Sunday 26 July. Song 101 ‘Peruvian Gloria’
Words: traditional / Music: Peruvian traditional
YouTube recording:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ep4TLwVM9mQ
Featured image: ‘Everything is possible with God’, from https://www.facebook.com/WorshipPeru

This short and easily learnt chant, in call-and-response form, has achieved popularity across all denominations in the last 30 years or so. I have heard it said that it is not, in fact, Peruvian, having been written in America. But if Microsoft’s Copilot AI has done its research well, it is better described as ‘indigenous‑influenced melody adapted for Christian liturgical text’. It is also not the full text of the Catholic/Anglican ‘Gloria’ used at the Communion service, though it is obviously also based on the angels’ song in Luke 2:14, ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven’.

That said, its popularity is well deserved. With few, and well-known words, and a very simple chant, it is easily picked up. The threefold ‘alleluia, amen!’ sung in rising thirds to finish on a major chord is also musically simple, but satisfying for congregations not used to singing in harmony. Sung according to the heading in Common Ground (‘Lively, but not too quickly’) it puts the congregation in the mood for the worship to follow. It also lends itself to adding further biddings such as ‘Glory to Christ Jesus’ and ‘Glory to the Spirit’.