Now Let Us Sing!
Songs for Children of All Ages

Compiled and arranged by Phyllis Robbins
With illustrations by Heidi Lauckner
Kingston, Ontario, Canada: Kingston Unitarian Press, 2004

Review by Pat Hoertdoerfer
Children, Family and Intergenerational Programs Director
Lifespan Faith Development, UUA
Boston, MA

Have you said to yourself or asked your congregation the question “Where is the Children’s Hymnal?” Many of us have asked this question again and again. Our hymnals – Hymns for the Celebration of Life and Singing the Living Tradition – published in 1964 and 1993, respectively, have expressed the conviction that a vital faith must be a singing faith and “that each generation needs to express itself freshly in its own idiom through song and the spoken word.” But neither of these hymnals had a section devoted to songs for children. We have to go back to We Sing of Life published by Beacon Press in 1955 to sing from a hymnal that includes songs for children, young people, and adults. You, like me, probably urged and cajoled, prodded and needled, service leaders to select suitable children’s songs when the children were present in the service or the service was intergenerational. Perhaps you have the old We Sing of Life hymnal or maybe you have a small collection of songs for children and youth from which you draw for children or youth worship services, RE classes, and intergenerational events.

But Phyllis Robbins, Kingston Unitarian Fellowship music director, has done it for us! She and her committee have gathered songs for children and teens?and children of all ages?from many sources. She has organized them around our seven principles. There are 61 hymns and songs from One More Step and One, Yes We’re All One to There Is Always Something You Can Do and A Place in the Choir to Garden Song and May Love Surround You. Robbins has made simple arrangements for keyboard and voice, with chords for guitar or autoharp. The collection is spiral-bound for easy use and includes title index and first line index.

Just what you have been waiting for – A Songbook for Children’s Services, for Intergenerational Worship Services and Just for Fun and Musical Pleasure! Order your copy from SONGBOOK, Kingston Unitarian Press, 214 Concession Street, Kingston, Ontario K7K 2B5 Canada (613-544-8777) and kuf@kingston.net. Prices: single copy is $15 plus $4.75 shipping and handling; 2-5 copies are $13.50 each and $3.00 per book for shipping and handling; 6-10 copies are $13.50 each plus $2.00 per book for shipping and handling.

Order your Songbook! Enjoy! Thank you, Phyllis Robbins, Heidi Lauckner, and the Kingston Unitarian Fellowship and Press!

Til every song is sung by everyone,
We’ll sing one more song.