The Genevan Psalter

CanRef Church adopts ESV

2012-02-01T09:45:00.012-05:00

In my two-part review of the Canadian Reformed Churches' new provisional psalter last year, I made this prediction:

The Bible translation used is the 1984 edition of the New International Version, which is a change from the Revised Standard Version used in the 1984 BOP. However, the NIV 1984 has now been updated and a new edition has just been published, the NIV 2011 (Click here to read my preliminary assessment of this new edition). Whether the CanRef Churches will adopt the update or switch to another translation remains to be seen. In any event, their Authorized Provisional Version was outdated at virtually the moment it was published. My guess is that the authorized final version will use yet another translation – possibly the English Standard Version, which is favoured in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod and the Presbyterian Church in America.

Local pastor Wes Bredenhof has confirmed that his congregation, Providence Canadian Reformed Church, will indeed be adopting the ESV: Switching from NIV to ESV. Bredenhof:

At our last Council meeting we discussed this report and came to a decision. Since the old NIV is no longer available and the new NIV is not acceptable, we are compelled to adopt a different translation. Of the options available (NASB, NKJV, ESV), the ESV is the most attractive. We have therefore decided to adopt the ESV effective September 1, 2012.

Whether the rest of the denomination will follow suit remains to be seen.

Stolz: Psalm 14

2012-01-31T15:12:00.001-05:00

Tim "9house": Psalm 103

2012-01-28T17:10:00.002-05:00

More from Tim Nijenhuis, this time Psalm 103:

CMK: Psalm 119

2012-01-28T10:30:00.004-05:00

A men's choir sings Psalm 119 at a church in Doesburg, Netherlands, accompanied by flute, oboe, violins and piano. The words are from the 1773 Dutch versification.

Tim Nijenhuis: Psalm 119

2012-01-27T10:47:00.003-05:00

I met the composer of this very fine fugue based on Psalm 119 at The Psalm Project's concert the other evening:

The Psalm Project: Teach Us to Pray Tour

2012-01-24T11:30:00.004-05:00

The Psalm Project's tour of North America continues. They performed last evening at Redeemer University College, and there is still time to see them in London, Grand Rapids and Chicago. They are definitely worth hearing.

Here is the rest of their itinerary for those wanting to see them before they return to the Netherlands:

January 25
Calvin College
Grand Rapids MI

January 26, 27
Worship Symposium,
Grand Rapids MI

January 28
Eagle Rock
Community Church
Homer Glen IL

January 29
Bethel CRC
Lansing IL

Stolz: Psalm 13

2012-01-16T09:18:00.002-05:00

Stolz: Psalms 10-12

2012-01-09T10:20:00.005-05:00

Psalm 23: alternative versification

2011-12-16T09:51:00.007-05:00

My versification of Psalm 23 is one of the first ones I wrote back in the mid-1980s. I have now posted another alternative versification that is closer to the original text, is unrhymed and consists of only two stanzas:

The LORD's my shepherd, I shall want for nothing.
He makes me lie in pastures lush and verdant.
He leads me to refreshing waters flowing,
restores my strength, leads me to righteous pathways
for his name's sake. Though I may walk in darkness,
I will not fear; for you are always with me.

Your rod and staff provide me constant comfort.
Before my foes, a feast you are preparing.
My head with finest oil you have anointed;
with you my cup is full to overflowing.
Goodness and mercy all my days pursue me,
and in the LORD's house I will dwell for ever.

Psalm 95 (St. George)

2011-12-15T10:06:00.002-05:00

I have posted a second video at the ByzantineCalvinist youtube channel:

Stolz: Psalm 9

2011-12-13T19:12:00.005-05:00

The count continues as Ernst Stolz has now posted Psalm 9:

Gaelic psalm-singing

2011-12-11T13:18:00.006-05:00

The BBC reports on Gaelic psalm-singing in the Isle of Lewis. Oddly, the reporter misfires at the outset with an obviously inappropriate reference to nature worship, but the remainder of the report is worth hearing.

Youtube channel posted

2011-12-09T15:35:00.005-05:00

I've finally established my own youtube channel, ByzantineCalvinist. Here is the first video I've posted, which contains my arrangement of Psalm 13 played on the guitar:

Ernst Stolz's psalms

2011-12-08T19:33:00.013-05:00

The psalm posted yesterday was performed by early music artist Ernst Stolz, whose youtube channel is worth exploring. Here is his performance of Psalm 7, which was posted just two days ago.

Stolz appears to be systematically going through the Genevan Psalter from the beginning (to the end?) and posting his performances here. Let us hope that he will soon release a recording of these.

Psalm 1

2011-12-07T09:53:00.002-05:00

And here is a recently posted performance of the first Psalm:

Ali Ufki's Psalm 8

2011-12-07T09:45:00.001-05:00

More from Ali Ufki, Sarband and Chorakademie Dortmund, complete with whirling dervishes:

Jimmy Webb's Psalm One-Five-O

2011-12-03T21:08:00.006-05:00

Some of us will remember the remarkable song-writer of the late 1960s and early '70s, Jimmy Webb, whose Wichita Lineman and Up Up and Away were runaway hits. I had not known until recently that he is a man of deep christian faith who once composed a jazz setting of Psalm 150. Although parts of it are somewhat dated nearly forty years later ("yeah, yeah, yeah"), it is nevertheless worth hearing.

Psalm 42: Mint a szép hűvös patakra

2011-12-03T19:45:00.004-05:00

Katalin Szvorák and Péter Pejtsik give Psalm 42 something of a Celtic flavour, with a slightly modified melody line in the mixolydian mode, proving once again that the Hungarians do marvellous things with the Genevan Psalms.

The decline of psalm-singing: the rosary

2011-11-29T09:48:00.016-05:00

We are given to understand that many religions have something akin to prayer beads to assist the devout in saying their prayers. The rosary is one such aid used especially by Roman Catholics. However, it seems that the prayers accompanying the rosary long ago supplanted the Psalms for the use of illiterate people who had no access to the latter. Here is the story, according to this website:

The Rosary is actually believed to have developed as a result of the monasteries, because in the monasteries the monks would pray the Psalms, 150 altogether. However, many monks as well as townspeople were unable to read, but wanted to be in solidarity in prayer with the monks, and so developed a means of praying 150 “Our Fathers” which later, given the rise in devotion to Mary, added the “Hail Mary” as well. This is why sometimes the Rosary is called “Mary’s Psalter.” However, what would happen is given the amount [sic] of prayers, it would be hard to keep track, so they developed a sort of abacus in order to keep count, originally it was stones but later developed into beads on a string.

This is confirmed elsewhere. Finally, here is the account given in the Catholic Encyclopedia (with sources deleted for ease of reading):

But there were other prayers to be counted more nearly connected with the Rosary than Kyrie eleisons. At an early date among the monastic orders the practice had established itself not only of offering Masses, but of saying vocal prayers as a suffrage for their deceased brethren. For this purpose the private recitation of the 150 psalms, or of 50 psalms, the third part, was constantly enjoined. Already in A.D. 800 we learn from the compact between St. Gall and Reichenau that for each deceased brother all the priests should say one Mass and also fifty psalms. A charter in Kemble prescribes that each monk is to sing two fifties (twa fiftig) for the souls of certain benefactors, while each priest is to sing two Masses and each deacon to read two Passions. But as time went on, and the conversi, or lay brothers, most of them quite illiterate, became distinct from the choir monks, it was felt that they also should be required to substitute some simple form of prayer in place of the psalms to which their more educated brethren were bound by rule. Thus we read in the "Ancient Customs of Cluny", collected by Udalrio in 1096, that when the death of any brother at a distance was announced, every priest was to offer Mass, and every non-priest was either to say fifty psalms or to repeat fifty times the Paternoster. Similarly among the Knights Templar, whose rule dates from about 1128, the knights who could not attend choir were required to say the Lord's Prayer 57 times in all and on the death of any of the brethren they had to say the Pater Noster a hundred times a day for a week.

I am unaware of any Reformed Christians using a rosary, and certainly no Reformed church endorses the practice. However, I have come across two efforts to reconnect the rosary with its origins in the Psalms and other scriptures: Pray the Rosary with the Psalms and The Daily Prayer Rosary.

Getting used to new texts

2011-11-28T11:17:00.022-05:00

I will not cross-post it here, because it is not entirely on-topic, but I will link to this short piece for those with a more general interest in liturgical matters: 'And with your spirit'. However, for our purposes here it is relevant to recall that Roman Catholic parishes are becoming accustomed, not only to new liturgical texts for the mass, but also to a revised Grail Psalter, which the Vatican recently mandated for English-speaking churches already used to the 1963 edition. As with the ordinary of the mass, many composers have written settings for the '63 Grail Psalms. Producing a new sung Grail Psalter will likely take some time. Why the changes? Here is a good explanation that applies in some respects to both the mass and the psalter:

When the Grail Psalms were first translated in the 1950s and early 1960s, the desire to retain strict rhythmic patterns similar to those found in their original Hebrew setting was a primary principle for the translators. In attempting to adhere to these rhythmic patterns, they would often abbreviate or paraphrase a text in preference to a more literal translation. By doing so, some instances of the rich biblical imagery of the Psalter were lost. Furthermore, in later decades, significant progress was made in the understanding of Hebrew rhetoric and how to incorporate the Hebraic style in English translation. Finally, there also arose a desire to return to a more elevated sacred language, in contrast to the informal and colloquial approach of the 1950s and 1960s.

Although my primary interest on this site is metrical psalmody, it must be admitted that the problems with the 1963 Grail Psalter apply in large measure to metrical psalms as well. This is not an argument against their use, but I do wonder whether Reformed churches ought not to consider ways of singing the psalms that do not necessitate altering, and in some cases abbreviating, the texts.

Praising God in the langue d'oc

2011-11-24T13:30:00.008-05:00

During the 16th century one of the areas of strength for the Reformation was the south of France. Here a distinctive romance language was (and is) spoken, known variously as the langue d'oc and Occitan. Here is Psalm 150 sung in the Occitan language. The Genevan melody is slightly altered in the 3rd, 4th, 5th and 8th lines. The portraits at .30 and 2.30 are of Marguerite d'Angoulême and her grandson, King Henri IV, respectively, both of whom played key roles in the religious struggles in France.

The psalms for guitar

2011-11-24T10:53:00.009-05:00

The guitar is one of my favourite instruments, and Marcelo de la Puebla is a great guitarist, as evidenced in the following performances of Psalms 92, 68, 128, 77, 47, 137 and 150. The arrangements are by Adrien le Roy.

Book of Praise, part 2: more on the Canadian Reformed psalter

2011-11-21T10:00:00.001-05:00

Unlike, say, the Free Reformed Churches and the Reformed Presbyterian Church in North America, the Canadian Reformed (CanRef) do not sing only the Psalms, though these have clear priority. There is a smaller section of their new Book of Praise (BOP) devoted to eighty-five hymns, but even these lean heavily towards biblical canticles found elsewhere in scripture, such as the Decalogue (hymn 11), the Song of Moses from Deuteronomy (hymn 12) and the Song of Mary, also known as the Magnificat (hymn 17). There are two versions of the Apostles' Creed, one metrical (hymn 2) and the other nonmetrical (hymn 1). The tunes tend to come from the Genevan and German chorale traditions, though not exclusively so.

