Peace, Be Still

Master, the tempest is raging

I. Origins

Mary Ann Baker (1832–1925) had a tumultuous upbringing. She was the first child of Joshua Baker and Catherine Eddy, born 16 September 1832 in Orwell, Oswego, NY. As a young child, her family moved to Branch County, Michigan. Her father died there on 25 October 1839 at age 39, as did an infant sibling, Elcy, three days previously, aged 1 month, 26 days—leaving behind Catherine with three young daughters, Mary, Lucina (b. 1835), and Eliza (b. 1837).

A few years later, in 1843, her mother married David Ripley and had two more children, William (b. 1844) and Rhoda (b. 1846), but by 1850, her mother was a single parent again with five young children, living in Kinderhook, Branch, Michigan. By 1855, they had relocated to Boonville, Oneida, New York, where Catherine married Ephraim Potter, a relative, a widower with four boys. By 1860, Catherine’s children had gone their own ways. Mary and her half-sister Rhoda Ripley opted to return to Michigan, where they both found work as compositors (type setters) and lived on Portage Street in Kalamazoo. Lucina Baker was a teacher in Sugar Grove Township, Kane, Illinois, not far from Chicago; William Ripley lived near Lucina, in Aurora, Kane, Illinois; Eliza Baker was a teacher in Redfield, New York, and married Allen D. Bump there around 1863.

Facing the impending marriage of Rhoda to George Ely in 1868 (and the end of their shared living arrangements), Mary moved to Chicago, where she found work as a compositor for Horton & Leonard, and thus also lived near Lucina and William. After the death of Ephraim Potter on 20 April 1870, Catherine joined Rhoda and George in Allegan, Michigan, and was counted there in June under her Ripley name. Catherine died in August. William, in a race against death by tuberculosis, seems to have been headed westward for a more favorable climate; W.D. Ripley, age 26, native of Michigan, was counted in Lawrence, Douglas, Kansas in 1870.

Around this time, Mary had connected with a Chicago publisher, Root & Cady, who published a hymn of hers, “No more the empty name,” in The Palm (1870). Soon after, she established a songwriting partnership with Horatio R. Palmer (1834–1907), who was choir director at Second Baptist Church in Chicago, a seasoned composer, and a nationally regarded church musician. The gospel collection Pure Diamonds (1872), edited by James Murray, contained three songs of theirs, “Names Written in Heaven,” “Lead Us, O Shepherd True,” and “The Tares.” Their most significant collaboration, “Peace Be Still,” happened in 1874 at a difficult time in Baker’s life, when her half-brother William was fighting for his life in the warmer, oceanic climate of San Bernardino, California. Mary later recalled the circumstances:

Dr. Palmer requested me to prepare several songs on the subject of the current Sunday-school lessons. One of the themes was “Christ Stilling the Tempest.” It so expressed an experience I had recently passed through, that this hymn was the result. A very dear and only brother, a young man of rare loveliness and promise of character, had been laid in the grave, a victim of the same disease that had already taken father and mother. His death occurred under peculiarly distressing circumstances. He was more than a thousand miles away from home, seeking in the balmy air of the sunny South the healing that our colder climate could not give. Suddenly he grew worse. The writer was ill and could not go to him. For two weeks the long lines of telegraph wires carried back and forth messages between the dying brother and his waiting sisters, ere the word came which told us that our beloved brother was no longer a dweller on the earth. Although we mourned not as those without hope, and although I had believed on Christ in early childhood and had always desired to give the Master a consecrated and obedient life, I became wickedly rebellious at this dispensation of divine providence. I said in my heart that God did not care for me or mine. But the Master’s own voice stilled the tempest in my unsanctified heart, and brought it to the calm of a deeper faith and a more perfect trust.[1]

“Peace Be Still” was first published in a collection edited by Palmer, Songs of Love for the Bible School (Fig. 1), which had been released in March 1874. William Ripley’s death in San Bernardino followed on 8 April 1874, and he was buried there.

The song was adopted into several other collections, including Ira Sankey’s influential Gospel Hymns No. 4 (1881), the cumulative edition, Nos. 1 to 6 (1894), and its related British editions. According to Baker, the hymn took on a heightened importance in the wake of the assassination attempt (2 July 1881) and eventual death (19 Sept. 1881) of President James A. Garfield, being used in vigils and memorials:

During the weeks when our nation kept watch by the bedside of our greatly beloved President Garfield, it was republished as especially appropriate to the time, and was sung at some of the many funeral services held throughout the United States.[2]

Baker’s recollection is difficult to corroborate, as the song is not mentioned in any known biography, newspaper article, or published memorial from that time in relation to the death of President Garfield.

