RT REVD TIMOTHY DUDLEY-SMITH OBE: 1926-2024
Timothy Dudley-Smith will be remembered best for his rich contribution to hymnody. He is widely-regarded as the greatest modern hymnwriter of the 20th and early 21st centuries. At his 90th birthday celebration, Pam Rhodes, presenter of BBC Songs of Praise, described his popularity as springing out of ‘his understanding of the human condition’.
Bishop Timothy’s first hymn, ‘Tell out, my soul, the greatness of the Lord’ was only ever intended as a poem. Leafing through a review copy of the New English Bible (NT) one morning, he reached for a pencil to attempt to turn the Magnificat into poetry. It took, as he later reflected, about 45 minutes. The hymn would appear in hundreds of hymn collections around the world. His ‘Lord, for the Years’ was sung at the Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II and in many Millennium events.
