This song is extremely popular (& justly so) at our church and sung a lot with great gusto. It is by Trish Watts and Monica O’Brien. We use it for everything but it works especially well as a gathering song and a recessional. Listen to a snippet here.
It is available to purchase for download at As One Voice.
When I was making a new backing of this I noticed the last note of the chorus in my old guitar AOV is a G and we have always sung an E. I’m not sure if we’ve always sung it wrong or whether the G is the harmony note but I’ve used what we always sing in this case. I’ve also upped the tempo to 132 bpm.
Refrain
Create a new heart, holy Lord,
Beckon our lives through your word,
Open our eyes to your call,
United as one for your world.
Heighten our minds to your thoughts,
Heal us of pride and of hurt,
May we go forth in your name,
We pray our hearts change.
Verse 1
The heart of the cross lowly and poor, calls us on.
Lord, it is you promising hope, promising truth.
Refrain
Verse 2
Restless the hearts who yearn for your peace in this land.
Deepen the dream, justice brings life, justice redeems.
Refrain
© Willow Connection
PS
My late mother was a huge fan of Englebert Humperdink, so when I first heard this song at mass when I become a catholic I thought, this sounds like “Les Bicyclettes De Belsize”. I have even seen this song printed with acknowledgement that the tune is adapted from that song and noting the Albert and Sons hold the copywrite. (Incidentally, I wonder if Willow could do a deal to get Kearney’s “Beatitudes” off Alberts.)
To be fair I went back and looked at that song. This backing is the same key, tempo and style as the hymn.
Turning and turning
The world goes on.
We can’t change it, my friend.
Let us go riding all through the days,
Together to the end, to the end.Les bicyclettes de Belsize
Carry us side by side
And hand in hand we will ride,
Over Belsize.
Turn your magical eyes.
Round and around,
Looking at all we found.
Carry us through the skies,
Les bicyclettes de Belsize.
It really is a very different song isn’t it. The verse is in a minor key and obviously different. The chorus is only similar for the first three lines really and there isn’t a complete note by note correspondence even there. I doubt it matters to the people who love this song, to whom the hymn evokes a need for openness to God and living in that restless yearning of uncertainty. Englebert’s song is OK too.
Hi,
Thank you very much for making this website available. My choir members do not have time to practice new songs so I normally email them the songs for every Sunday mass by using this link and they just sing along with the music.
Thanks again for your hard work. May God bless and keep you all.
In Christ,
Tram Nguyen
Thank you for your kind words and you are most welcome.
Geoff
Thank you for the post and the music its really peaceful and beautiful…
Thank you for the hymn. We sang this song a couple of times at church and it was so great. The song was on my mind when I woke up so it was good to sing aliing with the music.
I would love to download/purchase the instrumental music for the song ‘A new heart for a new world’. How do I go about doing this please. Thankyou
I heard today Les Bicyclettes De Belsize for the first time in a transcription (Le Grande!) for theatre organ and was struck by how similar this hymn was to it!
As usual, your analysis is way ahead of me, and the similarities too heavy for coincidence so nice to see there may be some acknowledgement – of course this follows the ancient tradition of St Phillip Neri and Palestrina of taking the secular and making it sacred, a habit of mine on making things as diverse as Marvel movie themes into mass settings!