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:

• Triumphant Songs (Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois: E. O. Ex­cell, 1889)
• Triumphant Songs No. 3 (Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois: E. O. Ex­cell, 1892)
• The Gospel Hymn­al (Cin­cin­na­ti, Ohio: Jen­nings & Pye, 1899)
• Famous Hymns, with Daniel Towner (Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois: The Bi­ble In­sti­tute Col­port­age As­so­ci­a­tion, 1907)
• Joy to the World (Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois: Hope Pub­lish­ing Com­pa­ny, 1915)
• Songs of Evan­gel­ism, edit­ed with George Schuler & E. W. Bie­der­wolf (Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois: Glad Tid­ings Pub­lish­ing Com­pa­ny, 1925)
• The Ex­cell Hymn­al, with Hamp Sew­ell & W. E. M. Hack­le­man (Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois: E. O. Ex­cell Com­pa­ny, 1925)

• Erickson, p. 288
• Hustad, p. 238
• Hall, pp. 299-302

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

1. Count Your Bless­ings
2. God’s Ho­ly Book
3. Golden Shore, The
4. His Glo­ry Fills My Soul
5. His Love Can Ne­ver Fail
6. Hope Set Be­fore You, The
7. I Come to Thee
8. I Do, Don’t You?
9. I Saw One Hang­ing on a Tree
10. I Will Fol­low Thee
11. Iconium
12. I’ll Be a Sun­beam
13. In the Sha­dow of His Wings
14. Jesus Bids Us Shine
15. Let Him In
16. Offering, The
17. Scatter Sun­shine
18. Some One Who Knows
19. Spend One Hour with Je­sus
20. That Old, Old Sto­ry Is True
21. What Would Je­sus Do?
22. Will Your Heart Ring True?
23. Your Best Friend Is Al­ways Near