Hal H. Hopson, born June 12, 1933, and a resident of Cedar Park, Texas, died July 20. He was an exceptionally prolific composer of church music with more than 1,800 published works with 30 publishers, which comprise almost every musical form in church music. With a special interest in congregational song, he made a significant contribution to the new repertoire of hymntunes and responsorial psalm settings as evidenced by the proliferation of his settings that are included in newly published hymnals and psalm collections.
Hopson was born in Mound, Texas, into a family of thirteen children where music making played a prominent role. His first piano teacher was his older sister, Merle, whom he held in deep regard for her enormous musical and personal influence on his life. Hopson’s well-known hymntune, Merle’s Tune, was named in her honor. He first accompanied worship services at age thirteen and later graduated from Baylor University with a Bachelor of Arts degree and from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary with a Master of Sacred Music degree. He pursued additional study at universities and conservatories in the United States and Germany.
Hopson’s cantata, God with Us, was one of the few compositions selected by a panel at the Kennedy Space Center, Washington, D.C., to be placed in a capsule during the American Bicentennial in 1976. The capsule will be opened at the Tricentennial in 2076 and will be heard again as a representative piece of American choral composition of this century.
Hopson composed music that was accessible to nearly all choirs and congregations, striving to include rather than exclude. His published repertoire included anthems for children, youth, and adult choirs, as well as compositions for organ, piano, harpsichord, and handbells. He especially wrote for congregations in concertato anthems, hymntunes, responsorial psalm settings, and liturgical services.
A church musician throughout his professional life, Hopson also served as a conductor-clinician for workshops and choral festivals in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Asia, and as a professor of church music at Westminster Choir College and Scarritt Graduate School. He was also a hymn writer whose texts appeared in major denominational hymnals.
As a recipient of many honors for his distinguished service to music, Hopson was listed in the International Who’s Who in Music, Cambridge, England. He served on the national boards of the Presbyterian Association of Musicians, Choristers Guild, and the Church Music Institute, and received annual awards from ASCAP. His expertise in psalmody and liturgy led to appointments on the Milwaukee Symposia for Church Composers sponsored by the Catholic Diocese of Milwaukee and the task Force on Psalmody sponsored by the Presbyterian Church, USA, which resulted in the official psalter for the denomination.
Hal H. Hopson was married to Martha Smith Hopson, also a church musician. They had three children, six grandchildren.
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