(This article was originally published in the Jan-Feb-Mar 2003 issue of THEME Magazine.)
Did you know that many early day Salvation Army songs were sung to secular, non-Salvation Army, non-church music?
Why??
Because the early Army meetings attracted mostly ‘unchurched’ men and women who knew secular (e.g. music hall) music better than church hymns. So the Army used ‘Army’ words set to secular song tunes to encourage the ‘unchurched’ to attend, participate and be converted in Army meetings.
Altogether, there are 105 secular song tunes which have ‘survived’ in our current Tune Book! If you click on the link below, you can see a listing of some of these tunes, with their original secular title:
Click here.