Uccelli [née Pazzini], Carolina Uccellini, Marco

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Unitarian church music.

Unitarianism is a religious movement whose origins lie in the Reformation, when dissenting groups of anti-Trinitarian believers emerged in Switzerland, Poland and Transylvannia. The Unitarian Church has traditionally subscribed to no formal creed, rejecting the doctrines of the Trinity and the Divinity of Christ and stressing the unipersonality of God. In America the Church has formally adopted the Universalist belief that no one is condemned to eternal punishment, salvation being ultimately granted to all. The dominant characteristic of present-day Unitarianism is the emphasis on individual responisbility in spiritual matters. This recognition of individual belief has encouraged the toleration and acceptance of a variety of practices and forms or worship and the use of different musical styles. Unitarian believers are found in more than 20 countries throughout the world, including Transylvania, where there is still a strong presence, but the following discussion is limited to Great Britain and the USA.

1. Great Britain.

The first anti-Trinitarian congregation in England and Wales was organized in 1651 by John Biddle (1615–62), but the formal beginnings of the Unitarian Church may be dated to 1662, when about 2000 ministers were ejected from the Church of England for refusing to accept the new Book of Common Prayer. These early Nonconformists or Dissenters were originally known mainly as Presbyterians or Independents. In 1689 an Act of Toleration granted them freedom of worship but not of doctrine. Penal Acts against Unitarians continued in force in England until 1813, when the Trinity Acts made legal the use of the term ‘Unitarian’. During the 18th and 19th centuries, however, Unitarian views were often accepted by other Nonconformist Churches in England. Throughout the 19th century and the early 20th two strands of Unitarianism existed side by side, one Presbyterian and more ecumenical, the other distinctively more sectarian and at times militantly Unitarian. Each had its own worship style, hymnbooks and national body. In 1928 the two branches united in the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches.

During the latter part of the 17th century and throughout the 18th and 19th centuries the progress of Unitarian Dissent in England and Wales coincided with the development of the hymn as a replacement for the metrical psalm. Unitarians undoubtedly played an active role in the emergence of the hymn – the Nonconformists’ greatest contribution to worship – although it is difficult to ascribe any particular developments to the Unitarians before the Trinity Acts of 1813. The English Unitarian Church contributed to the large number of hymnbooks published in the 19th century, notably James Martineau’s Hymns for the Christian Church and Home (1840) and the influential Hymns of Faith and Prayer (1874); hymn tunes for the latter were composed by Russell and Basil Martineau. The Essex Hall Hymnal was published in 1902, followed in 1927 by Hymns of Worship, which was the main Unitarian hymnbook in England for over 50 years (a supplement was issued in 1951 and a revision in 1962). Several 19th-century hymn writers achieved recognition beyond the Unitarian Church itself, notably, Sarah Flower Adams (1805–48; composer of Nearer my God to Thee) and John White Chadwick (1840–1904; Eternal Ruler of the Ceasless Round).

The 19th century was also the period when Unitarians sought a more structured approach to worship through the use of liturgies, often with psalms and sung responses. In larger churches the liturgical tradition was particularly strong and usually supported by a large organ and a professional choir. The use of the organ was very much a 19th-century practice, as, for example, at the Old Chapel, Dukinfield, where an organ was installed in 1816 replacing a small group of instrumentalists.

The diverse background of Unitarianism means that the church buildings vary from simple Meeting Houses to quasi-parish churches, and the variation in architecture is reflected in the use of different forms of worship. Unitarian congregations are autonomous, with each church free to organize its own worship and music. Despite this freedom, general patterns of worship have emerged, through the need for a balanced combination of certain common elements, such as hymns, readings, prayers, sermons, music and silence. Some congregations, exceptionally, use a set liturgy (with changing elements) that might include the chanting of psalms and sung responses, but most Unitarian worship is centred on hymns, with various forms of incidental music before, during and after the service. With the decrease in the number of church choirs, the singing of introits and anthems is mostly restricted to special services and occasions.

As in most Nonconformist denominations, congregational singing of hymns is the principal means whereby worshippers can be actively involved in services. Because Unitarianism has no creed, written material takes on a greater significance than in other denominations, and throughout the Church’s history hymnbooks have been an important indicator of belief. Two hymnbooks produced in Britain towards the end of the 20th century, Hymns for Living (1985) and Hymns of Faith and Freedom (1991), express the variety that still exists within Unitarianism, but they are also a response to the need for hymns, and particularly words, that address new issues and use contemporary ideas and symbolism. Of these two books, only Hymns for Living is available with words and music; the texts aim to express contemporary Unitarian thought, ideals and principles, but the music is generally more conservative and familiar, with new material introduced only where necessary.

