Anyone who has awakened to the magic of dew-laden grass and a brilliant sunrise can identify with this expression of joy in the service of the Lord! Geoffrey Anketell Studdert-Kennedy was born September 27, 1883, at Leeds, England. He was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, and ordained to the ministry in 1908. He served pastorates at Rugby, Leeds and Worcester, and was a much-loved chaplain in the armed forces in World War I. His selfless courage in rescuing wounded soldiers brought a rebuke from his superior officer, and another from the king! He was a great preacher, traveling all over England and the United States to speaking appointments. He was active in the Industrial Christian Fellowship, and the  king appointed him as one of the royal chaplains. A colleague described him as “one of God’s greatest gifts to our generation.” He died as he lived-on his feet, preaching, at Liverpool, England, March 8, 1929.

MORNING SONG gets its name from the text by Isaac Watts carrying that title and beginning “Once more my soul, the rising day.” It appeared with this tune in John Wyeth’s Repository of Sacred Music, Part Second, 1813, under the tune name CONSOLATION. Many tunes in this pioneer songbook were borrowed by other compilers of these Southern tune books with shaped notes. Davisson’s Kentucky Harmony, 1816, gave credit to a Mr. Dean. Some hymnologists think this is a misprint for Elkanah Kelsy Dare (1782-1826), a Methodist preacher from Delaware who is given credit for 13 of the tunes in the Wyeth collection mentioned above. Annabel Morris Buchanan, the noted researcher of American folk songs, has traced this melody to its ancestry in English folk songs and carols.

The harmonization used here is by Charles Winfred Douglas (1867- 1944; see SDAH 72). Douglas also arranged SDAH 136, IN DULCE JUBILO.

See SDAH 215 for a unison setting of MORNING SONG by Melvin West.

📖 Reference: Companion to the Seventh-day Adventist Hymnal by Wayne Hooper and Edward E. White. Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1988.