Then come the three ecumenical creeds, the Three Forms of Unity (i.e., the Belgic Confession, the Heidelberg Catechism and the Canons of the Synod of Dort), the liturgical forms (or rites) for various occasions, prayers, the church order and forms of subscription. This volume is, in short, a book for ordering the entire worship life of an ecclesial body rooted in a particular Reformed confessional tradition. This makes it indispensable for its members for whom it was produced, but it also limits its usefulness beyond its boundaries, which is regrettable given that much therein deserves to be more widely known and appreciated. More on this in a moment.

The Bible translation used is the 1984 edition of the New International Version, which is a change from the Revised Standard Version used in the 1984 BOP. However, the NIV 1984 has now been updated and a new edition has just been published, the NIV 2011 (Click here to read my preliminary assessment of this new edition). Whether the CanRef Churches will adopt the update or switch to another translation remains to be seen. In any event, their Authorized Provisional Version was outdated at virtually the moment it was published. My guess is that the authorized final version will use yet another translation – possibly the English Standard Version, which is favoured in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod and the Presbyterian Church in America.

Now to the Psalms themselves. As I indicated in my first post, the texts generally flow smoothly – more smoothly than those in the previous edition. However, the major difficulty with these versifications, as I see it, is that they stick rather too closely to the rhyming schemes of the original French texts, which, oddly enough, do not always fit well with the tunes. This often leaves the stressed long notes coinciding with unstressed syllables or even short words like the and to. This is not peculiar to the BOP, but is characteristic of every translation of the Psalms of which I am aware, including Lobwasser's German, Strejc's Czech, Molnár's Hungarian and the 1773 Dutch psalters. Moreover, masculine (stressed) and feminine (unstressed) endings in the text do not always match the masculine and feminine endings in each line of the music. Together these make for somewhat awkward singing and may in part explain why the Genevan melodies did not catch on in English-language psalters.

One example should suffice. Consider Psalm 13, first in French:

Jusques à quand as estably
Seigneur, de me mettre en oubly?
Est ce à jamais? pour combien d'aage
Destourneras tu ton visage
De moy, las, d'angoisse remply?

Try singing it to this tune. The word oubly (note the archaic spelling) should be accented on the second syllable, but the music makes for a stress on the first. The same can be said of remply. (Note that the second syllable of visage contains a melisma, or two notes on a single syllable, a relative rarity in the Genevan Psalter. In their efforts to make the Psalms singable by ordinary congregations, the composers of the psalter's tunes deliberately tried to avoid melismata where they could.) Here now is the BOP's most recent English version:

How long will you forget me, LORD?
How long must sorrow be endured?
You hide your face while here I languish.
Foes with their taunts increase my anguish.
Will I forever be ignored?

If you try singing it to the tune above, you will notice that the music for sorrow places the stress on the second syllable, while that for endured emphasizes the first – precisely the opposite of what they should be. Similarly, the music associated with ignored stresses the first rather than the second syllable. (The melisma comes on the first syllable of anguish.) Such incongruities are found throughout the psalms. Again this is not peculiar to the BOP; it is found in all the translations of which I am personally aware. Here the CanRef Churches might have hewed less closely to some of the specifics of their own tradition for the sake of singability and, I would argue, for the long-term durability of their larger tradition of sung psalmody.

I offer here my own translation of the same Psalm:

How long, O LORD, must I endure?
Will you forget me for ever?
Shall I look on your visage never?
How long shall my soul constant pain endure,
and my poor heart be in sorrow?

Note that I have altered the traditional rhyme scheme from AABBA to ABBAC, the latter of which better fits the stresses in the tune. I have also eliminated the unnecessary melisma in the fourth line. The final line does not rhyme with any of the others, but this, in my view, has no bearing on its singability and in fact may enhance it.

Will the CanRef Churches continue to sing the Genevan Psalms in future decades? I hope and pray that they will, however the historic tendency for hymns to replace psalms in the liturgy is well attested. My understanding is that the Dutch counterparts to the CanRef Churches have begun to use supplementary books with praise choruses in worship. One hopes this does not indicate a decline in psalm-singing. My prayer is that this new Book of Praise will help to maintain and invigorate the Genevan tradition for future generations in the one English-speaking denomination whose worship it has shaped. In the meantime I will continue my own efforts here in hope of disseminating the Genevan tradition more widely elsewhere.

Hollywood takes on the Genevan psalms

2011-11-21T09:58:00.007-05:00

In 1952 Miklós Rózsa, one of Hollywood's great film composers, borrowed the Genevan Psalter's tune for Psalms 36 and 68 in scoring Plymouth Adventure, the story of the Pilgrims' migration to North America in 1620.

Here is the text sung by the chorus:

Confess Jehovah thankfully,
For He is good, for His mercie
Continueth for ever.
To God of gods confess doo ye,
Because His bountiful-mercee
Continueth for ever.
Unto the Lord of lords confesse
Because His merciful kindnes
Continueth for ever.
To Him that dooth Himself onely,
Things wondrous great, for His Mercy
Continueth for ever.

The film's creators obviously did their homework, for this text comes from Henry Ainsworth's Psalter of 1612, which the Pilgrims brought with them from the Netherlands. This versification is of Psalm 136, which Ainsworth's Psalter assigns to this tune. I've not seen this film myself, but a friend told me that it aired last evening on television.

Singing the Psalms at AUB

2011-11-20T18:02:00.002-05:00

Singing Psalm 42 en français at the American University of Beirut:

Calvin in the Golden Age

2011-11-19T13:48:00.013-05:00

I have recently acquired another recording featuring the Genevan Psalms: Calvijn in the Gouden Eeuw: Calvinist Music from France and the Netherlands. A number of psalms are here beautifully performed by the Camerata Trajectina, an early music ensemble based in Utrecht, Netherlands. This recording was produced in 2009, the Calvin quincentenary year. Among the Psalms performed are 100, 2, 91, 8, 9, 5, and several more, according to arrangements by Goudimel, Sweelinck, Claude Le Jeune and others. These are sung in Dutch and French. Tellingly, the Dutch versions use the 16th-century versifications of Pieter Datheen rather than the "traditional" 1773 version used in most Dutch churches into the mid-20th century, undoubtedly because the latter are judged to be too "late" for an ensemble specializing in music before 1600. The recording ends with Psalm 103 played on the carillon. I would love to be in a town square while this was being played from a church's bell tower. This is definitely worth purchasing and listening to.

Lengyel's psalms, continued

2011-11-18T01:46:00.003-05:00

Psalm 23:

Psalm 42:

Psalm 90:

More psalms from Judit Lengyel

2011-11-16T10:34:00.007-05:00

I find myself quite taken with Lengyel's beautiful, unadorned renditions of the psalms. Here is Psalm 31:

And Psalm 130:

And finally Psalm 150, which we get to see her sing:

Our Father

2011-11-16T09:28:00.004-05:00

I have now posted a simple unrhymed versification of the Lord's Prayer set to the tune, VATER UNSER, with which it is historically associated. The tune is often ascribed to Martin Luther and originates in Valentin Schumann's Geistliche Lieder of 1539. Luther's German text (translated into English here) assigns one stanza to each petition, making for a total of nine stanzas, and follows the logic of Luther's explanation of the prayer in his catechism.

Psalms from Hungary

2011-11-13T21:48:00.007-05:00

I have abandoned the effort to include every rendition I can find of the Genevan Psalms on my video pages. As the content of youtube expands, so also do the numbers of videos devoted to the Genevan Psalms, and it is proving impossible to keep up. However, I will be calling attention on this blog to notable performances, of which I include three below. Judit Lengyel sings, while Tibor Tóth accompanies.

Psalm 38:

Psalm 51:

Psalm 54:

A review: the Canadian Reformed Book of Praise, 1

2011-11-12T10:27:00.047-05:00

Although I have had this collection in my possession for some months, I am only now getting round to reviewing it. Now that I have completed a first draft of my manuscript on authority, office and the image of God, I will offer my own thoughts on the new edition of the Book of Praise: Anglo-Genevan Psalter.

The Canadian Reformed Churches originate in a tragic 1944 schism within the Gereformeerde Kerken in Nederland, which post-war Dutch immigrants brought with them to Canada and the US. As far as I can determine, this small denomination is the only English-speaking church to sing the Genevan Psalter in its entirety. The Canadian Reformed could have followed the lead of the Christian Reformed and Free Reformed Churches and adopted the 1912 Psalter, with its regular metres and familiar hymn tunes, but they deliberately chose to stick with the Genevan tunes.

This led to the production of the Book of Praise, a title shared, incidentally, with the psalter and hymnal of the Presbyterian Church in Canada. Its subtitle, "Anglo-Genevan Psalter," will likely confuse the historian of metrical psalmody, who will expect in vain to find therein the collection produced by the Marian exiles from England in 1561. But a google search will quickly set her straight.

This new collection is described as the "Authorized Provisional Version," suggesting that it still requires final synodical approval following a period of trial use in the congregations. The copy I have has a black flexible binding that is somewhat sturdier than paper. Its size is 8½" x 5½" x 1 1/8", making it bigger than its 1984 predecessor, which measured only 6½" x 4½" x 7/8". This makes for a larger, easier-to-read font. Unusual for liturgical books in the English-speaking world, it contains only the melodies, with a treble clef on the first staff only, replicating the visual layout of the old Dutch psalters and borrowed from the Dutch Liedboek voor de Kerken.

A major difference between the two editions is that the 2010 BOP abandons the liturgical use of the old second-person-singular pronouns (thou, thee, thine, &c.) in reference to God, nearly two generations after most other English-speaking Christians had done so. That the 1984 held onto this usage undoubtedly reflects the influence of the Revised Standard Version, which remained the denomination's preferred Bible translation until it was replaced two decades ago by the New Revised Standard Version. (The RSV's mixed use of contemporary and 17th-century pronouns was never consistent and made for some bizarre readings. But that's another subject.)

In virtually every way the 2010 BOP is superior to the 1984 edition. Compare the following first stanzas of Psalm 25. First the 1984:

Unto Thee, O LORD, my Saviour,
I lift up my waiting soul.
O my God, in Thee I trusted;
Let no shame now o'er me roll.
On my enemies be shame,
Oft without a cause transgressing;
But all those who trust Thy Name
Honour with abundant blessing.

Now the 2010:

LORD, for you my soul is longing;
O my God, in you I trust.
Do not let my foes disgrace me;
stop the taunts of the unjust.
All whose hope is in your name
you will honour with your blessing;
traitors will be put to shame --
those without excuse transgressing.

The first version was written by Samuel G. Brondsema in 1931, while the revised version is by William Helder. The latter is more straightforward, flows more easily from the lips, and reads better as well, insofar as it removes the unnecessary upper-case letters that visually break up a sentence (although the meaning of the final line is somewhat ambiguous). More of the psalm is expressed in the first stanza of the 2010 version than in the 1984, though the total number of stanzas in each is the same at 10.

