William B. Bradbury: Sunday-school melodies and gospel hymns

William Batchelder Bradbury wrote the melody of Jesus Loves Me in 1862, two years after Anna Bartlett Warner's words appeared in her sister's novel Say and Seal, and added the refrain himself. The catalogue holds 215 Bradbury scores, about 115 minutes of music and 52,023 notated notes.

Text is unusually plentiful here, with 104 entries carrying lyrics, and the difficulty is spread wider than usual: 157 scores at complexity index 0, 55 at index 1 and three at index 2. A violin part for Jesus Loves Me is the most-viewed item, at 8,628 views.

215Scores
115 minutesMusic (approx.)
52,023Notated notes
104Scores with lyric notation

About William Batchelder Bradbury

Bradbury was born in York, Maine, on 6 October 1816 and moved to Boston at seventeen, where he studied with Lowell Mason and George Webb at the Academy of Music. He was an organist by eighteen and taught at singing schools in Machias, Maine, and St John, New Brunswick, before settling in New York. A year in Germany in 1847 sharpened his harmony and composition, and on his return he started the Bradbury Piano Company with his brother Edward. From 1841 he ran free singing classes for children and staged annual juvenile festivals in which a thousand uniformed children might sing. He died of tuberculosis at Bloomfield, New Jersey, now Montclair, on 7 January 1868.

He compiled or wrote fifty-nine books from 1841 onwards, among them the Sunday-school collections Golden Trio, Golden Chain, Golden Shower and Golden Censer, which together sold around three million copies. His tunes include Woodworth, published in the Third Book of Psalmody in 1849 and later paired with Charlotte Elliott's Just as I Am; the setting of Margaret Mackay's Asleep in Jesus from 1843; and the melodies still sung to Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead Us and Sweet Hour of Prayer.

The 215 scores here run to about 115 minutes. Because each printing and arrangement is kept apart, Jesus Loves Me appears as an instrumental part and as a text setting, and several titles carry a lyricist's name after the first line: Charitie Lees Bancroft, Margaret Mackay, Charles Wesley. The composer credit is hard to read from a title alone, so check the file before assuming an arranger.

Listening and playing notes

Bradbury writes for children and for congregations that learned to sing from a songbook, so phrases are short and refrains are meant to be caught on one hearing. Keep the tempo brisker than the Victorian photographs suggest; these are marching songs as much as prayers. In Jesus Loves Me the tune should stay plain and, if possible, unaccompanied. In Just as I Am the harmony does the work, with a low median voice and a cadence that resolves without fuss.

Selected scores

Jesus Loves Me (Violin Part)
The most-viewed score on the page: a separate violin line for the 1862 children's hymn.
Jesus Loves Me, This I Know
Bradbury's melody with the refrain he added, set to Anna Bartlett Warner's words from Say and Seal.
Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead Us
One of his best-known Sunday-school settings, printed in hymnals under the tune name Bradbury.
'Tis Midnight, and on Olive's Brow
A Gethsemane hymn for Holy Week, sung to Bradbury's tune Olive's Brow.
Before the Throne of God Above
The title preserves the lyricist's name; the hymn is a setting of Charitie Lees Bancroft's 1863 text.
Just as I Am
Bradbury's tune Woodworth, published in 1849 and later matched to Charlotte Elliott's invitation hymn.
Asleep in Jesus! Blessed Sleep
His 1843 setting of Margaret Mackay's poem, sung at his mother's funeral and again at his own.
The Water of Life
A gospel invitation in the revival idiom, with a refrain built for a room of untrained singers.
Whither, Pilgrims, Are You Going?
A pilgrimage hymn in dialogue form, one of the longer texts in the collection.