This article is from the EMU News Archive. The approximate date of publication was in January 1999. Current EMU news is available at www.emu.edu/news

Book Explores Hymn Singing

HARRISONBURG, Va. — If singing were taken away from them, Mennonites would not know how to worship. Their faith would be barren.

These are among the conclusions of a new book on Mennonite singing — the first book anywhere that discusses hymn singing from the perspective of those sitting in the pews.

Traditionally, many Mennonites, especially in the eastern United States, sang without organs or pianos. And choirs were rare. Each member sang one of the four parts in the hymn book — soprano, alto, tenor, bass — and taught this to the children.

The new book, released on May 4 by Herald Press, is the culmination of a two-year listening and research project by Kenneth J. Nafziger of Eastern Mennonite University and Marlene Kropf of Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary.

Titled Singing: A Mennonite Voice, the 192-page book is a collection of stories and reflections gathered from ordinary Mennonite worshipers throughout the United States and Canada. The interviews showed again and again that singing is the Mennonite sacrament.

Dr. Kropf and Dr. Nafziger were both involved in the eight-year project that led to the 1992 publication of Hymnal: A Worship Book, which is used in Mennonite and Brethren churches throughout the U.S. and Canada. Nafziger was the music editor and Kropf served on the Hymnal Council. The new book grew out of the hymnal project.

The authors sought answers to the question, "What happens when you sing?" They interviewed more than 100 people of all ages and backgrounds and experiences.

"We heard that the physical pleasure of singing is prized, that images that speak to a person’s life are useful handles and that singing is the most important activity in which people engage in worship," the authors write in the book’s preface. "We heard that matters of experience, association and the challenges of hymn singing are often most important to people who sing."

Nafziger and Kropf heard answers that would "rarely please those for whom rational or theological or aesthetic arguments are necessary to support the inclusion or exclusion of a hymn." The answers, they say, would likewise displease "those for whom literary excellence is a prime concern."

Most of the interviews were conducted in 1994 and 1995. Kropf incorporated some of the research into her doctoral project, Singing as Sacrament: An Exploration of the Role of Hymn Singing in Mennonite Spiritual Formation. The interviews also became the basis for "Why Mennonites Sing," the keynote address by Nafziger and Kropf at the 1997 conference of the Hymn Society in the U.S. and Canada.

Nafziger is professor of music at Eastern Mennonite University in Harrisonburg, Va. He directs EMU’s Chamber Singers and is founding director of the Shenandoah Valley Bach Festival, which is held each June at EMU.

Kropf is associate professor of spiritual formation and worship at Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary in Elkhart, Ind. She is also minister of worship and spirituality at Mennonite Board of Congregational Ministries in Elkhart.

Singing: A Mennonite Voice is available for $14.99 in the United States and $22.29 in Canada. — Steve C. Shenk