In some cases Helder has improved on his own previous versifications, as seen in the somewhat stilted opening of Psalm 1 from 1984:

How blessed is the man whose walk is not
In evil counsel which the wicked plot . . .

Compare this to the 2010 version, which reads much more smoothly and naturally:

How blest is he who shuns the path of sin,
who spurns the counsel of unrighteous men . . .

Another addition to the 2010 BOP is the incorporation of the superscripts above each Psalm, e.g., "Of David. A maskil" for Psalm 32. Most liturgical psalters omit the superscripts, apparently assuming that they are unnecessary for worshippers, who would not be reciting or singing them in any case. (At least one Bible translation, the New English Bible, left them out altogether, although its successor, the Revised English Bible, put them back in.) The editors of the BOP perhaps judged that, if the superscriptions are part of the inspired text, they should be included in even a metrical psalter. But in the absence of explicit mention in the introduction, one is left to speculate on this.

More to come on the BOP. Stay tuned.

Champeaux recordings of the Psalms

2011-11-12T10:10:00.003-05:00

I would love to obtain these recordings, but I don't know whether they are available in North America.

Psalm 24

2011-11-11T20:34:00.005-05:00

I trust I am not the only person to find this sturdy rendition of Psalm 24 especially inspiring. Confessing that the earth is the LORD's and the fulness thereof seems like a good way to close out a week.

♪ La Terre au Seigneur appartient ♪ MT
from joe-topc on Vimeo.

Introduction revised

2011-11-01T13:31:00.010-04:00

I have just posted a revised and expanded introductory essay which replaces the one I wrote ten years ago for this site. The current version is an adaptation of the paper I delivered at Princeton in April and reflects more recent research. Although I do not have a formal research assistant for this ongoing project, my friend Lucas Freire has helped me immeasurably by uncovering a number of metrical psalters of which I was previously unaware. For both of us metrical psalmody is something more than an avocation. Obrigado, Lucas! Deus te abençoe.

The Psalm Project: Teach us to Pray Tour, 2012

2011-10-31T13:19:00.004-04:00

The latest from The Psalm Project, which will be performing at Redeemer University College during their North American tour in January:

Brother Down sings the psalms

2011-08-22T21:32:00.010-04:00

An acquaintance has linked me to two excellent psalm renditions performed by an American band called Brother Down: Psalm 13 and Psalm 75. Yes, these are the Genevan tunes! Here is more from Douglas Wilson: Psalm Off Results. "Canon Press is now negotiating with the band Brother Down in Santa Cruz in hopes of releasing an album of Reformation-era psalms, all done in their distinctive style." It seems we have something to look forward to.

Update: Psalm 122, the halfway point

2011-08-08T12:08:00.020-04:00

I have now posted my versification of Psalm 122 and arrangement of its melody. The opening verse is familiar: "I was glad when they said to me, let us go to the house of the LORD." Psalms 120 through 134 are known as the Songs of Ascent, which may have been sung by pilgrims on their way to the Jerusalem temple. Because God had chosen the temple as the most important place to meet his people, the pilgrims are understandably concerned for its continued welfare, as well as for the flourishing of the city as a whole. After all, their own relationship with God depends on it.

Psalm 122 is often used in christian liturgies to open a worship service. The Genevan tune is in the ionian mode, which is identical to our major scale. The metrical pattern is the highly unusual 8888 88 9898. I have largely maintained the traditional rhyming scheme of abba cc deed, with variation in line 7 to fit better the melody line.

With this I have now posted 75 psalms on this website, which is half the total number of the Psalms. It has taken me approximately 25 years to make it this far.

Update to update: I've redone the first stanza to this psalm. This project is, of course, very much a work in progress.

Update: Psalm 127

2011-08-02T12:39:00.029-04:00

I have now posted my versification for Psalm 127, along with my harmonization of the Genevan tune. The metrical text follows:

Unless the living LORD shall build,
the builders' aims go unfulfilled.
Unless the LORD himself defend,
on sentries we cannot depend.
In vain you early wake to rise;
in vain you close your weary eyes.

Though you may toil to earn your bread,
you'll soundly sleep upon your bed.
Sons are a blessing from the LORD,
the fruitful womb a great reward.
Like arrows in a warrior's hand
are strapping youths who by you stand.

Happy and blessèd are the ones
who find their quiver full of sons:
they will not suffer injury
when challenged by an enemy. [sung to last four lines of music]

Psalm 127 is a much loved psalm, whose opening verse is memorable in the King James Version familiar still to my generation: "Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the LORD keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain." This psalm strikes out at the false pride of the "self-made man," who imagines himself to be utterly independent of others, including the Almighty. It is a reminder that those who undertake great endeavours do so only by the grace of God, to whom they owe their very existence.

This psalm anticipates at least one of the themes taken up in the next psalm, numbered 128: the fruitful womb is a blessing from the LORD. It is easy to get sentimental about children, but this psalm makes a very practical point about their value. The NIV 2011 renders verse 3 in gender-inclusive fashion: "Children are a heritage from the LORD, offspring a reward from him." True enough, but it misses the point of the psalm, which I have attempted to communicate with my own metrical versification. The New Oxford Annotated Bible footnote has it right: "The gift of many stalwart sons makes a father feel secure." Even the NRSV gets it right this time. Ain't nobody gonna mess with a man and his sons.

The tune has a metrical structure of 88 88 88 — surprisingly regular for one of the Genevan melodies. It is in the hypo-mixolydian mode and has a rhyming scheme of aabbcc, a departure from the traditional rhyming scheme of abbacc. The occasion for my writing this was a short holiday last weekend at the shores of Lake Huron.

Lobwasser's psalms for lute

2011-07-06T17:30:00.002-04:00

My video pages are in desperate need of updating, but until I have the opportunity to do this, here is a version of Psalm 5 beautifully performed by Christoph Dalitz. The words are the versification of Ambrosius Lobwasser.

Chanting the psalms, daily prayer

2011-06-26T23:18:00.004-04:00

An acquaintance recently called to my attention two paragraphs from the Second Helvetic Confession, one of the confessional standards of the Swiss and Hungarian Reformed Churches, as well as of the Presbyterian Church (USA):

CHAPTER XXIII
Of the Prayers of the Church, of Singing, and of Canonical Hours

SINGING. Likewise moderation is to be exercised where singing is used in a meeting for worship. That song which they call the Gregorian Chant has many foolish things in it; hence it is rightly rejected by many of our churches. If there are churches which have a true and proper sermon but no singing, they ought not to be condemned. For all churches do not have the advantage of singing. And it is well known from testimonies of antiquity that the custom of singing is very old in the Eastern Churches whereas it was late when it was at length accepted in the West.

CANONICAL HOURS. Antiquity knew nothing of canonical hours, that is, prayers arranged for certain hours of the day, and sung or recited by the Papists, as can be proved from their breviaries and by many arguments. But they also have not a few absurdities, of which I say nothing else; accordingly they are rightly omitted by churches which substitute in their place things that are beneficial for the whole Church of God.

There are a number of things erroneously rejected by many of the Reformers, whose knowledge of antiquity was not always accurate, including the sursum corda in the Lord's Supper and the sign of the cross. In this case the authors of the Confession appear to have been unaware that chanting the Psalms in the course of daily prayer has ancient roots in the church, extending back into biblical times. See, for example, Psalm 119:164: "Seven times a day I praise you for your righteous ordinances." Also Daniel 6:10: "[Daniel] got down upon his knees three times a day and prayed and gave thanks before his God. . . ." And Acts 10:9: "Peter went up on the housetop to pray, about the sixth hour." Following scripture, the Rule of St. Benedict prescribed (or, perhaps better, codified) seven daily prayer offices for use in the monasteries:

As the Prophet saith: "Seven times a day I have given praise to Thee" (Ps 118[119]:164), this sacred sevenfold number will be fulfilled by us in this wise if we perform the duties of our service at the time of Lauds, Prime, Tierce, Sext, None, Vespers, and Complin; because it was of these day hours that he hath said: "Seven times a day I have given praise to Thee" (Ps 118[119]:164). For the same Prophet saith of the night watches: "At midnight I arose to confess to Thee" (Ps 118[119]:62). At these times, therefore, let us offer praise to our Creator "for the judgments of His justice;" namely, at Lauds, Prime, Tierce, Sext, None, Vespers, and Complin; and let us rise at night to praise Him (cf Ps 118[119]:164, 62).

Although St. Benedict intended these daily prayer offices for monastic communities, it seems evident that they were much more widespread in the early church. The Muslim practice of praying five times daily, which many westerners regard as strange, obviously has roots in earlier Jewish and Christian usage.

The Reformers recovered so many ancient things lost to the mediaeval church, especially the doctrines of grace. Yet, given what we know now of the ancient church and its liturgical practices, it is difficult not to conclude that in some instances they were too quick to discard usages that ought to have been retained.

Update: Psalm 38

2011-06-20T09:59:00.011-04:00

I have just posted my versification for Psalm 38, along with my arrangement of the tune. This psalm is scarcely less dark than Psalm 88, which I set to verse the weekend after the Japanese earthquake and tsunami in March. It is definitely a psalm of lament, the kind we tend not to sing in our churches these days.

My iniquities flood o'er me,
and before me
all my sins are a burden.
My wounds fester without healing,
I am reeling
from my mad and foolish ways.

I am bowed low in my grieving,
scarce believing
that I'll cease from my mourning.
For my loins are racked with burning
from your spurning;
there's no soundness in my flesh.

The author of the psalm appears to be conflicted, sounding different, and not entirely consistent, themes throughout. On the one hand, he recognizes and confesses his own sin and its role in his current state of suffering. Yet he also believes he has been unjustly abandoned by his friends, who fear to suffer his fate along with him:

Foes oppose me without reason
in their treason,
they are many and mighty.
Those who answer good with evil
cause upheaval;
enemies are they of right.

This psalm, which is ascribed to David in the Hebrew, could relate to episodes in the great Hebrew ruler's life when he was fleeing from enemies plotting his demise, including his wayward sons whom he proved unable to control. A not altogether able administrator, David was undoubtedly painfully aware of his own shortcomings in the unfolding of these episodes, while nevertheless protesting against his betrayers.

On the other hand, a christological interpretation might see this psalm expressing the words of Christ, who, while not sinful himself, bore the sins of the world in his own suffering on the cross.

A word about the tune, which has a metrical structure unusual even for the Genevan psalms: 847 847. The rhyming scheme is aab ccd, with the short four-syllable lines rhyming with the previous eight-syllable line. The traditional rhyming scheme has rhymed lines 3 and 6, despite their having feminine and masculine endings respectively. Consequently, I have abandoned any effort to rhyme these lines in my own versification, which I believe makes the psalm more singable.

This psalm of lament ends, if not on an upbeat note, at least on a note of expectation of future redemption:

LORD above, do not forsake me,
rather make me
to be near you for ever.
Hurry to become my saviour;
show your favour
to me, my redeeming LORD.

Earliest English edition of Genevan Psalms?

