With words taken from Ecclesiasticus, Isaiah and the Book of Common Prayer, Strengthen ye the weak hands was composed for the opening service of the Canterbury Festival in Canterbury Cathedral on 25 June 1949 to commemorate the Science and Art of Healing. More symphonically conceived (like Stanford’s For lo, I raise up), the anthem is framed by a theme exclusive to the organ. An introductory recitative for solo tenor leads to the main body of the anthem—a ternary design for the full choir, beginning with the text that gave rise to its title. The longer secondary paragraph (‘Then shall the eyes of the blind’) of this tripartite structure leads to a fuller, affirmative restatement of the first idea before the anthem concludes with a wistful recurrence of the organ theme and a more austere, declamatory coda (‘O Saviour of the world’) for the full choir.

from notes by Jeremy Dibble © 2019