Based on Phillipians 2:5-7 this song is 46 in OCP’s Guitar Accompaniment Book. It is by Caroline Maria Noel and here set to KING’S WESTON by Ralph Vaughan Williams.
The text is at Hymnary along with details of the tunes that were used before this setting. The sheet music for Williams piece can be purchased at OCP where the copyright is attributed to Oxford University Press. On Hymnary there are images from English hymnals with no copyright note for the tune so…
Here’s a question: Is this song still copyright in the USA but public domain in England?
The tune is published in 1931 and Williams died in 1958.
Here’s some thinking music in the form of yet more fake organ on BIAB. This tune has a rather an ominous feeling to it.
The words are now public domain pretty much everywhere: the author died in 1877.
But tunes by Ralph Vaughan Williams are a different story. He died in 1958. So things he wrote will be copyright in countries with a “death + 70” (most of Europe, the UK, and I think NZ) approach until 2029. But the US is different. If something was published there before 1923, it’s now in the public domain. If something was first published IN THE USA later, then the current status depends on whether copyright was registered and renewed or not.
So there are few works that are still copyright in England but the USA, and vice-versa too.
There are lots of other complex question around this: what if a tune was never published in the USA? What if it’s never been formally published, but has been circulating on the Internet (and thus on computers in the USA) n text form since teh 1980s etc.