2011-06-06T18:47:00.019-04:00

My Brazilian alter-ego, Lucas Freire, has alerted me to the following volume available via Google Books: All the French Psalm Tunes with English Words, a collection of Psalms accorded to the verses and tunes used in the reformed Churches of France and Germany (London: T. Harper, 1632). This is the first I have heard of this version, which places an English translation of the Genevan Psalms earlier than I had previously assumed.

As was typical of the early metrical psalters, the language, while rhymed, is not particular poetic and is rather woodenly literal. Psalm 150 runs as follows:

Let vs all Gods praise expres,
Praise him in his holines.
Praise him in the firmament
Of his povver [power] permanent,
And his high magnificency.
Praise him in his greatnes shevved [showed?],
In his goodnes multitude,
VVitnessing his excellency.

Praise him, ioyning vvith the noyse
Both of Trumpets and Hautboyse[1],
Praise him in the Psaltery,
And the Harps svveet harmony.
Laud the Lord with praise abounding,
Timbrel, Taber[2], Fife and Flute,
Organ, Sagbut[3], Cornamute[4],
Laud the Lord, his praise resounding.

Praise to him for his goodnes,
Let the cymbals loud expres
Viall[5], Virginall[6] and lute,
Let not string nor breath be mute,
Him to praise let all indeuer [endeavour].
All his works, aboue, beneath,
VVhat so ere doth moue or breath,
Praise the Lord most blessed euer.

Note: Here is a key to some of the less familiar musical instruments referenced above:

1. Hautboyse = hautbois, or oboe
2. Taber = tabor
3. Sagbut = sackbut
4. Cornamute = cornamuse
5. Viall = viol
6. Virginall = virginal

Singing the Psalms at Redeemer and Princeton

2011-04-21T15:13:00.010-04:00

This is to let everyone know that my two presentations on the Psalms took place earlier this month. The first took place at Redeemer University College on tuesday, 5 April, as I announced late last year. Around 20-25 people attended, some of whom I know, including a former student of mine. I brought along a classical guitar and played my own arrangements of some of the Genevan tunes before the formal part of the talk began. The presentation and discussion lasted around two hours in total with a break in the middle.

Then a week ago I was at Princeton Theological Seminary for the annual Kuyper Center conference titled, "Calvinism and Culture." The keynote speaker and recipient of the Kuyper Prize was Marilynne Robinson, author of Gilead, Home and The Death of Adam. There I presented sections of a paper titled, "Singing the Psalms in the 21st Century: An historical survey and update (or why Abraham Kuyper was wrong about the Genevan tunes)." I hope it will be published in some form in The Kuyper Center Review.

I will here indicate that I am available to present publicly my work on the Psalms elsewhere, for example in churches or educational institutions. If you are interested, please contact me at dkoyzis[at]redeemer[dot]ca.

Phos Hilaron

2011-03-29T09:19:00.006-04:00

I have recently posted my freshly composed versification of the ancient Greek hymn, the Phos Hilaron (Φῶς Ἱλαρόν), which is the most ancient Christian hymn outside the Bible itself, dating back at least to the 3rd century AD, if not earlier. It is an evening hymn most appropriately sung at the beginning of vespers in the Liturgy of the Hours. It is first recorded in the Apostolic Constitutions in the 4th century. St. Basil the Great spoke of it as an ancient hymn already in that same century. For the tune I have taken that for Genevan Psalm 77/86 and somewhat extended it to fit the length of the single stanza. The tune is in the hypodorian mode. I may still come up with my own tune at some point.

Praying the Psalms in community

2011-03-22T13:11:00.024-04:00

I recently found this wonderful quote from St. John Chrysostom through one of my current students:

If we keep vigil in church, David [the author of the psalms] comes first, last and central. If early in the morning we want songs and hymns, first, last and central is David again. If we are occupied with the funeral solemnities of those who have fallen asleep, or if virgins sit at home and spin, David is first, last and central. O amazing wonder! Many who have made little progress in literature know the Psalter by heart. Nor is it only in cities and churches that David is famous; in the village market, in the desert, and in uninhabitable land, he excites the praise of God. In monasteries, among those holy choirs of angelic armies, David is first, last and central. In the convents of virgins, where are the communities of those who imitate Mary; in the deserts where there are men crucified to the world, who live their life in heaven with God, David is first, last and central. All other men at night are overcome by sleep. David alone is active, and gathering the servants of God into seraphic bands, he turns earth into heaven, and converts men into angels.

Coincidentally, I have been reading The Rule of St. Benedict, which in some fashion governs the monastic communities in the Benedictine tradition. I am struck by how much my own practice of prayer for the last more than three decades has been shaped by Benedictine spirituality, and especially the place of the Psalms within it. The basic patterns of the Liturgy of the Hours were at least codified, if not created, by St. Benedict in the 6th century. Among other things, Benedict prescribed that all 150 Psalms were to be sung each week. After having set forth the pattern of sung psalms through the successive prayer hours during the night and day, he offers this:

We particularly admonish that if this distribution of the psalms is displeasing to anyone, he should make any other disposition he may think better. Let him take care, however, above all that each week the entire Psalter of one hundred fifty psalms be recited and be always begun anew at the Night Office on Sunday. For those monks show an exceedingly slothful service in their devotion who, within the course of a week, sing less than the entire Psalter with the usual canticles, since we read that our holy Fathers resolutely performed in a single day what we tepid monks but hope to achieve in an entire week.

For those of us who are even more tepid than St. Benedict and his followers, some are content to sing through the Psalms every 30 days, as prescribed in the Book of Common Prayer, or at an even slower pace. Inspired by these readings, this past weekend I versified and arranged another psalm, this time Psalm 133, which extols the joys of living in community:

Behold, how right and good it is whenever
brethren have dwelt harmoniously together!
It is like precious oils that flow
upon the consecrated priestly head;
down to the beard their goodness too is shed;
even to Aaron's beard they go.

Anointing oils flow down along the trimming
of Aaron's garments where their drops are gleaming,
as if the dew that oft descends
on Hermon's mountains were to come and rest
on Zion's mount where God his people blessed
with blissful life that never ends.

Of course, most of us do not live in monasteries. But what if the ordinary communities of which we are part, namely, families, schools, work communities, &c., were to adopt something of this benedictine spirituality, praying through the psalms together on a regular basis? By God's grace, it could just transform these very communities.

The Politics of the Psalms

2011-03-18T14:47:00.001-04:00

Perhaps it has something to do with my first name, but I have always been fascinated by the biblical book of the Psalms. I grew up singing from a hymn book in which the Psalms set to meter were given a prominent place. The liturgical practice of singing the Psalms has ancient roots going back to temple and synagogue worship, finding its way also into Christian churches. It is thus not surprising that, until the end of the 18^th century, the majority of Protestants sang from metrical psalters containing all 150 Psalms. Most Protestants since then have abandoned this practice, but many in the Reformed tradition have held to it, glorifying God, as it is often said, in his own words.

Read more here.

Updates: Psalms 128 and 88

2011-03-13T20:51:00.021-04:00

I have just completed versifications and arrangements for two more psalms: 128 and 88. The tune for Psalm 128 I first heard more than 30 years ago when I was a graduate student at Toronto's Institute for Christian Studies. Senior Member Calvin Seerveld had brought along to class his own versification of this psalm and had us, his students, sing it through. I was intrigued and began to follow in his footsteps, setting to verse Psalm 133 albeit to my own rather weak common metre melody. I finally returned to this psalm late last week.

The psalm itself is one of the more cheerful and optimistic ones, promising peace and prosperity to those who fear the LORD. I completed it last friday, the very day that northeastern Japan was struck by a devastating earthquake and tsunami. Because its promises sounded a little too glib against the backdrop of tragedy, I held off posting it until I had also versified and arranged Psalm 88, easily the darkest of the psalms. This I completed today. Verses 16-17 are reminiscent of a tsunami:

Your wrath has swept over me;
your terrors have destroyed me.
All day long they surround me like a flood;
they have completely engulfed me.

In my own regimen of praying through the psalms, I currently encounter Psalm 88 on the 17th day of each month at morning prayer. It always takes my breath away because it is so bereft of anything resembling hope. It is appropriately said or sung on Holy Saturday, that is, the day between Good Friday and the Paschal feast. As St. Paul puts it in 1 Corinthians 15:17-19:

And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.

Yet Christ has indeed risen, which is our ultimate source of hope as we travel through the penitential Lenten season. Psalm 88 does not have the last word, although it is the last psalm for morning prayer that day. However, at evening prayer Psalm 89 is sung, which begins: "I will sing of the LORD’s great love forever; with my mouth I will make your faithfulness known through all generations." God's faithfulness has the final say as we look forward to the day of our salvation at Christ's return.

Psalm 128 is a rhymed psalm, while Psalm 88, with its feminine endings in four of the six lines, is unrhymed. Both melodies are in the dorian mode, which is probably the most versatile of the traditional church modes, easily capable of communicating both hope and despair. More of the Genevan Psalms are in the dorian mode (45 in total) than in any other single mode.

Updates: Psalms 111 and 112

2011-03-08T19:50:00.028-05:00

Last month I mentioned that I had posted Psalm 111, but I will say a bit more about this psalm now that I have posted 112 as well. Psalms 111 and 112 are in effect mirror psalms comparing God with the godly person. It may be justly said that the notion of man being created in God's image, often thought to be limited to Genesis 1:26-27 and 9:6 and implied in Psalm 8, is also found in these two psalms. Both are alphabetical acrostic psalms containing 22 lines each. Each line of 111 is reflected in some fashion in its counterpart in 112, conveying the sense that, e.g., if the justice or righteousness of God endures for ever, so does that of the just man (the ו VAV line is identical in both psalms). The alleluias at the beginning of each psalm precede the alphabetical lines.

Although the Genevan tunes for the two psalms have different metres (889 889 and 999 999), they nevertheless have the same number of lines per stanza. With four stanzas in my own versification, this adds up to 24 lines in total, two more than the number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet. Consequently, I have had little choice but to expand slightly the thoughts contained in the first stanzas of each psalm while following the number of lines from the original in the remaining stanzas. The texts are unrhymed.

Both tunes are in the dorian mode. That for 111 is shared with Psalms 24, 62 and 95, while the tune to Psalm 112 is unique to that psalm.

Updates: Psalms 70 and 80

2011-03-04T09:45:00.013-05:00

Psalms 70 and 80 have now been posted. Psalm 70 is an unrhymed metrical versification set to a tune in the phrygian mode. Since ancient times the first two lines of this psalm have been used to open the prayers in the liturgy of the hours, especially at vespers. Here the psalmist cries out to God for help in distress brought on by his enemies. The Hebrew superscript ascribes it to David, while the Septuagint indicates merely that it is for him or pertains to him.

Psalm 80 is striking in that it obviously originates in the northern kingdom of Israel after its division from Judah following the death of Solomon. It relies, somewhat curiously, on a mixed metaphor. As in the beloved Psalm 23, God is likened to a shepherd, yet his people are likened, not to sheep, but to a vine which he took from Egypt and planted so that its tendrils would spread from the river (the Jordan or perhaps even the Euphrates) to the sea. The reference in verse 17 to the "son of man" could perhaps be understood as an anticipation of the coming Messiah, the True Vine. This is a rhymed versification and the tune is in the dorian mode.