For the composer, Horatio Palmer, the hymn was brought to life during a trip to Israel, when he was able to see Galilee for himself:

During their visit to the Holy Land, Dr. and Mrs. Palmer were invited to a Sunday afternoon tea in Jerusalem, and were greeted by about fifty people who sat at the same table. Instead of saying “Grace,” all joined in singing his “By and by we shall meet Him, By and by we shall greet Him.” When at Tiberias on the Sea of Galilee, the young people of the mission invited the Doctor to a moonlight row on the sea and surprised him by singing his “Galilee, Blue Galilee” and “Peace, Be Still” on the beautiful waters which gave rise to the songs.[3]

II. Analysis

At its core, the hymn is a narrative depiction of Mark 4:37–41 from the King James Version:

And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that it was now full. And he was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a pillow: and they awake him, and say unto him, “Master, carest thou not that we perish?” And he arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, “Peace, be still.” And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. And he said unto them, “Why are ye so fearful? How is it that ye have no faith?” And they feared exceedingly, and said one to another, “What manner of man is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”

Karen Lynn Davidson, a scholar of the Latter-Day Saints, outlined the hymn’s message as follows:

In the first verse, our words are those of a fearful disciple in that boat on the Sea of Galilee; our panic rises as a growing tempest threatens to capsize us at any moment. In the second verse, the fear and despair are just as great, but these are figurative storms, “torrents of sin and of anguish.” The third verse recognizes the peace that comes after Jesus has calmed the storm, whether it is a storm on Galilee or a storm within the heart. The same chorus follows each verse, and here we speak words of faith in the Savior’s ability to calm the storm. The hymn’s central phrase and message, “Peace, be still,” is repeated four times in this chorus.[4]

LDS minister Howard W. Hunter, in a message about this passage, summarized the application in the life of a Christian:

All of us have seen some sudden storms in our lives. A few of them, though temporary like these on the Sea of Galilee, can be violent and frightening and potentially destructive. As individuals, as families, as communities, as nations, even as a church, we have had sudden squalls arise which have made us ask one way or another, “Master, carest thou not that we perish?” And one way or another we always hear in the stillness after the storm, “Why are ye so fearful? how is it that ye have no faith?”[5]

Minister Robert Cottrill drew comparisons between this story and the life of Job:

We may not see all the reasons for the storms we pass through in life, or the wise and loving purposes of God in them, but we are assured that God is at work in all circumstances for the good of His children (Rom. 8:28). In towering faith, Job, in his painful extremity, cried, “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21). Yet he continued to wrestle with unanswered questions. Later in the book, Job declares his confidence that his case will be addressed at a future time, when he stands in the presence of his Redeemer (Job 19:25–26). Sometimes, we’ll learn more about the ways of God through such experiences in this life. But full answers to the “Why?” question may elude us until we look back from the perspective of eternity.[6]

For additional Scripture references, see Wayne S. Walker (2008).

Musically, the triple meter tends to evoke the lilt of waves. Harmonically, it begins by following a simple chord structure, then moves temporarily to the relative minor, resolving back to the safety of the home key. The refrain is one of the most ambitious examples of the genre, being fairly long (20 measures), in fact, longer than the stanzas (16 measures). It features a gradual and intensifying rise of an octave, underpinned by sturdy secondary dominant chords, then a resolution back downward.

III. Earliest Recordings

The hymn was first recorded in December 1912 by Rev. William H. Morgan and the Edison Mixed Quartet, released in March 1913 on the Edison Blue Amberol cylinder 1642. At the time, Morgan was pastor of Central Methodist Episcopal Church in Newark, New Jersey. The quartet probably included Elizabeth Spencer, Cornelia Marvin, Harry Anthony, and Donald Chalmers.[7] The brief recording features Rev. Morgan reading the Scripture, then the quartet singing through one stanza and one refrain. This recording has been preserved and digitized by the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB).

A similar recording was made on 9 August 1914 with evangelist-composer J. Wilbur Chapman (1859–1918) and the Edison Mixed Quartet, which in this case included Elizabeth Spencer, E. Eleanor Patterson, John Young, and Donald Chalmers. This was issued as a 78-rpm disc rather than a cylinder. This recording has been preserved and digitized by Internet Archive.