In Britain there is a 19th-century legacy of large buildings with fine organs (e.g. Mill Hill, Leeds), but the number of such instruments has dimished as congregations have moved to establishments more appropriate to their size and financial resources. Where possible, organs have been modified to suit the new church buildings, as, for example, at the New Meeting (formerly Church of the Messiah) in Birmingham. A number of particularly fine historic instruments have also been relocated, such as the Snetzler organ that was moved from Glasgow Unitarian Church to Glasgow University. In some congregations the musical accompaniment is provided by the piano or, more rarely, by other instruments; recorded music may also be used for accompanying hymns and as occasional music.

The Unitarian Church Music Society, founded during the 1930s at Manchester College, Oxford, largely at the instigation of the then director of music, Harold Spicer, provides a forum for sharing ideas and a stimulus for the more effective use of music in worship. The society’s magazine, Cantemus, often includes a music supplement.

2. USA.

The first Unitarian church to be established in America was the King’s Chapel at Boston, an Episcopalian congregation that formally adopted Unitarianism in 1782. The movement spread during the last years of the 18th century and in the 19th, especially throughout the Puritan settlements in New England, and the American Unitarian Association was formed in 1825. During the 19th century many Unitarians came to recognize that they shared much common ground with members of the Universalist Church, a movement that had emerged from radical Pietism in 18th-century Germany and was officially established in America in 1793. Hosea Ballou (1771–1852) converted many Universalist ministers to Unitarianism in 1805 with the publication of his Treatise on Atonement, and in 1893 the Unitarian Free Religious Association declared that Universalist doctrine formed the basis of all religions. During the first half of the 20th century the two Churches moved closer together, and in 1961 the Unitarian Universalist Association was founded.

During the late 18th century and the 19th Unitarians and Universalists used similar forms of worship, with an emphasis on hymnody as a means of expressing their beliefs. The Universalist Church issued New Hymns for Various Subjects by Silas Ballou in 1785, and the first Unitarian hymnal was A Collection of Psalms and Hymns for Public Worship published in 1799 for use in King’s Chapel, Boston. Such early hymnbooks contained no tunes, and comparatively few of the texts were newly composed, most being adaptations of existing hymns. Later 19th-century hymnals increasingly contained new works, notably, A Collection of Psalms and Hymns for Sacred Worship, which was published in 1830 by the Rev. Francis Greenwood for the Unitarian congregation of King’s Chapel, Boston, and remained in use for many decades. Several writers associated with the Transcendentalist movement in New England made a particularly important contribution to Unitarian hymn writing; they included Ralph Waldo Emerson (1814–82), Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809–94; Lord of All Being Throned Afar), Edward Hamilton Sears (1810–76; It Came upon the Midnight Clear), Samuel Johnson (Book of Hymns, 1846) and Samuel Longfellow (Hymns of the Spirit, 1864).

Since the late 19th century, Unitarian hymn texts have become gradually more ecumenical, showing a concern for the wider interests of humanity. The Pilgrim Hymnal, published by the Congregational Church in 1904 and designed to reflect the contemporary ‘new theology’, contained 547 hymns, of which over 100 were written by Unitarians. In 1937 the Unitarian and Universalist Commissions on Hymns and Services issued a joint hymnbook, Hymns of the Spirit, which drew on music from diverse sources, such as chorales, plainchant, Jewish cantillation and traditional American tunes; in their appeal to humanists as well as theists, the texts of some of the hymns show the influence of Universalism.

Since the foundation of the Unitarian Universalist Church in 1961 both texts and music of the hymns have continued to reflect Universalist doctrine. In 1964 Hymns for the Celebration of Life included words attributed to the Buddha and a poem from the Bhagavad Gītā. This and later hymnbooks, such as Singing the Living Tradition (1993), contain mainly traditional tunes but also include music of Eastern religions, Hebrew chant and secular music of various periods. The folk style of hymn writing is represented in the works of Universalist composers such as Malvina Reynolds and Carolyn McDade.

Unitarian Universalist churches employ a wide range of styles in their choral and solo vocal repertories, drawing on the traditions of other faiths as well as Western sacred and secular music from the Middle Ages to the present. Instrumental music is also not unusual in services, whether for solo performer, chamber ensemble or a combination of instruments and choir. The choice of texts and music is always determined by the individual congregations according to their particular concerns and musical resources.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

H.W. Foote: American Unitarian Hymn Writers and Hymns (Cambridge, MA, 1959)

H.W. Foote: Three Centuries of American Hymnody (Hamden, CT, 1961)

W.D. Kring: Liberals among the Orthodox (Boston, 1974)

E.B. Navias: Singing our History (Boston, 1975)

A. Christ-Janer, C.W. Hughes and C.S. Smith: American Hymns Old and New (New York, 1980)

J. Goring and R. Goring: The Unitarians (Exeter, 1984)

D.C. Doel: Old Chapel and the Unitarian Story (London, 1994)

A.M. Hill: The Unitarian Path (London, 1994)

DAVID DAWSON, WALTER KLAUSS