February updates

2011-02-16T14:09:00.014-05:00

I have just obtained a copy of the first English-language album by The Psalm Project, titled Psalms Unplugged, which was just released late last month. Here is the brief review I've posted on the discography page:

This is a noteworthy recording rendering the Genevan Psalms in contemporary jazz style, employing a full array of instruments. The group generally sings in Dutch, but this is their first English-language album. With their unique treatments, they make the Genevan tunes sound as if they were composed the day before yesterday, although they do alter the melodies and rhythms somewhat to fit their purposes. For example, the well-known tune to Psalm 138 they effectively move from ionian to mixolydian mode, giving it nearly a Celtic flavour. In the hands of The Psalm Project, Psalm 150 takes on the flavour of a lively African-American gospel song. The results will likely win over even the classical music aficionado. Unlike many contemporary treatments of scripture songs, they do not restrict their efforts to psalms of praise, but are willing to tackle such lamentations as found in Psalm 22. Perhaps unsurprisingly they have not thus far touched the imprecatory psalms. Check out The Psalm Project's Dutch and English websites.

CDs can be purchased in Europe: info@thepsalmproject.nl, in the United States: Calvin College Campus Store, and in Canada: psalms@newmaker.net.

Here is a sample from the album:

I have just posted an unrhymed versification of Psalm 111, which I wrote last week. I did not have to arrange the tune, which is the same as that for Psalms 24, 62 and 95, which are already posted. Psalm 70 is forthcoming. I've come up with a text but I have yet to complete a harmonization of the melody.

I have received a copy of the "Authorized Provisional Version" of the Book of Praise of the Canadian Reformed Churches. I have not yet made a detailed comparison to the 1984 edition, but from what I've seen thus far, it looks to be superior. I will be posting a fuller review at some point. A few things immediately struck me that I will mention here. First, the volume has finally dropped the old second-person-singular pronoun and verb forms in addressing God, a usage that this federation of churches retained long after other English-speaking Christians had abandoned it. Second, Psalm 150 now has a reference to dancing, which the earlier edition had seen fit not to include. I will have other observations to make in the near future.

Genfi Zsoltar: the Psalms in Hungarian

2011-01-15T13:23:00.028-05:00

I have posted a link on both my bibliography and links pages to a pdf file of the Psalms in Hungarian. These versifications were the work of Albert Szenci Molnár (1574-1639), or Szenci Molnár Albert. (In the Hungarian language the "Christian name" comes last with the family name coming beforehand. In Molnár's case Szenci refers to his birth village of Senec, near the city of Pozsony, now Bratislava, Slovakia. A not uncommon family name, Molnár means "miller" and obviously refers to a forebear's occupation.)

A Reformed pastor, Molnár travelled widely during his life, visiting and studying in a number of European centres of the Reformation. His metrical translation of the Psalms was inspired by the German-language Lobwasser Psalter and was published in Herborn in 1607. (The Reformed Christian legal theorist Johannes Althusius had published his Politics in Herborn a few years earlier but had moved to Emden before Molnár's arrival.) He died in Kolozsvár in Hungarian Transylvania, now Cluj-Napoca, Roumania.

The following video shows choral performances of Psalms 19 and 128, using Molnár's texts:

Revised Grail Psalter now online

2011-01-03T10:40:00.002-05:00

It can be found here.

Year-end updates

2010-12-31T07:45:00.079-05:00

For Christmas this year my beloved wife gave me an old copy of the Lobwasser Psalter, a sturdy little volume that has weathered the centuries remarkably well. The Lobwasser Psalter was a German-language translation of the Genevan Psalms set to verse in 1573 by Ambrosius Lobwasser (1515-1585), a Lutheran teaching law at Königsberg in East Prussia. His translation was based on the French text he had heard the Huguenots singing during his stay in France. Lobwasser intended his Psalter primarily for private rather than liturgical use. This edition was published in Zürich in 1770, by which time it evidently was being used in public worship after all.

I have now scanned and posted the Czech-language psalter I purchased in Prague at age 21, titled Malý Kancionál (Little Hymnal) and published in Kutná Hora in 1900, when Bohemia and Moravia were still part of the Habsburg empire. The Czech translation was made by Jiří Strejc (also known as Georg Vetter, 1536-1599), a minister of the Unity of the Brethren (Unitas Fratrum) from Zábřeh in Moravia. Strejc studied in Tübingen and Königsberg and came into contact with the Lobwasser Psalter, which impressed him so favourably that he decided to model his own Czech version on it, an undertaking he completed in 1587. Strejc is probably best known for his German-language hymn text, Mit Freuden Zart, familiar in English as Sing Praise to God, Who Reigns Above, the tune to which comes from the Bohemian Brethren's Kirchengesänge (1566) and bears more than a passing resemblance to that of Genevan Psalm 138.

My thus far preliminary research has raised some intriguing questions worth further exploration. First, might Strejc have met Lobwasser personally in Königsberg and thereby come under his more direct influence?

Second, given that the Kirchengesänge were produced by the same group of which Strejc was a minister, might this be evidence of a connection between the tunes for Psalm 138 and Mit Freuden Zart? To be sure, Strejc's versification of that Psalm came later, but might the Unity of the Brethren have become aware of the Genevan tunes earlier, and might it have been through Strejc? Tellingly, the Lutheran Book of Worship (1978) ascribes the tune directly to the "Trente quatre pseaumes de David, Geneva, 1551." These two possibilities are probably mutually exclusive.

Third, if Lobwasser based his translations on the French text of Marot and Bèze (for which he was criticized by his Lutheran colleagues), and if Strejc based his translations on Lobwasser's German text, how true are Strejc's texts to the Hebrew? Only someone conversant in all four languages would be able to answer this question.

By the way, the city of Königsberg has been called Kaliningrad since 1945 and has been part of the Russian Federation. At some point there was talk of changing the name (Kalinin was a Stalin-era Soviet functionary) to honour its most famous citizen, Immanuel Kant. I would like to suggest as an alternative that it be renamed for either Lobwasser or Strejc. Or even both: Lobwasserstrejcgrad!

Those interested in becoming better acquainted with congregational psalm-singing in the Netherlands would do well to check out Ijsselm's Channel on youtube (short for Ijsselmeer perhaps?). Here one finds a number of recently-posted Genevan Psalms sung in the traditional 19th-century Dutch fashion characterized by four distinctive features: (1) they are sung at a slow pace; (2) they are often sung in isometric rhythm (i.e., every note having equal value), as opposed to the more syncopated rhythms of the original tunes; (3) the organist plays the initial note for a few seconds before the congregation joins in, leaving the impression that the congregation is lagging behind; and (4) the arrangements used suppress the modal flavour of the original tunes. I will probably not be posting these on my video pages, but I will post one below as an example:

I might point out that, amongst the Dutch Canadians I know personally, many dislike intensely this style of singing and their churches have thus altogether abandoned the Genevan Psalms for more contemporary fare. I find this tragic, and my own efforts over the past quarter century are intended to recover the Genevan tradition and to make it more singable for younger generations of Christians in a variety of traditions.

Huckaby on the psalms

2010-12-28T23:10:00.004-05:00

Chuck Huckaby has expanded his earlier post on the Genevan Psalms for The Worldview Church: Reviving Personal Devotion through use of the Genevan Psalms. In the course of this article he is kind enough to mention my own work in this area.

The Psalm Project

2010-12-19T16:10:00.019-05:00

I have recently been made aware of The Psalm Project, a group of young Christian musicians in the Netherlands who are rendering the Genevan Psalms in contemporary form. Here is a medley of their efforts below, which are quite compelling:

Here are Psalms 86, 119 (partial, obviously) and 139:

Quite honestly, I do not recommend the microphoned performance style for liturgical use, as it calls too much attention to the singers, whose voices unduly dominate rather than support those of the congregation. Nevertheless, taken as performance music, these pieces are quite nice and worth listening to.

Update: How would The Psalm Project render the imprecatory psalms such as the closing verses of Psalm 137? Are their contemporary versions of the Psalms capable of accounting for the quite varying spiritual and emotional range of the collection? I will be interested to follow their efforts to see how, or whether, they will treat these.

Salmo 2

2010-12-14T20:55:00.004-05:00

The following Portuguese-language version of Psalm 2 is set to the Genevan tune and begins the same as this CBS rendition, but from there the two texts part ways.

Afrikaans Psalter link

2010-12-13T07:05:00.003-05:00

With the gracious permission of Josef du Toit, I have now posted the Afrikaans-Geneefse Psalmboek on our server with a link from the links page. Heart-felt thanks to Mr. du Toit.

The Psalms in Brazilian Portuguese

2010-12-10T12:53:00.017-05:00

A Brazilian acquaintance, Guilherme de Carvalho, has drawn my attention to a Portuguese-language article by Lucas G. Freire, titled A igreja deveria cantar mais os salmos, translated into English as The church should sing psalms more. Freire is a member of the Brazilian Committee on Psalmody (Comissão Brasileira de Salmodia, or CBS), which is undertaking to versify all 150 Psalms in the Portuguese language. The fruit of these efforts can be found at Saltério Reformado. Those versifications with Freire's name at the bottom are first drafts. Those attributed to CBS are final drafts. The intention is to have 150 Psalms set to the Genevan tunes and 150 Psalms set to more familiar hymn tunes. The collection should come out sometime next year. We wish Freire and the entire committee God's guidance and blessings as they undertake this important work for his glory.

Psalter resources

2010-12-07T21:41:00.006-05:00

Chuck Huckaby, pastor of St. Andrews Church, Lawrenceburg, Tennessee, recommends a number of resources related to the Genevan Psalter, including the forthcoming new Canadian Reformed psalter: Updated Anglo Genevan Psalter Unveiled. Although this collection is known as both the Book of Praise, a title used since at least 1897 for the Presbyterian Church in Canada's psalter and hymnal, and Anglo-Genevan Psalter, a title given to the collection published in 1556 in Geneva by English clergy exiled during the reign of Queen Mary, no one is likely to confuse the new psalter with either of these earlier works. A preview can be found here.

The Psalms in Afrikaans

2010-12-02T11:00:00.011-05:00

The Afrikaners of South Africa have their origins in a trading post established by the Dutch East India Company in 1652 at the Cape of Good Hope. The original Dutch settlers were joined by subsequent migrations from France and Germany, as seen in the surnames of many Afrikaners. For centuries the Reformed Christians who constituted the majority of Afrikaners read from the Dutch Statenvertaling Bible and sang the Genevan Psalms in Dutch. However, in the early 20th century the poet Jakob Daniël du Toit, better known by his latinized pen name Totius (photograph at right), versified the Psalms in Afrikaans, the Dutch-descended language used in everyday speech. His collection, commissioned and supervised by the Dutch Reformed Churches, was published in 1936, thereby providing this liturgical resource in Afrikaans for the first time.