IV. Adaptation

In the gospel music industry, the earliest recorded attempt at converting the hymn into something suitable for a gospel choir was an arrangement by the Original Gospel Harmonettes, recorded 11 July 1951 in Hollywood, California, for Specialty Records, but it was unreleased until it appeared on a retrospective CD, Get On Board (SPCD-7017) in 1992 (Amazon / YouTube). The group included Dorothy Love Coates, Mildred Miller, Odessa Edwards, Willie Mae Newberry Garth, and Vera Kolb, accompanied by Evelyn Starks. The lead vocalist on this track was Mildred Miller. In this rendition, the group stuck somewhat closely to the original harmonic progression of the hymn, at least through the first stanza, then switched gears, laying into a 4/4 beat for the chorus in a call-and-response style. With this being unreleased, the only chance of it being heard would have been via live performances in person or over the radio.

A far more successful adaptation emerged in the 1960s, via the ministries of several Los Angeles musicians, especially those associated with pianist Gwendolyn Cooper Lightner (1925–1999). Lightner, formerly of Chicago, had studied gospel piano with Kenneth Morris before relocating to Los Angeles, initially serving as pianist under Rev. John Branham at St. Paul Baptist Church, where she worked with other luminaries like James Earle Hines and Sallie Martin, and played for several recordings the church made for Capitol Records from 1947 to 1950, while also participating in regular radio broadcasts over KOWL. According to one historian, “The church and choir became a symbol of achievement and an example for other churches, for not only was the broadcast heard in seventeen states with an audience of one million people (the largest audience on the west coast), but the success at St. Paul encouraged many other Los Angeles churches to begin similar programs.”[8]

At some point in the 1950s, she and vocalist James Ewell moved to Bethany Baptist Church. In 1957, Lightner worked with Thurston Frazier (1930–1974) to assemble a community gospel choir called the Voices of Hope, of which Ewell was a member. Frazier had been a singer with the Wings Over Jordan choir and was mentored in gospel music by Hines at St. Paul before coming into his own as a successful choir director. In the 1950s, Frazier was directing choirs at Phillips Temple Colored Methodist Church, Southern Missionary Baptist Church, Opportunity Baptist Church, and especially Victory Baptist Church, where he led the Voices of Victory.

According to James Ewell’s daughter, Melodi Ewell Lovely, it was Ewell who approached Lightner with the idea of adapting “Peace Be Still,” which he had found in the Broadman Hymnal (1940), a popular Baptist hymnal at the time.[9] Lightner’s arrangement then became part of the repertoire for Bethany Baptist, the Voices of Hope, and the Voices of Victory. The Voices of Hope, with Frazier and Lightner, recorded it on 20 November 1965 for the album Walk on by Faith (Capitol T-2480). On the record’s label, the song was credited only to H.R. Palmer.

But the Ewell/Lightner arrangement had been on the air and on the stage long before it was on vinyl, which allowed another notable Los Angeles musician to step in and record it first. James Cleveland (1931–1991) had moved to Los Angeles in 1962 to direct music at New Greater Harvest Baptist Church, and shortly upon his arrival he set up a publishing collaboration with Thurston Frazier, releasing several songs under the Frazier-Cleveland banner over the next few years, while also maintaining publishing and distribution relationships with Sallie Martin, Kenneth Morris, and Roberta Martin. James Cleveland was a transplant from Chicago, where he grew up singing in Thomas Dorsey’s church choir and learned how to play piano like Roberta Martin. Martin published some of Cleveland’s earliest works. In 1958, Cleveland became music director at Prayer Tabernacle Spiritual Church in Detroit, whose choir was known as the Voices of Tabernacle. Now working in Los Angeles, but signed to a contract with Savoy Records in New York, he arranged to use Lawrence Roberts’ Angelic Choir, based in Nutley, New Jersey, for a series of albums: This Sunday In Person (Savoy MG-14059, 1962), Volume II (MG-14063, 1963), Peace Be Still (MG-14076, 1963), and seven other LPs to follow by 1969.

Given his connection to Frazier, and his probable acquaintance with Lightner, the adoption of “Peace Be Still” into Cleveland’s repertoire is easy to understand. But Cleveland gave the piece his own stamp: rather than have the choir sing the opening verse, he made it a compelling solo. John Hason’s piano introduction harkens in some ways to Evelyn Starks’ work with the Harmonettes and to Lightner’s styling, providing an interesting thread among the three recordings. “Peace Be Still” was recorded at Trinity Temple Seventh Day Adventist Church in Newark, New Jersey, on 19 September 1963, released as a 45-rpm single (Savoy 4217) and as the title track of the LP, in both cases credited solely to Cleveland.

V. Published Scores

To complement the recording, Savoy published a score of “Peace Be Still,” registered for copyright on 29 October 1963, with both words and music credited to Cleveland. Another copy was registered a year later, on 28 October 1964, with a note saying it had “added words.” No copies of either score could be located for examination.

