I suppose it’s stating the obvious that this line conjures up an image of ‘the bright young things’ and ‘the beautiful people’ who attach themselves to the Christian rock scene, ligging and cavorting in the backstage area at Greenbelt just like they would at any other festival. And because anyone who’s ever sung ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’ whilst seething with scorn for its creationist propaganda will automatically see images (as it seems Monty Python members did in their parody) of the nastier side of ‘creation’ too, we also get the idea that the participants in the tented village aren’t really at all bright or beautiful. They all look like they belong in Bosch’s ‘Garden of Earthly Delights’ by the time the mud has been churned up after three days of the lord’s worst tunes, fuelled by the coke that’s coke.
I say ‘creationist propaganda’, rather than just seeing it like I did when I was a little kid as some sort of innocent statement of an innocent worldview from before ‘The Origin of Species’, because I now realise that the evolutionary debates were already starting to rage heatedly even in the 1840s.
The most authenticated claim to be Mrs. Alexander’s hymn’s birthplace, it seems, is the medieval village of Dunster at the foot of… well not quite the Quantocks, which are nearby, but the purple-headed Grabbist Hill on the edge of Exmoor. But what _was_ inspired and begun while checking out the Quantocks was of course Coleridge’s great ‘Rime of the Ancient Mariner’, one of the final (and worst) stanzas of which was undoubtedly the inspiration for Mrs. Alexander’s chorus.
“He prayeth best, who loveth best All things both great and small; For the dear God who loveth us, He made and loveth all.”
26 September 2013
RobJ
Mrs J pointed out to me yesterday that the lyrics of All Things Bright and Beautiful fit nicely to the tune of A Town Called Malice…
27 September 2013
Spindrifter
Just tried to sing these words to the Jam song in my head. It’s harder to do than you think.
28 September 2013
Vendor Of Quack Nostrums
Well stop, wait a minute Mr Spindrifter you don’t know what I think.
28 September 2013
Third Rate Les
I would also point out that the sheet music you’ve put at the top of the page there isn’t the tune that I’d associated with it. The one I think of is the same one as Monty Python’s.
One thing that puzzles me about Anglicans is that tendency to have really odd tunes to hymns. Weirdest one I heard was “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks” to the tune of “On Ilkley Moor Bar t’Hat”
29 September 2013
bengwy
Stewart Lee used to do a routine about this, which I remember being really funny though I can’t recall much about detail other than him getting increasingly exasperated by the continual unnecessary addition of specific examples of things that the Lord God had made in the verses when the refrain had already made it unambiguously clear that He made all things. Oh, and there was also some bemusement at the concept of a purple headed mountain.
29 September 2013
cream cheese and chives
As a kid we used to have our holidays in Dunster and heard the story of how All Things Bright and Beautiful was written on Grabbist. As an eight year old I think I was vaguely impressed and told my teacher back at school. She was not.
17 November 2020
dr desperate
That Stewart Lee routine (from Comedy Central’s late-90’s ‘Before They Were Famous’ series) shows him being somewhat disingenuous with his set diagram, implying that “all things bright and beautiful” equals “all things”. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7dYXVLPd6Y
18 November 2020
EXXO
I’d agree with you if he was pointing out something shit, dull, ugly, evil, unwise, etc. that was supposedly created, which he could have done quite easily if he’d wanted, but he doesn’t so I think we can just assume, from his clear understanding of the chorus, that his Set A ‘all things’ is an abbreviation for the type of things defined in the chorus. Should have used ellipsis though.
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ROBJ
Junior school sniggers at purple-headed things.
26 September 2013
toastkid
I know that this verse is usually omitted, as it suggests that god created the class system:
The rich man in his castle,
The poor man at his gate,
God made them high and lowly,
And ordered their estate.
26 September 2013
Archie walker
G.O.D.C.O.R.E.
26 September 2013
Chris The Siteowner
I submit Ben Hillman’s alternative Evolution Made Us All.
And of course Monty Python’s All Things Dull And Ugly.
26 September 2013
ChARLES EXFORD
I suppose it’s stating the obvious that this line conjures up an image of ‘the bright young things’ and ‘the beautiful people’ who attach themselves to the Christian rock scene, ligging and cavorting in the backstage area at Greenbelt just like they would at any other festival. And because anyone who’s ever sung ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’ whilst seething with scorn for its creationist propaganda will automatically see images (as it seems Monty Python members did in their parody) of the nastier side of ‘creation’ too, we also get the idea that the participants in the tented village aren’t really at all bright or beautiful. They all look like they belong in Bosch’s ‘Garden of Earthly Delights’ by the time the mud has been churned up after three days of the lord’s worst tunes, fuelled by the coke that’s coke.
I say ‘creationist propaganda’, rather than just seeing it like I did when I was a little kid as some sort of innocent statement of an innocent worldview from before ‘The Origin of Species’, because I now realise that the evolutionary debates were already starting to rage heatedly even in the 1840s.
The most authenticated claim to be Mrs. Alexander’s hymn’s birthplace, it seems, is the medieval village of Dunster at the foot of… well not quite the Quantocks, which are nearby, but the purple-headed Grabbist Hill on the edge of Exmoor. But what _was_ inspired and begun while checking out the Quantocks was of course Coleridge’s great ‘Rime of the Ancient Mariner’, one of the final (and worst) stanzas of which was undoubtedly the inspiration for Mrs. Alexander’s chorus.
“He prayeth best, who loveth best
All things both great and small;
For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all.”
26 September 2013
RobJ
Mrs J pointed out to me yesterday that the lyrics of All Things Bright and Beautiful fit nicely to the tune of A Town Called Malice…
27 September 2013
Spindrifter
Just tried to sing these words to the Jam song in my head. It’s harder to do than you think.
28 September 2013
Vendor Of Quack Nostrums
Well stop, wait a minute Mr Spindrifter you don’t know what I think.
28 September 2013
Third Rate Les
I would also point out that the sheet music you’ve put at the top of the page there isn’t the tune that I’d associated with it. The one I think of is the same one as Monty Python’s.
One thing that puzzles me about Anglicans is that tendency to have really odd tunes to hymns. Weirdest one I heard was “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks” to the tune of “On Ilkley Moor Bar t’Hat”
29 September 2013
bengwy
Stewart Lee used to do a routine about this, which I remember being really funny though I can’t recall much about detail other than him getting increasingly exasperated by the continual unnecessary addition of specific examples of things that the Lord God had made in the verses when the refrain had already made it unambiguously clear that He made all things. Oh, and there was also some bemusement at the concept of a purple headed mountain.
29 September 2013
cream cheese and chives
As a kid we used to have our holidays in Dunster and heard the story of how All Things Bright and Beautiful was written on Grabbist. As an eight year old I think I was vaguely impressed and told my teacher back at school. She was not.
17 November 2020
dr desperate
That Stewart Lee routine (from Comedy Central’s late-90’s ‘Before They Were Famous’ series) shows him being somewhat disingenuous with his set diagram, implying that “all things bright and beautiful” equals “all things”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7dYXVLPd6Y
18 November 2020
EXXO
I’d agree with you if he was pointing out something shit, dull, ugly, evil, unwise, etc. that was supposedly created, which he could have done quite easily if he’d wanted, but he doesn’t so I think we can just assume, from his clear understanding of the chorus, that his Set A ‘all things’ is an abbreviation for the type of things defined in the chorus. Should have used ellipsis though.
18 November 2020