I have just received a copy of the most recent Afrikaans-language metrical psalter from one Josef du Toit (no relation), who has himself done work on revising Totius' original versifications. I look forward to exploring it more thoroughly in the near future. In the meantime, here is a Reformed congregation in Franschhoek, Western Cape, South Africa, singing Psalm 81:

Not so exclusive psalmody

2010-11-24T10:29:00.016-05:00

Like the Reformed Presbyterian Church in North America, the Free Church of Scotland has historically allowed only unaccompanied singing of Psalms in the liturgy. However, its synodical assembly has now decided, by a narrow majority, to permit extrabiblical hymns and instruments in worship for those congregations desiring it. Given that the assembly was divided on the issue, many are unhappy with the decision — with one minister considering leaving the "Wee Free" for another Reformed denomination — thereby incurring the scorn of at least one member of the press. The Free Church's statement can be found here.

Incidentally, I have just been lent a copy of the RPCNA's new Book of Psalms for Worship, which replaces the Book of Psalms for Singing. I have not yet had a chance to look at it carefully, but at first glance I see that it is strictly limited to the 150 canonical Psalms, excluding other biblical material, such as the Decalogue, the Song of Hannah and the three Lukan canticles.

November update

2010-11-17T11:16:00.008-05:00

Andrew Donaldson mentioned my introductory essay in the web version of The Presbyterian Record: You’ve Got to Listen to This.

I have added the Chabanel Psalms to the links page. The Corpus Christi Watershed, which is behind this project, has its own youtube site that is worth exploring.

Also on the links page is a link to the 1912 Psalter as used by the Free Reformed Churches of North America. The 1912 Psalter was the basis for the Christian Reformed Church's Psalter Hymnal, as well as the Orthodox Presbyterian Church's Trinity Hymnal, whose 1961 edition I grew up with. The Free Reformed Churches may be the only denomination still singing from the complete 1912 Psalter.

Singing the Psalms: Chabanel Psalter

2010-11-15T11:47:00.041-05:00

First there was Wikipedia, the global collaborative encyclopedia of virtually everything worth knowing — and, admittedly, a lot we'd be better off not knowing. Then there was open-source software — free, downloadable software that is also part of a collaborative effort. Now we have the Chabanel Psalms, which might be described as an open-source liturgical psalter.

The St. Noel Chabanel Responsorial Psalm Project, found at www.chabanelpsalms.org, exists as a remedy for the problematic and sometimes malignant musical settings that so often destroy the prayerful atmosphere the Church requires for her public worship. It is part of the fruit of the nonprofit organization Corpus Christi Watershed, an apostolate and institute dedicated to helping renew the arts and creative media in the Church. . . .

This website clearly lays out all three liturgical years, and for each Sunday and feast day provides numerous musical settings of the Responsorial Psalm in English. The different versions, sometimes as many as twelve per Psalm, were contributed by highly skilled Church musicians working in parishes all over the world. . . .

Everything on this website (vocalist scores, organist scores, transposed scores, alternate versions, audio mp3 examples, etc.) is provided for instant download, completely free of charge.

Although the Chabanel Psalms are composed with the liturgical standards of the Roman Catholic Church in mind, there is in principle no reason why the Reformed churches could not make good use of them. After all, we have our own share of "malignant" musical settings crying out for better-quality replacements. Furthermore, there is no canon requiring us to sing only metred psalms. Chanting the psalms would certainly suffice and might even have an advantage in that it requires no alteration of the texts. It's worth a try. Here are four examples below:

Psalm 130:

Psalm 122:

Psalm 112:

Psalm 16:

Random act of worship

2010-11-09T11:19:00.006-05:00

Although the words to Handel's Hallelujah Chorus come from the Revelation and not from the Psalms, I just had to post this uplifting video, which has moved a number of people I know to tears. As we draw nearer to Advent, it is good to be reminded musically of the hope we have in Christ, who will come again to bring his kingdom to fruition.

Exclusive psalmody, encore une fois

2010-11-01T19:03:00.008-04:00

One of my Redeemer protégés, Michael Zwiep, has written a post on his Nadere Reformatie blog, Essay: Psalmody Through the Ages, defending the exclusive use of Psalms in the liturgies of the Reformed churches. His own Free Reformed Churches of North America, practise what Zwiep preaches, although they sing largely from the 1912 Psalter rather than from the Genevan Psalter.

Singing the Psalms at Redeemer

2010-11-01T18:51:00.005-04:00

On Tuesday evening, 5 April 2011, I will be presenting a lecture on Singing the Psalms at Redeemer University College. This is from the announcement on Redeemer's website:

Dr. David Koyzis will explore the tradition of singing the psalms set to poetic metres as found especially in the 16th-century Genevan Psalter when this tradition was initiated by John Calvin. In particular he will discuss his own 25-year project of writing fresh poetic versions of the psalms and arranging their proper Genevan melodies. Be prepared not only to learn but to sing!

Dr. David T. Koyzis is Professor of Political Science at Redeemer University College and is an amateur poet and musician. He is the author of Political Visions and Illusions (InterVarsity Press, 2003) and is currently writing a book on authority and the image of God.

You are cordially invited to attend. Bring your voices along!

Psalm 46 and Reformation

2010-10-31T14:26:00.002-04:00

Today our church, Central Presbyterian Church in Hamilton, observed the 450th anniversary of the Scottish Reformation with a special worship service. Our minister, Dr. Clyde Ervine, preached on Ezekiel 34:1-13a and Romans 10:6-17. The choir sang this wonderful version of Psalm 46 set to the Anglican chant version of Ein' Feste Burg:

Two psalms, 27 and 103, were sung from the Scottish Psalter of 1650, whose version of Psalm 46 follows below:

Praise God for John Calvin, John Knox and other Reformers, who worked so tirelessly and fearlessly for the sake of the gospel.

Exclusive psalmody

2010-09-07T16:24:00.010-04:00

I have added another link to my website: the Rev. Mark Koller's Exclusive Psalmody. There is, of course, an old tradition within some branches of the larger Reformed family that has congregations singing only metred psalms in worship. Although it has never been the majority position, even in such conservative denominations as the Orthodox Presbyterian Church and the Presbyterian Church in America, proponents can nevertheless accurately point to a tragic history that has seen "uninspired" (i.e., not directly from scripture) hymnody squeeze out the psalms over the centuries. I myself would not go quite as far as to advocate singing only psalmody, though I definitely believe that the biblical Psalms in some form should constitute the heart of the church's sung liturgy.

Salterio de Ginebra

2010-09-05T14:45:00.013-04:00

The Genevan Psalter is now available in its entirety in the Spanish language from Faro de Gracia. Here is the description from R. Scott Clark's Heidelblog:

It contains the 150 Biblical Psalms, complete and entire, and versified to be sung with the Genevan Psalter tunes. It contains a translation of John Calvin’s preface, and the introductions to each Psalm which appeared in the original French psalter. The guiding principle of the work has been to remain as close as possible to the Biblical text of the Spanish Reina-Valera translations of 1909 and 1960, in such a way that the Biblical text will be completely recognizable to everyone, in spite of the formal requirements of the versification.

This project has taken us seven years of constant work and revision. We do not conceal the satisfaction it gives us to see it now published, above all because the goal is nothing other than the public worship of the Lord by His church. We hope, then, that with it historic protestant worship can be recovered in the Spanish-speaking evangelical churches, an issue of immense importance in our day.

I've not yet seen a copy, so I cannot say whether there is a relationship between this new publication and the Spanish-language psalter found here. I will let readers know when I do.

Psalm-singing at Christ Church, Moscow, Idaho

2010-07-04T15:05:00.037-04:00

I know little of the community of Christians worshipping at Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho, except that they are part of a larger body called the Confederation of Reformed Evangelical Churches, which are not well known outside of their own circles. They are liturgically distinctive in that they seem to have developed their own way of singing the biblical psalms, as evidenced below. The result is not quite chant, but it's not quite metrical either, and no attempt has been made to set these psalms to verse. Nevertheless, they are definitely rhythmic with a drum keeping the beat. Whether the congregation sings these at weekly worship or only at special psalm sing gatherings I cannot say. It sounds to me as though these would take some training to sing properly. Here the congregation sings Psalm 149, as composed by Dr. David Erb:

Here Erb manages to extend the shortest of the psalms, Psalm 117, by rendering it as a canon:

And now Psalm 19:

The congregation also sings the Apostles' Creed:

Are these psalms sung elsewhere, perhaps in other CREC congregations? Further information on this subject would be welcome.

Addendum:

A brief exploration of the CREC reveals that it has a publishing arm, Canon Press, which produces the denomination's liturgical publications. The above psalms are from Worship in Harmony, while the one below is a portion of Psalm 119 from its primary congregational worship book, Cantus Christi. The singing is inspiring.

Singing the Psalms: a Reformed lectionary

2010-05-26T09:11:00.020-04:00

Pierre Pidoux's edited volume, Le psautier huguenot du XVIe siècle: Mélodies et documents, contains a fascinating lectionary for singing through the entire Psalter in the course of 25 weeks, or approximately half a year. This was used in Geneva during the 16th century. I am unaware of any Reformed denomination, at least in North America, prescribing such a pattern for its congregations. Note that it presupposes two sunday worship services and a wednesday "day of prayers." When I was a child, our church congregation had a midweek prayer meeting. This chart makes it clear that such a gathering has historical precedent. The reference to the second ringing of the bell may arouse curiosity nowadays given the lack of bells in most contemporary church buildings. Click on the image below to bring it up in a larger and more legible format.

My question is whether it would be in order to revive the use of this or a similar lectionary to ensure that the entire Psalter will be covered on a regular basis in the church's liturgy. It is worth at least serious consideration.

Crossposted at First Things: Evangel

Singing the psalms: bluegrass

2010-05-13T09:46:00.005-04:00

I have sometimes thought, only partly tongue-in-cheek, that I should try to recover my former competence on the banjo after some four decades away and arrange at least a few of the Genevan Psalm tunes for bluegrass. It seems someone got there ahead of me. No, it isn't a Genevan tune, but it definitely is the banjo and it's even in Hebrew. Here's Psalm 89:

Ascension Day

2010-05-13T09:44:00.002-04:00

Today the church recalls the ascension of Christ to heaven, where he sits at the right hand of God the Father. In the liturgies for this day, the assigned psalm is often Psalm 47: “God has gone up with a shout, the Lord with the sound of a trumpet. Sing praises to God, sing praises! Sing praises to our King, sing praises! For God is the King of all the earth; sing praises with a psalm!” Here is the Genevan tune for this psalm, sung in French:

Here is my own English versification:

Clap your hands, all you peoples of the earth,
shout to God with a song of joyful mirth!
Hold the Most High our LORD in reverent awe.
Our great King rules the peoples with his law;
he has put all the nations in their place;
he has chosen us, Jacob, in his grace.

God ascends amid great resounding cries,
with the blast of the trumpet see him rise!
Sing to God, all your praises to him sing,
let your praises be rendered to our King!
For our God is the Ruler of the earth;
sing his praise, sing to him with psalms of mirth!

