“The heavens declare your glory, the firmament your power; day unto day the story repeats from hour to hour. Night unto night replying, proclaims in every land, O LORD, with voice undying, the wonders of your hand.“
The Heavens Declare Your Glory is the hymn tune FAITHFUL, written by J.S. Bach. We enjoyed putting together this arrangement for 3-5 octaves of handbells! With lots of opportunity for mallets in the bass, a lively beginning and ending, and a thoughtful and contemplative middle section, there’s plenty in this piece to keep your ringers and audience entertained!
How to get the music, and more information about Choraegus
The Heavens Declare Your Glory is a Level 3 arrangement, for 3-5 octaves of handbells. If you’d like to play it, the sheet music is available to download from Choraegus.
When you buy handbell music from Choraegus, the music score will come to you as a PDF file. That means you’ll be responsible for printing your own music, and you won’t receive anything in the mail. When you’ve downloaded your music, your one-time payment (for the full-choir copy) entitles you to print up to 15 copies for your group. Please read our licensing agreement for full information about this. If you’re new to buying music from Choraegus, we recommend our step-by-step guide, which we designed to take you through the process in a stress-free way!
Purchasing this 3-5 octave arrangement gives you no-fuss permission for performance, broadcasting, live-streaming and online video-sharing, as part of a performance or worship service.
Any questions about buying or playing our music?
If you have any questions for us, please look at the Frequently-Asked Questions first, in case the answer is there. If you don’t find the information you’re looking for, please contact us and we’ll be happy to help.
Finlandia is our latest arrangement for 8 handbells.
Some of the history of Finlandia
The Finnish composer Jean Sibelius wrote Finlandia in 1889. It was originally the Finlandia Hymn; part of a symphonic poem. Sibelius then reworked it as a standalone piece, as part of his Masonic Ritual Music. The Finnish poet Veikko Antero Koskenniemi wrote words for it in 1941, and it became popular as a national song for Finland, although not the official national anthem.
In 1752, Katharina Amalia Dorothea von Schlegel had written a hymn in German: Stille meine Wille, dein Jesus hilft siegen. In 1855, Jane Laurie Borthwick translated it into English as Be Still, My Soul.
“Be still, my soul, the Lord is on thy side; Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain. Leave to thy God to order and provide; In every change He, faithful, will remain. Be still, my soul, thy best, thy heavenly friend Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.”
Another popular hymn sung to the Finlandia tune is We Rest on Thee, written in England by Edith G. Cherry in 1895. This Is My Song is another hymn that uses the same tune, with words written in 1934 by Lloyd Stone. It’s also the tune used for Gweddi dros Gymru (A Prayer for Wales), which is widely considered to be the second Welsh national anthem.
With thanks to Los Altos United Methodist Church for allowing us to rehearse and record this piece in their beautiful sanctuary.
Would you like to play Finlandia?
If you’d like to play this arrangement the music is available for purchase and download from Choraegus.
When you buy music from Choraegus, please remember that it will come to you as a digital file (PDF). You’ll be responsible for printing your own music, and you won’t receive anything in the mail. Your purchase of this 8-bell arrangement will entitle you to print up to 4 copies for your handbell group. Please see our licensing agreement for full details.
If you’re new to buying music from Choraegus, you might find our step-by-step guide helpful!
Any questions?
If you have any questions about buying or playing our music, please contact us and we’ll be happy to help!
During our recent visit to England, we enjoyed the opportunity to rehearse some handbell music with friends. Our trip was mainly for the purpose of meeting our new granddaughter for the first time and catching up with family members we hadn’t seen for far too long. However, we didn’t want to miss the chance to get together with Gay and Alan Cooper, the other half of Pizzazz Handbell Quartet.
More about Pizzazz
Back in the days when Carla lived in England, Pizzazz was a trio, with Gay, Alan and Carla as members. They rehearsed in Wallingford, with coffee, sometimes pizza, and lots of music. The three of them would often keep rehearsing until very late into the night. After all, who needs to sleep when there are handbells to play? The three group members shared a willingness to squash far too many bells, tables, foam pads, table covers, music and people into a car. They’d travel just about any distance to give a performance or take part in a handbell event.
As a group, Pizzazz gave performances and workshops at local and national events. They had success at music festivals and in the Trinity College London intermediate and advanced recital exams. The trio recorded a handbell track on a CD by London-based avant pop duo French for Cartridge. They also performed at parties, weddings, charity events and open-mic nights, and represented the UK at an exciting handbell event in Talinn, Estonia.
Christmas festivities at Heathrow AirportIn concert in Estonia
Carla’s move to California
After all the fun they’d had, the members of the trio were understandably reluctant to break up the group, when Carla moved to California (and got married) in 2012. The best solution was obviously for the trio to become a quartet – an international one – with Gay and Alan on one side of the ocean and Larry and Carla on the other. We had our first opportunity to rehearse together during our visit to England at the beginning of 2014.
Since then, we’ve been more than 5,000 miles apart, communicating on Facebook and by email, but not able to rehearse or perform together as a group. When we knew we’d be visiting England again, it was exciting to be able to make plans to get together with Gay and Alan for another rehearsal!
The Waltz from Sleeping Beauty
As we only had one evening to rehearse, we decided to use our time to try out something new. We played through Larry’s 16-bell arrangement of Tchaikovsky’s Sleeping Beauty Waltz. You might recognise the tune as the Once Upon a Dream song from the Disney movie.
This piece was new to all of us. It meant that we weren’t able to get a note-perfect performance in the time available. Still, we hope this video will give you some idea of how the piece should sound. We had a lot of fun with it! We hope to be able to get together again someday, and perhaps try for a more polished performance next time!
Our thanks go to Gay and Alan! We appreciated their continued willingness to play insane handbell stuff at crazy hours of the day (and night).
Would you like to play the Waltz from Sleeping Beauty?
If you’d like to play this piece, the music is now available for purchase and download from Choraegus.
Choraegus handbell music is designed to come to you as a digital download (PDF file). That means you’ll be responsible for printing your own music, and you won’t receive anything in the mail. Your purchase of this 16-bell arrangement allows you to print up to 8 copies for your handbell group. Please see our licensing agreement for full details.
Any questions?
If you have any questions about Pizzazz, or about our music, please contact us and we’ll be happy to help!
Pizzazz Handbell Quartet – reunited in Wallingford!
