The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced on Monday June, 18 the Hymnbook and Children’s songbook will be revised.
The first collection of hymns, which were put together by Emma Smith, were published in 1835, according to Mormon Newsroom. The latest revisions of the hymnbook were done in 1985. The current Children’s Songbook was published in 1989, according to lds.org.
“Under the direction of the First Presidency, committees have been assembled to recommend revisions to the current music collections,” Mormon Newsroom stated.
Darwin Wolford, a retired BYU-Idaho professor was in the Executive Hymnbook Committee in 1985. He said what the Church is trying to do is to make all Hymnbooks and Children’s Songbook the same across the world.
“What they want to do is streamline the English hymnbooks with the other languages and have the same hymns and same page numbers,” Wolford said.
He said he think the new revision will be better than the one he was part of in 1985.
“I think this will be better so that the hymns will be the same in the every book,” Wolford said. “That means we will no longer have patriotic hymns like ‘America the Beautiful’ because that will not be in German, Spanish or Italian.”
He said something else the Church is wanting to accomplish with this revision is be able to fill in doctrinal gaps especially with the new changes made of High Priests, elders and ministering.
“They’ll be more hymns having to do with service, service oriented hymns, to accommodate the ministering,” Wolford said. “Without the Boy Scouts in a year, then there will be songs for boys and girls not one or the other.”
The Church invited people to submit original music for consideration.
“Up to five hymns and five children’s songs may be submitted by an individual for consideration,” Mormon Newsroom Stated.
The new submissions have to be submitted by July 1, 2019.
For more information about the revision of the Hymnbooks and Children’s Songbook you can visit mormonnewsroom.org, and to submit original music you can visitnewmusic.lds.org.