God reigns over the nations here below,
from his throne his decrees down to them flow.
Princes gather from earth’s remote extent
with God’s people of Abraham’s descent.
All the shields of the earth to God belong;
let us highly exalt him with our song!

Psalm 119 files

2010-05-09T09:09:00.001-04:00

I have now posted eleven pdf files for my complete versification of Psalm 119 with music.

Gelineau psalmody

2010-04-05T16:53:00.026-04:00

Unbelievably, no one appears to have posted any Gelineau psalmody on youtube. . . until now, that is. Here is a description from my Reformed Worship article, Straight from Scripture, originally published some two decades ago:

One of the more interesting ways of singing the psalms was developed by Joseph Gelineau of France. Of all the methods of singing the psalms, Gelineau's chant best preserves the Hebrew poetic style, retaining both the parallelism and the metrical structure of the original. Ancient Hebrew meter is somewhat like early English meter (e.g., nursery rhymes) in that it focuses on the number of stresses within a line rather than on the number of syllables. Gelineau psalmody is often sung to the Grail translation, which was produced specifically for this purpose. The following passage (again from Psalm 54) is "pointed" to indicate the regular rhythmic stresses in each line:
O Gód, sáve me by your náme;
by your pówer, uphóld my caúse.
O Gód, heár my práyer;
lísten to the wórds of my moúth.

Gelineau psalmody also takes into account the different number of lines within each stanza, something that is not possible with other methods of psalm-chanting.

Gelineau psalms are usually sung responsively. The soloist or choir begins by singing the refrain; then the congregation repeats it. The psalm then proceeds responsively with a soloist or choir chanting the verses and the congregation responding with the refrain. Many Roman Catholics, who have recently begun congregational singing, have found this "responsorial" style of psalm-singing very helpful. A refrain (or antiphon, an older term) is much easier to learn than the whole psalm. Among Protestants who are used to exclusive metrical psalmody, the responsorial style has the advantage of making a clear distinction between psalms and hymns. Rather than simply reading the psalm directly from the Bible or singing a paraphrased version of it metrically, the congregation can sing the actual words from Scripture.

Within the last month St. Peter's Church in Columbia, South Carolina, has posted six Gelineau Psalms, numbers 23, 24, 29, 34, 80 and 104. Because these are not Genevan tunes, I will not post them on the website proper, but I will post them below, because I firmly believe Gelineau psalmody deserves to be better known outside of Roman Catholic circles.

Blast from the past

2010-03-08T10:47:00.006-05:00

Using the Wayback Machine Internet Archive I have located what my Genevan Psalter website looked like a decade ago, when it was no more than a single page with links to a few midi files. This is how it looked on 9 October 1999. And this is it a year later on 27 October 2000. Needless to say, the site grew considerably over the next few years.

By the way, I have a short piece, Metrical psalmody: singing God's word, which was recently posted at The Worldview Church, which bills itself as "Resources for Pastors from the Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview."

Update: Psalm 146

2010-03-01T09:59:00.009-05:00

Having heard Sweelinck's arrangement of Psalm 146 below, I have now composed my own and versified the text, which I posted this morning here. This is the first stanza of the text:

Praise the LORD; sing alleluia!
O my soul, sing forth his praise.
Praises will my voice be chanting
to the LORD through all my days.
To my God my lips shall give
songs of praise while yet I live.

Updates: Sweelinck arrangements

2010-02-22T14:30:00.014-05:00

Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck (1562-1621) was a Dutch musician who, among other things, arranged the Genevan Psalms for choral singing. Coincidentally, Sweelinck's birth year saw the Genevan Psalter's completion. I have just added a number of his arrangements to the videos page. Two of them follow, the first Psalm 8 and the second Psalm 146.

One more update: bibliography, discography, links and videos are now on separate pages.

Psalm 95 - T'ai Giorkou

2010-02-16T11:04:00.029-05:00

There is an intimate connection between folk and liturgical music that often goes unnoticed. Both typically grow out of local communities in which their personal origins are obscured. No one in particular writes folk songs, and, until fairly recently, the same was true of the songs used in corporate worship. Folk and liturgical music is also modal music, that is, it is composed in the several musical modes or in variants thereof. This is in contrast to more recent (i.e., post-Renaissance) western music, which tends to be in major or minor scales only.

Recognizing the relationship between folk and liturgical music, some years ago I paired a versification of Psalm 95 I had written in the 1980s with the tune of an ancient Greek Cypriot folksong, Τ'αη Γιωρκού (T'ai Giorkou), which is an epic poem about St. George and the Dragon. Here it is sung by Greek Cypriot musician Alkinoos Ioannidis:

In the summer of 1993, my sister, Yvonne Koyzis Hook, and I recorded Psalm 95 set to my own arrangement of this beautiful tune at St. Barnabas Church, Glen Ellyn, Illinois. Note the asymmetrical rhythm of the piece, which is in 5/4 time. Thus far I have not written down the arrangement, which exists only in this recording. Here is the text:

Come, sing our praises to the LORD,
the Rock of our salvation;
into his presence now let us come
with songs of jubilation.
O let us make a joyful sound,
our happy voices raising;
for God is King above every god
and worthy of our praising.

For in his hands he holds the earth
and all the depths thereunder;
to him belong all the mountain peaks
amid their regal splendour.
His also is the restless sea,
the work of his creation;
his hands have fashioned the continents
and fixed their habitation.

Come, let us chant our Maker’s praise
and bow before the Father;
for he is ours and we too are his,
the flock that he would gather.
If only you would hear his voice,
accepting his correction!
Incline your ear and hear what he says
and he will give direction.

Text copyright © 1986 by David T. Koyzis; recording copyright © 1993 by David Koyzis and Yvonne Koyzis Hook

Tallis' haunting tune

2010-01-31T16:37:00.002-05:00

This year marks the one-hundredth anniversary of the first performance of English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams’ masterpiece, Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis. I fell in love with this magnificent work nearly 30 years ago while studying for my written comprehensive exams at Notre Dame. The “theme” in the title is a tune composed by Renaissance composer Thomas Tallis for Archbishop Matthew Parker’s Psalter to which a versification of Psalm 2 is set. In most hymnals it is given the title THIRD MODE MELODY, because it’s in the phrygian mode, and it is sometimes paired with Horatius Bonar’s text, I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say. In the Christian Reformed Church’s Psalter Hymnal a metrical version of Psalm 62 is set to it. Here is the original psalm below:

The tune itself doesn’t seem especially strong, at least at first. There’s not much movement in the first half of the melody, which sneaks up on the listener hesitantly with a chant-like quality. Yet it is surprisingly compelling, all the same. Like most music of the period, it lacks a regular time signature, yet it’s in the double common metre ubiquitous in English psalmody and hymnody. Above all it is an “ecclesiastical” tune.

In the hands of Vaughan Williams this tune takes on an unforgettably haunting quality. The Fantasia is played entirely by strings, and the composer even employs parallel fifths, which defy musical convention but work wonderfully to heighten a sense of awe and mystery. When the piece finally brings us back to the original tune, we recognize that we have been on a remarkable musical journey – perhaps into a nearly forgotten past of some four and a half centuries ago. On more than one occasion this piece has left me with moist eyes. Listen for yourself below:

One can nearly picture the peaceful nobility of the English countryside in the composer’s swelling cadences. I myself tend to associate it with another tranquil landscape, namely, that formed by the land along the Illinois Prairie Path, where I rode my bicycle during that summer so long ago.

Remarkably, Vaughan Williams seems to have considered himself an agnostic, despite his having contributed so much to the music of the English church. Who does not love to sing For All the Saints, set to his whimsically (un)named SINE NOMINE? Incidentally Vaughan Williams was the grandnephew of Charles Darwin.

As for Tallis' THIRD MODE MELODY, here is another elaboration composed by the late Texas composer Fisher Tull in 1971, Sketches on a Tudor Psalm. This has a quite different feel to it. While Vaughan Williams' Fantasia is written entirely for strings, Tull's Sketches are for brass band. This gives the piece a less tranquil and more dynamic and agitated flavour, as underscored by the discordant tonality and energetic percussion. There are echoes of Vaughan Williams in a very few of Tull's phrases, as heard below:

Finally, soon after discovering Tallis' tune, I wrote a metrical versification of Psalm 25 to be sung to it, which returns it to its original use, namely, as a setting for a psalm.

Update: 'gods' and 'angels'

2010-01-23T10:50:00.029-05:00

I have just completed a versification of Psalm 97 along with an arrangement of the Genevan melody.

As is the case with a number of psalms (e.g., 8, 82, 95, 138), Psalm 97 includes two references to "gods," which appear to presuppose a polytheistic context. Some of our study bibles tell us that this accords with an ancient view of God presiding over a council of gods, as seen, e.g., at the beginning of Job. However, in Psalm 82 the translators of the New International Version place inverted commas around the word "gods," implying that these are not genuine gods but definitely subordinate to the one true God. The context appears to point to earthly political rulers who fancy themselves gods, as was not uncommon in the ancient near east. The RSV translates Psalm 97:7 thus:

All worshipers of images are put to shame,
who make their boast in worthless idols;
all gods bow down before him.

However, the New English Translation of the Septuagint (NETS) renders the same verse slightly differently:

Let all who do obeisance to carved images be put to shame,
those who make their boast in their idols.
Do obeisance to him, all his angels (άγγελοι)!

Note the change from the Hebrew to the Greek — from gods (elohim) to angels. I have rendered the same verse thus:

Those who deny his name
are quickly put to shame
for worshipping untruly
and reverencing unduly.
You gods, pay homage now;
before him you must bow.

However, following the Septuagint rendering, the fifth line could be rendered as follows: "Pay homage, angels, now." But for the present I have kept it as is. Such references to gods in scripture could thus mean either (1) false gods, as understood by the pagans; (2) angelic beings, as the LXX has it; or (3) political rulers who claim divinity. Interpreting which is correct obviously depends on context.

God as 'Supreme Being'

2010-01-22T09:48:00.000-05:00

It is well known that liturgical language changes more slowly than ordinary spoken or written language and that people are exceedingly reluctant to alter the language of worship unless forced to do so. Of course any innovation, however controversial at first, has the potential to develop into hallowed tradition over time.

The Dutch Reformed churches have long sung from the Genevan Psalter, but there has been more than one approved versification of the psalms. An early versification in Dutch was that of Pieter Datheen, which became the standard version sung in the Reformed churches after 1566. In 1773 the States General of the Netherlands commissioned and imposed a new versification of the psalms on the churches. This was controversial at the time, as told by my emeritus colleague, Dr. Harry Van Dyke:

There were of course nation-wide protests when the 1773 berijming [versification] was forced on the church by the States-General. People hate to lose their well-known spiritual songs. In the town of Maassluis riots broke out when the minister announced a psalm from the new versification. A complication was that they were also to be sung at a faster tempo than the old version, and the congregation had practised doing so in weekday evening sessions a month earlier. That Sunday, however, people stormed out of the sanctuary and bellowed loud protests. But it was not likely to have been a protest against rationalism in the verses, and much rather a question of the tempo and the wish to stay with the old and familiar versification of Petrus Dathenus of 1566 (still sung in some ultra-conservative Reformed churches, esp. in Zeeland).

