Son of a Ger­man Re­formed Church pas­tor, Ex­cell start­ed his work­ing life as a brick­lay­er and plas­ter­er. His love of mu­sic called him though, and he went to Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois, to stu­dy un­der George Root. Ex­cell went on to found sing­ing schools at var­i­ous lo­ca­tions in Amer­i­ca, and to ex­pand in­to the re­li­gious field, work­ing with evan­gel­ist Sam Jones for two de­cades. Ex­cell al­so wrote over 2,000 Gos­pel songs, and worked at a mu­sic pub­lish­ing house in Chi­ca­go. His works in­clude:

• Joy to the World (Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois: Hope Pub­lish­ing Com­pa­ny, 1915)

Sources

Hymns

1. Grace, Enough for Me
2. His Love Is All I Need
3. I Am Happy in Him
4. Little Bit of Love, A
5. Since I Have Been Re­deemed

Music

1. Count Your Blessings
2. His Love Can Never Fail
3. Hope Set Before You, The
4. I Saw One Hanging on a Tree
5. I Will Follow Thee
6. I’ll Be a Sunbeam
7. In the Shadow of His Wings
8. Jesus Bids Us Shine
9. Let Him In
10. Scatter Sun­shine
11. Spend One Hour with Je­sus
12. What Would Jesus Do?
13. Will Your Heart Ring True?