DWL Adopt Scheme Works

Hymns and Tunes by Thomas Jordan

Printed tune book, 170x260x25mm, Bound in boards with marbled paper sides and leather spine and corners.

Provenance: Unknown

Collection: Congregational Library

"A set of hymn tunes in four parts", "Psalm and hymn tunes in four parts - second set", "A third set of psalm and hymn tunes" and "Psalm and hymn tunes in four parts - fourth set", ca. 1833-5.

The volume  contains the four issues of hymn tunes by Thomas Jordan, namely "A set of hymn tunes in four parts", "Psalm and hymn tunes in four parts - second set", "A third set of psalm and hymn tunes" and "Psalm and hymn tunes in four parts - fourth set", ca. 1833-5.  The second set only is catalogued at both St Andrews Univerity Library and the Bodleian. No other  copies have come to light as yet.

Thomas Jordan of Chesham (1785-1839) was one of a number of  amateur composers of church music, mostly Baptist, in the first half of the nineteenth century in Buckinghamshire and around, which are the subject of study leading to a published anthology by one of our reader's, Ian Cutts. Music of this type has seen a revival of interest in recent decades. This Thomas Jordan appears to be the Rev. Thomas Jordan, first pastor of Speen Baptist church in 1813.

There is evidence that the first three sets of tunes were stabbed stitched and the volume was bound in its present form after the publication of the fourth part dated 1835?. The spine has disintegrated with use and the sewing is broken to the point that all the gatherings are now loose.