Andrew L Skoog

Andrew L. Skoog was a Swedish American organist, choir director, composer, editor, and translator in the Evangelical Covenant tradition. Born in Gunnarskog, Värmland, Sweden, in 1856, he emigrated with his family to St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1869. As the eldest child he worked in his father's tailor shop and received little formal schooling. Hymnary records only twelve formal lessons on the melodeon, yet music became his vocation.

Skoog served revival ministries connected with Erik August Skogsbergh in Chicago and Minneapolis, then worked for many years as organist, choir director, and Sunday school superintendent at the Swedish Tabernacle in Minneapolis. He edited the monthly choir journal Gittit from 1892 to 1908 and participated in major Swedish American songbooks, including Sions Basun, De Ungas Sångbok, and Mission Hymns.

His career bridged a generational language change. Earlier he translated English gospel songs into Swedish; later he translated Swedish devotional texts into English for younger Covenant congregations. His English version of Sandell's hymn appeared in Mission Hymns in 1921 with Ahnfelt's tune. That publication helped carry a Swedish Lutheran revival song into a much wider English-language hymnal tradition.