as loud as I can and still be reverent.
I love Daniel Beck, but don’t have this CD. I’d love to own it! I have several favorite hymns. One of them is Lead Kindly Light. I sang it with the other young women, lead by our yw president who is so musically talented that she turned our voices into something much better than they ever sounded. And the words to the hymn have helped me through much “encircling gloom”.
I love “have I done any good in the world today?” and “there is sunshine in my soul today!”
Choosing a favorite hymn is like choosing a favorite scripture–it’s always changing. Today, I especially love “I Believe in Christ.” I would love to win this–Danny is an old friend from high school.
How fun, I want to enter!
My favorite hymn (I have so many I love) is “Where Can I Turn For Peace”. I was at a bad point in my life and a lot of things were up in the air in regards to my family and marriage. I was sitting in RS feeling pretty bad about life and they sang this song for the opening. I cried and cried the whole way through it, and the spirit testified to me that everything would be ok, and that Heavenly Father wasn’t only mindful of my heavy heart, but was actively helping me with my problems. It was a wonderful moment, and everything not only turned out ok, but my life and marriage are better then they have even been. I am so thankful for the soothing spirit of that song.
It’s too hard to pick only one favorite – but I’d say one of my top favorite’s is “I Need Thee Every Hour”. Thanks for the giveaway – music is so powerful.
I have so many favorite hymns and each resonates with me for a different reason. Lately, I’ve been humming “Families Can Be Together Forever” because *tears* my little family is going to be sealed as a forever family in January. This is my dream finally come true!
Two favorites. One is “Be Still, My Soul” because on more than one occasion, hearing it has given me the courage to make important decisions in my life and not fear for the future (including choosing to get married). The other is “Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing” because there’s something about it that speaks to the depth of my soul about my utter dependence on the Savior. I can’t hear the chorus sung at full-tilt without getting choked up.
“Be Still my Soul” was playing as I took a tour through the BYU radio Facilities for a class in college. It was within the week after 9-11 and it really brought peace to me as a young student away from home and family during that scary time.
I had not heard of Daniel Beck, and I thank you for bringing him to my attention! I have 2 son’s on missions, and I am always on the hunt for music to send to them.
My current favorite hymn is ‘Nearer My God To Thee’. My 2nd missionary son, who is serving in the Mississippi Jackson Mission, sang this hymn with his dad, and 2 brothers that were here at home, (the other was already in Samoa on his mission.) As I watched and listened to those beautiful voices, and glowing faces-my heart about burst…..They sang it in 4 part a’capella….and it was stunning….now as I read the Scripures each night, I sing that hymn in my head…as well as ‘Ye Elder’s in Israel’, ny other missionary son’s favorite hymn. I find it has opened up the teachings and messages of the Gospel more fully to me, where I am at, at this time of my life. Music has a way of speaking to the heart….and I am forever grateful for it!
Thank you Cocoa for doing this, I enjoyed reading all of the comments.
Erica, that sounds like a truly amazing experience, having the Tabernacle Choir singing all around you at the funeral. I can only imagine the wonderful spirit that would have been there and enjoying the voices of angels.
A hymn that means a great deal to me because of a difficult trial I was going through is, “Be Still My Soul”. I love the peace and hope it gives a troubled heart and the importance of allowing the Savior to be our guide.
For me, it’s “Lord, I Would Follow Thee”. I had the most amazing experience before the Nauvoo Temple dedication where I realized that was my heart’s deepest desire!
Too hard to pick, but I love #286 Oh, What Songs of the Heart. As I struggle with depression a lot, some days I really long for “home” and to “no more from our loved ones…roam.” Also, #41 Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise. I love hymns that you can sing boldly!
I stand all amazed is one of my favorite as well. IT is a great reminder of the many blessings we have been given and I do stand all amazed.
I also love all Christmas songs. For a long time, when my husband were first married, we would only sing Christmas songs for FHE.
HOW GREAT THOU ART!! I think this song is marvelous!! Would like to win the new one.
Love your blog!!
JLS
My husband sings lead kindly light all the time so he would love this.
Why haven’t I heard of him?
Pick me random number generator!!!
I think it is a tie between “I am a Child of God” and “I Need Thee Every Hour”. My children love to hear “I am a Child of God” as a bedtime song, and it has a special place in my heart because some friends sang it when I joined the Church.
“I Need Thee Every Hour” just brings me so much peace, especially when my husband is gone. It’s really become my motto. 🙂
God be with you ‘Til we meet again. There is just something about it that makes me think of those who have passed before me. I love that we live after we die.
I love Come Thou Fount!
My favorite hymn is Be Still My Soul. It lets me know that God is always constant no matter what is happening around me and in my life.