True Light: Voices of Witness and Hope
A concert of spirituals, sacred choral works, and a world premiere
presented by the Sanctuary Choir of Faith Presbyterian Church (PCUSA) & friends
Sunday, May 31, 2026 · 3:30 PM
Faith Presbyterian Church Sanctuary
5003 Whitesburg Drive, Huntsville, AL 35802
Free and open to the public
Sing with us
If you’d like to join the Sanctuary Choir & Friends — for this concert or a future season — we’d love to hear from you. Voices of every part are welcome, and we’ll help you find your fit if you’re not sure.
For participating singers
- Concert — Sunday, May 31, 2026 at 3:30 PM (1:30 PM call time) in the Sanctuary
- Dress rehearsal — Saturday, May 30, 2026 at 3:30 PM in the Sanctuary
- Wednesday rehearsals — 6:45 PM in the Choir Room, weekly leading up to the concert. All are welcome.
- Concert attire — any combination of black and white business casual (top, skirt, or pants) with a pop of color: tie, scarf, pen, anything. Individuality is encouraged.
Program
The afternoon unfolds in two halves. The first half opens with a question — Who’ll be a witness? — and travels through lament and the intimate cry of Precious Lord before turning toward praise with the world premiere of Jubilate Deo. The second half rises from joy through light and perseverance, gathers into the gospel-anthem propulsion of Revelation 19, and closes with a final, full-throated declaration of transformation.
Act I
I. Witness
Traditional Spiritual · Arr. Jack Halloran (S.A.T.B. arr. Dick Bolks)
Gentry Publications, ©2000
Jack Halloran’s setting of this 19th-century African-American spiritual has stood as the definitive choral arrangement since its release. Built on the rolling refrain “Who’ll be a witness for my Lord?”, it moves from a hushed unison into thundering eight-part declaration. We open the evening with it as both call and challenge — the question every singer, and every listener, is asked to answer.
Listen: Toronto Mendelssohn Choir · University of Utah Singers | Score: PDF
II. Give Me Justice
James MacMillan (b. 1959) · Words from Psalm 42 (43)
Boosey & Hawkes, ©2008
Sir James MacMillan, the leading Scottish composer of his generation, wrote this short, haunting introit for unaccompanied mixed voices, alternating an English refrain (“Give me justice, O God, and defend my cause”) with chanted Latin verses. The piece is structurally simple but harmonically restless — a cry from the depths that prepares the ear for the journey ahead.
III. Precious Lord, Take My Hand
Words and Music by Thomas A. Dorsey (1899–1993) · Choral setting by Jack Schrader
Hope Publishing Company, GC 968
Thomas A. Dorsey — the father of Black gospel music — wrote “Precious Lord” in 1932 in the immediate grief of losing his wife and newborn son. It became Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s favorite hymn; he requested it on the night he was assassinated in Memphis, and Mahalia Jackson sang it at his funeral. Jack Schrader’s SATB setting honors the song’s raw intimacy: a personal prayer that became a national one.
Listen: YouTube performance · Hope Publishing preview | Score: PDF
IV. Jubilate Deo: A Harmony of Psalm 23 and Psalm 100 (World Premiere)
Stephen A. Sivley · Text and music by the composer
©Stephen A. Sivley, 2026
Begun in 2024 as a simple two-part children’s setting of the Latin Jubilate Deo text, this work grew over two years into a serious a cappella SATB piece (with divisi) that braids Psalm 100’s exuberant call to praise with Psalm 23’s quiet trust. The composer dedicates the work to the Sanctuary Choir of Faith Presbyterian Church, who give its first performance this afternoon. The text, compiled and adapted by the composer, harmonizes the two psalms — a single song moving from praise into the valley of shadow and back to alleluia.
Score: PDF
— Intermission —
Act II
V. Joy in the Morning
Natalie Sleeth (1930–1992) · For SATB choir & keyboard, with optional brass or 3–5 octave handbells
Hope Publishing Company, ©1977 (no. F 957B)
Natalie Sleeth wrote “Joy in the Morning” in 1977 for the West Virginia Wesleyan College Choir, premiered at the inauguration of her husband as the college’s president. She drew the title from Psalm 30 (“weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning”). It has since sold more than a million copies and become a fixture of the American choral repertoire. We use it here to open the second half: a turn from grief and lament toward hope and dawn.
Listen: YouTube · Hope Publishing preview | Score: PDF
VI. True Light
Words and Music by Keith Hampton · Written for Essence of Joy, Penn State University, Dr. Tony Leach, conductor
Dr. K.T. Productions, ©2002 (dist. earthsongs)
Keith Hampton’s anthem opens with a familiar phrase from “This Little Light of Mine” before opening into something larger — a sixteen-measure soprano solo on lines from the tenth-century Armenian poet Grigor Narekatzi’s Book of Mournful Chants, framed by the choir’s repeated affirmation: “He lives in us as True Light.” Hampton, a leading African-American composer of contemporary sacred music, fuses spiritual roots with concert-hall craft.
Listen: Houghton College Choir · earthsongs preview | Score: PDF
VII. We Shall Overcome
African-American Spiritual / Civil Rights Anthem · Arr. Tesfa Wondemagegnehu; adapted by Stephen Sivley
Drawn from the gospel song “I’ll Overcome Some Day” and reshaped on the picket lines and freedom marches of the 1950s and ’60s, “We Shall Overcome” is the most enduring anthem of the American civil rights movement. Tesfa Wondemagegnehu — a leader of the Justice Choir movement and faculty member at St. Olaf College — has crafted a community-singing arrangement that invites every voice into the song. Tonight we invite you to sing with us.
Listen: Fitchburg State Concert Choir | Score: PDF
VIII. Revelation 19 — “Hallelujah! Salvation and Glory”
Words and Music by A. Jeffrey LaValley (b. 1953) · Choral setting by Jack Schrader
Savgos Music / Candied Jam Music; this arrangement ©2004 Hope Publishing (C5309)
Jeffrey LaValley, a Milwaukee-born gospel writer who came up through the Black church traditions of Chicago and Detroit, set Revelation 19:1 — “Hallelujah! Salvation and glory, honor and power, unto the Lord our God” — as a gospel anthem in 1985. It found its way around the world after the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir and others recorded it. Jack Schrader’s choral arrangement keeps the propulsion of the original while opening the piece up for SAB voices and piano.
Listen: Notre Dame of Mt. Carmel Choir · Hope Publishing preview | Score: PDF
IX. I Know I’ve Been Changed
African-American Spiritual · Arr. Damon H. Dandridge
Alliance Music Publications (AMP 0370) — Brazeal W. Dennard Choral Series
Composed for the 50th anniversary of the Brazeal W. Dennard Chorale of Detroit, Damon Dandridge’s a cappella arrangement (with soprano solo) is a soaring testimony — quiet conviction in the opening, building to a full divisi shout of transformation. We close the concert with it as the answer to the question “Witness” asked at the beginning: yes — and I know I’ve been changed.
Listen: Damon Dandridge arrangement · Brazeal Dennard Chorale (Live from Orchestra Hall) | Score: PDF
Faith Presbyterian Church (PCUSA) · Huntsville, Alabama
Sanctuary Choir & Friends · Spring 2026