Lo, he comes with clouds descending - Helmsley

This is probably my favourite Advent hymn, and, indeed, one of my favourite hymns altogether. I'd suggest it for my funeral if I could (the possible confusion of the "he" combined with the reference to clouds, assuming I'll be cremated, could be disconcertingly weird for those present).

You can pretty much make up your own back story for the tune, Helmsley. It's usually attributed to Thomas Olivers, 1725-99 (who had an interesting back story of his own), who may have heard it in the street, which seems improbable to me; he may have written it himself; or he may have "borrowed" it from someone else ... it depends which source you like to believe. Olivers was a hymn writer born in Wales ... but Helmsley is in Yorkshire.

There are various versions of the words, too. The original text was a collaboration between a certain John Cennick and Charles Wesley.
The words I had in mind when recording this are in Hymns Ancient and Modern Revised.

Lo, he comes with clouds descending,
Once for favoured sinners slain;
Thousand thousand saints attending
Swell the triumph of his train:
Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!
Christ appears on earth to reign.

Every eye shall now behold him,
Robed in dreadful majesty;
Those who set at naught and sold him,
Pierced, and nailed him to the tree,
Deeply wailing, deeply wailing, deeply wailing,
Shall the true Messiah see.

Those dear tokens of his Passion
Still his dazzling body bears,
Cause of endless exultation
To his ransomed worshippers:
With what rapture, with what rapture, with what rapture
Gaze we on those glorious scars!

Yea, Amen, let all adore thee,
High on thine eternal throne;
Saviour, take the power and glory,
Claim the kingdom for thine own:
Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!
Thou shalt reign, and thou alone.

The last verse harmonies are by the great Martin How.