A choir director's guide to "Perfect Praise" (aka "How Excellent")

"Perfect Praise" is in the key of Eb. It is written for three-part choir (soprano, alto, and tenor) plus a lead singer. It is accompanied by a standard gospel band.

The best-loved feature of the song is the vocal counterpoint for the choir that occurs on the last line of each passage (". . . is Thy name") and on the vamp ("in all the earth"). It takes a little work at first for a choir to learn those passages, but once you get it you never lose it

I think this is a great song to use as a choir's first "hard" song. Walt Whitman's choir, the Soul Children of Chicago, is literally made up of minors. So clearly it's a song that youth choirs can master if they're ready to work at it. I once heard a children's choir blow the roof off with this one at a little storefront church in Compton.

Even though it's not a fast song, it builds a lot of excitement just through the melodic structure.

"Perfect Praise" adapts very well to embellishments and variations, which makes it a popular "show piece".

Perfect PraiseFor a while, the entire "This Is the Day" album was selling as an MP3 album on Amazon, but right now the tracks are listed as "Not Available".

But the song "Perfect Praise" can be found on this anthology album. If you click the link, you'll see that the anthology album has the song listed with the incorrect title "Perfect Peace", but it is indeed the right song.

"Perfect Praise" was written by Brenda Joyce Moore. According to BMI, Ms. Moore's publishing company is Balutik's Music.

You can get a mechanical license for this song from the Limelight Licensing.

• "Perfect Praise" does have some complicated passages in it. The melismatic parts on the word "is" might take some extra practice for your choir.


• It does get a little high. The highest note the sopranos sing is an Eb (an octave and a third above middle C), the highest note for the altos is a Bb, and the highest note for the tenors is a G. If those notes are too high for your choir singers, you may want to try it in a different key.


• If you don't have a musician, there are accompaniment tracks available for "Perfect Praise".

On the vamp portion of the song, when the altos come in, the second time they say "in all the earth", the first note they sing on the word "earth" is an A-natural. A lot of people think that it sounds flat and "off". I agree with them. I think it sounds dissonant in all the wrong ways and detracts from the beauty of a wonderful song.

The idea for that whole line is that it rises a half step with each repetition of the phrase. On the first repetition the alto notes for "earth" are:
Ab-G-F-G-Ab

Then on the next repetition, "earth" is:
A-Ab-G-Ab-A

And on the final repetition, "earth" is:
Bb-A-G-A-Bb

So mathematically it seems logical for that note to be an A. But the instruments are playing an Ab chord at that point, so the A-natural coming from the altos sounds very dissonant and jarring. Sometimes jarring is good, but the feeling you want for this song is harmonious and uplifting, and the A is disturbing in that context. By the end of the word, the instruments are playing an F chord, so that final A-natural sounds beautiful. It's only the first one that's a problem.

What some directors do (myself included!) is instruct their altos to take that first note up to a Bb instead, so "earth" is sung as:
Bb-Ab-G-Ab-A

It doesn't follow the "logical sequence", but it sounds much better!

People love to play around with this song. Here are some of the variations I've heard.

• Most of the choirs I've heard singing "Perfect Praise" do it without the lead singer. All the lead does is sing the verse once, exactly the same way that the sopranos do it when the choir comes in. So the lead is very much optional.


• I've never heard anyone do any changes on the "Oh Lord, how excellent" part. But people love to play around with that last line -- "Jesus excellent is Thy name". Some of these variations include:
  
  • Repeating the word "excellent" over and over and stretching it out or adding riffs to it.
  
  
  • Repeating the phrase "Jesus, excellent" with a 4-beat pause after each one. After a couple of repetitions of that you can do an inversion (the sopranos go up to a G, the altos to the Eb, and the tenors to the Bb) if that's not too high for the singers in your choir. My choir at home does this song in the key of Db, so for us that inversion works nicely.
  
  
  • Repeating the word "is" over and over, at times replacing the "is" with "ooh".
  
  
• After ending the entire song, as the instruments are playing their final chord and the drums are rolling, you can have the sopranos come in alone with their line -- "Every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess that He is Lord" -- and then bring the whole choir in on "Jesus excellent" and end it in the normal way. It sounds very majestic.

Oh Lord How Excellent
(Eb) Richard Smallwood

Oh Lord How Excellent (Eb) Richard Smallwood
by Fruition Music, on their album called Instrumental Gospel Tracks Vol. 2

The musicians who made this track refer to it as a Richard Smallwood song. It appears that Smallwood did do a version of it at some time, but I don't think that album is in print any more.

But it is the same song, and in the same key.

African American Heritage Hymnal

African American Heritage Hymnal: 575 Hymns, Spirituals, and Gospel Songs

I love the African-American Heritage Hymnal. So many great black gospel songs finally written down in sheet music form! And "Perfect Praise" is one of them.