Phrasing Text with Tune
With the textual phrasing in place, turn now to the hymn tune. Musical phrases--complete musical thoughts--are indicated by the blue slurs to the right. These are given for illustration only--slurs in this context need not be marked in your score.
Where phrasing of the text and music agree; that is, where a break occurs in all verses of text at the same point as the musical phrasing, you might use a vertical line within the text (see red lines), or a “V” mark. We will break each verse as we come to those points.
To render the text clearly between measure 4 and 5 (yellow highlight), as already discussed, include reminders in the text. Even though the musical phrasing breaks at that point, the tiny slurs remind us not to break in verses 1 and 3. The number “2” reminds us to break at that point in verse 2.