Kenneth Morris quickly produced his own version of the score, which was registered on 2 December 1963. Morris properly attributed the original song to Baker and Palmer, but he claimed the arrangement in his own name, “As sung and recorded by leading radio, T.V., and recording artists.” Curiously, Morris’s score starts chorally, like what Lightner had conceived, rather than as a solo, but it is not the same as what the Voices of Hope recorded. It could either be Morris’s own attempt at filling in parts, or it could be his recollection of hearing a version like this as transmitted by an unknown choir.

The following year, Roberta Martin also produced a score of “Peace Be Still.” Like Morris’s score, it was published in Chicago, and it is entirely choral, which similarly begs the question of where or how Lightner’s version had been transmitted prior to her recording of it in 1965. Her score follows the Voices of Hope rendition more closely than Morris’s. She credited Baker and Palmer as the original authors but took full credit for the arrangement. In spite of the copyright notice, this does not appear to have been registered with the U.S. Copyright Office.

Since 1963, James Cleveland’s interpretation has become the most recognized version of the song. His album has sold as many as 800,000 copies, or perhaps more when counting digital reissues. The hymn is still printed in hymnals, although primarily in collections produced for African American churches. Many have continued to reprint the original version by Baker and Parker, while a few have attempted to reproduce the gospel choir version, as in the African American Heritage Hymnal (2001) using a score devised by Nolan Williams, or in One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism (2018), using a score by Joseph Joubert. Both hymnals were published by GIA in Chicago.

by CHRIS FENNER
for Hymnology Archive
23 February 2022

Footnotes:

1. Quoted in Ira Sankey, My Life and the Story of the Gospel Hymns (1906), pp. 252–255: Archive.org; see also John A. Earl, “Editor Earl recently visited,” etc., The Baptist, Northern Baptist Convention, vol. 5, no. 12 (19 April 1924), p. 268: Archive.org

2. Quoted in Ira Sankey, My Life and the Story of the Gospel Hymns (1906), p. 256: Archive.org

3. J.H. Hall, “Dr. H.R. Palmer,” Biography of Gospel Song and Hymn Writers (1914), pp. 93–94: Archive.org

4. Karen Lynn Davidson, “Master, the tempest is raging,” Our Latter-Day Hymns (1988), p. 133.

5. Howard W. Hunter, “Master, the tempest is raging,” LDS General Conference (Oct. 1984): LDS

6. Robert Cottrill, “Master, the tempest is raging,” Wordwise Hymns (18 Sept. 2013): WH

7. Robert M. Marovich, Peace Be Still (2021), p. 82.

8. Jacqueline Cogdell Djedje, “Los Angeles composers of African American gospel music: The first generations,” American Music, vol. 11, no. 4 (Winter, 1993), p. 416: JSTOR

9. Robert M. Marovich, Peace Be Still (2021), p. 82–84.

Related Resources:

Wilbur Fisk Tillett, “Master, the tempest is raging,” Our Hymns and Their Authors: An Annotated Edition of the Hymn Book of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South (Nashville: M.E. Church, 1892), pp. 342–343: Archive.org

Rev. William H. Morgan, D.D. and Edison Mixed Quartet, “St. Mark 4:35 to 41. Peace! be still!” (1913), Edison Blue Amberol 1642, UCSB Cylinder Audio Archive: USCB

Karen Lynn Davidson, “Master, the tempest is raging,” Our Latter-Day Hymns (Salt Lake City: Deseret, 1988), pp. 133–134.

Wayne S. Walker, “Peace, Be Still,” Hymn Studies Blog (15 Oct. 2008): Website

Robert Cottrill, “Master, the tempest is raging,” Wordwise Hymns (18 Sept. 2013): WH

Cedric Hayes & Robert Laughton, Gospel Discography 1943–2000, 3rd ed., 2 vols. (Canada: Eyeball, 2014): Eyeball

“‘Master, the tempest is raging’: A hymn about the storms of life,” Tabernacle Choir Blog (6 July 2018): Website

Robert M. Marovich, Peace Be Still: How James Cleveland and the Angelic Choir Created a Gospel Classic (Urbana: University of Illinois, 2021): Amazon

Robert Marovich, “Peace Be Still,” Library of Congress, National Recording Preservation Board (2021): LOC

“Peace Be Still,” Hymnary.org: https://hymnary.org/text/master_the_tempest_is_raging

William D. Ripley (1844–1874), Find-a-Grave, No. 21578643: FG