With respect to "rationalism," the 1773 version refers to God as het Opperwezen (Supreme Being) in 16 psalms (7, 8, 21, 33, 38, 40, 68, 71, 77, 78,81, 96, 99, 102, 112 and 113). With its abstract and impersonal connotations, Opperwezen's use here reflects the influence of the Enlightenment and Deism — at their height in the 18th century. It is found nowhere in the Statenvertaling, the 1637 Dutch translation of the Bible, comparable to our own King James Version.

The 1967 versification of the Psalms almost entirely removes Opperwezen as a reference to God except for a single uncharacteristic reference in Psalm 68 that appears to have escaped the attention of the editors.

New year updates, 2010

2010-01-09T16:43:00.036-05:00

I have made several updates to my website in recent weeks, as indicated below.

For Christmas my wife gave me a rather extraordinary CD, The Psalms of Ali Ufki, whose name readers will recognize. It is billed as "An interfaith concert of sacred music exploring the shared traditions of Judaism, Turkish Sufism, Greek Orthodoxy and Protestant Christianity." This performance by a collection of musicians was recorded under the auspices of Dünya, an organization undertaking to "foster awareness, educate, deepen the dialogue and celebrate the similarities between the Jewish, Christian and Muslim faiths." Recorded 2005 at Harvard University.

The one Genevan tune on this disc is Psalm 13, performed in Protestant, Jewish, Greek Orthodox and Turkish Sufi versions. The tracks to listen to are 1, and 17 through 21. Number 19, the "Greek Orthodox Version," takes its text directly from the Septuagint, where it is numbered Psalm 12, managing, by means of melismatic manipulation, to fit this nonmetrical text to the Genevan tune, where it sounds strikingly like Byzantine chant. This is a remarkable achievement, yet it is testimony to the enduring strength and versatility of the Genevan tunes. Definitely worth hearing and savouring. I have posted this on the discography section on the links page.

Incidentally when I told my father, who was born in the Greek Orthodox community in Cyprus, about Ali Ufki, he recognized the name immediately, knowing that he had translated the Bible into Turkish. Ali Ufki seems to be better known in the eastern Mediterranean than in the English-speaking world.

After having received this CD, I versified the text of Psalm 13 and just this past week composed an arrangement of the tune. Although the traditional rhyming scheme for this psalm is a-a-b-b-a, I have altered this to a-b-b-a-c, which better fits the alternation of masculine and feminine endings to each line: m-f-f-m-f. The music can be heard here, and the score can be downloaded here. For purposes of comparison, Michael Owens' performance of Goudimel's arrangement can be heard here.

I have at last completed a full versification of Psalm 119, the alphabetical psalm which is by far the longest. The tune I arranged back in 2001, while I began the unrhymed versification in 2007. I had still not done very much of the psalm as recently as September of this past year when I decided to go through it methodically and attempt a full versification before Christmas, a deadline I managed to beat by one day.

I confess that I am not entirely satisfied with much of this, because the Genevan tune has six lines per stanza while each Hebrew letter has sixteen lines. I opted to try to fit two English stanzas into each letter, making for a total of 44 stanzas. This meant that I usually had to combine the thoughts of four lines into two lines per stanza, or eight lines into four lines per Hebrew letter. This doesn't work equally well throughout the psalm. I may try to reversify the psalm using a different scheme at some point.

I have not yet had the time to put together printable musical scores for the entire psalm, but that will come, probably sometime during the summer months.

My text, Christ Who Is in the Form of God (Philippians 2:6-11), was recently republished in Hymns for Worship, by Faith Alive Christian Resources, the publication arm of the Christian Reformed Church. It is set to Sir Charles Hubert Parry's tune, JERUSALEM, to which, in my humble opinion, it is ill suited. The CRC should have followed the Mennonites in using Orlando Gibbons' SONG 34, which the late Canadian pianist Glenn Gould thought to be the finest piece of music ever written.

As of last October I am one of the bloggers at the new First Things blog, Evangel. First Things is, of course, the journal founded two decades ago by the late Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, whose death almost exactly a year ago silenced one of the more significant Christian voices in the North American public square. For the most part my posts there concern Christianity and the public square, but I am taking the opportunity when appropriate to post on the psalms and liturgical matters in general. This is my most recent contribution: Epiphanytide.

Finally, I should mention another gift from my thoughtful wife, who thoroughly supports my interest in the psalms. To my surprise, she presented me with a copy of the 1903 facsimile reproduction of the 1640 Bay Psalter, a scanned version of which can be found here. What a wonderful surprise! Thank you, sweetheart.

John the Forerunner

2009-12-17T09:35:00.004-05:00

The following appears as the most recent instalment of my monthly column, "Principalities & Powers," in the Canadian newspaper, Christian Courier:

Among the four gospels Luke is unique in offering readers four canticles, along the lines of those found in the Old Testament. The best known of these is the Magnificat of the Virgin Mary (1:46-55), whose structure and content is patterned after the ancient Song of Hannah (I Samuel 2:1-10). Another is the Nunc Dimittis of Simeon (Luke 2:29-32), the elderly man who rejoiced that his eyes had at last seen in Jesus the salvation God had “prepared in the presence of all peoples.” The Gloria in Excelsis (Luke 2:14) would come to be elaborated and extended, finding its way into the ordinary of the mass in the western church.

Then there is the Benedictus of Zechariah, father of John the Baptist, who sang it on the occasion of his son’s birth, shortly after his voice had returned to him (Luke 1:68-79). In the Orthodox tradition John is called Prodromos (Πρόδρομος) or Forerunner. He is portrayed in icons with long unkempt hair and beard, and with a cloth cloak covering a blue fleecy camel hair shirt. He is sometimes given angelic wings, as Jesus had identified him as the promised messenger (Greek: άγγελος) sent before him (Malachi 3:1; Matthew 11:10). Sometimes John is even shown carrying his own severed head in a dish!

During his lifetime, John was popularly recognized to be a prophet, and even the sceptical authorities were reluctant to deny it outright for fear of the people (Mark 11:32). Zechariah himself had prophesied that his son would be “called the prophet of the Most High” and “go before the Lord to prepare his ways” (76). Jesus identified John with Elijah, whose coming “before the great and awesome day of the LORD” Malachi had forecast centuries earlier (Matthew 11:14; Malachi 4:5).

Nearly a decade ago I wrote a metrical versification of the text of Zechariah’s song, to be sung to the tune, AN WASSERFLÜSSEN BABYLON, by Wolfgang Dachstein, organist for Martin Bucer who contributed to the metrical psalter used in 16th-century Strasbourg. The text follows below:

Praise to the Lord, to Israel’s God
who came to bring us redemption,
for he has raised from David’s house
a mighty power for salvation.
He spoke through prophets long ago
that he would free us from the foe.
He promised father Abr’ham
that he would save us, free of all fears,
from every enemy that appears,
that we might serve in holiness before him.

You, little child, are called of God
to prophesy to the nation,
to go before the Saviour’s way
and gladly herald salvation;
to tell abroad to all that live
that God is anxious to forgive;
for through his mercies tender,
his rising sun will shine from above,
illuming those who strayed from his love,
to guide their feet in peace with his own splendour.

Comfort, Comfort Ye My People

2009-12-14T21:34:00.001-05:00

There is perhaps no biblical passage that more breathes the spirit of Advent than Isaiah 40:1-8, which, after the destruction predicted earlier in the book, suddenly and unexpectedly promises comfort to the people of Israel, who have gone through generations of exile in Babylon. So unexpected is this change of tone that many, if not most, biblical scholars think it must have been written by someone other than the 8th-century prophet.

The opening of Isaiah's Book of Consolation is marvellously captured in this metrical versification so familiar to Christians during Advent: Comfort, Comfort Ye My People.

Written by 17th-century hymn writer Johannes Olearius, it was translated into English two centuries later by the great Catherine Winkworth, who did more than any other person to bring the corpus of German hymnody into the English language. The tune was composed in Geneva in 1551 by Louis Bourgeois and was assigned to Psalm 42. The third stanza runs thus:

Hark, the herald's voice is crying
In the desert far and near,
Bidding all men to repentance
Since the Kingdom now is here.
Oh, that warning cry obey!
Now prepare for God a way;
Let the valleys rise to meet Him
And the hills bow down to greet Him.

The Gospel writers understood this passage to refer to John the Baptist (Matthew 3:1-6; Mark 1:1-8; Luke 3:1-18 and John 1:19-23). I will return shortly to John's role in the coming of the Messiah.

Hannah’s song, Mary’s Magnificat

2009-12-11T14:22:00.000-05:00

It would take too long to list the myriad composers who have set to music the Magnificat of Mary, as found in Luke 1:46-55. J. S. Bach's is perhaps the best known of the baroque settings, while, of the modern English-language versifications, Timothy Dudley-Smith's Tell Out My Soul has been a perennial favourite of many congregations for nearly half a century.

Less well known and less used liturgically is the ancient Song of Hannah as recorded in 1 Samuel 2:1-10. The Magnificat and Hannah's song are properly mentioned together, because the former is literarily and thematically dependent on the latter. Both Hannah and Mary are mothers rejoicing at the birth of an unexpected child. Hannah praises God that he has seen fit to end the curse of her barrenness, while Mary glorifies the Lord because he has chosen her to bear the promised Messiah. Each knew to her sorrow that she would have to give up her son one day.

John Mark Reynolds alludes to an ancient tradition which identifies Mary's parents as Joachim and Anna. Though the tradition has no explicit scriptural basis, it could conceivably represent a continuing memory of genuine persons who lived in the first century before Christ. However, I myself wonder whether there might not be another explanation for at least Anna's name. The Greek name Anna (Άννα) is, of course, a transliteration of the Hebrew Hannah (חנה). If Hannah's song is the "mother" of Mary's song, might this explain the identification of Mary's biological mother as Hannah? I will defer to the biblical scholars here, but it seems plausible to this admitted amateur.

Last summer I wrote a metrical versification of Hannah's song to be sung to the Genevan tune for Psalm 98. The music can be found here. Back in 1987 I versified Mary's Magnificat and composed an original melody, SOUTH BEND, named for where I was living at the time. The music can be found here and a descant for the 4th verse here.

"My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour."

Updates to video page

2009-11-02T06:54:00.006-05:00

Several more videos have been added, including Psalm 47 sung by Les pèlerins du pays de Montbéliard, and Psalms 81 and 119 (partial) sung by the Musica Humana Choir, Ada & the Teachers' Chamber Choir, Komló, Hungary.

Metres: uniformity versus diversity

2009-10-10T03:03:00.001-04:00

Our family are currently members of a church that sings the psalms some of the time, if less than I myself would like to see. Those psalms that we do sing come in large measure from the Scottish Psalter of 1650 or a related tradition. One of the principal characteristics of metrical psalmody in the British Isles is its regular metres.

The most common metre in use is called, unsurprisingly, common metre (CM) or ballad metre, whose structure is as follows: 8.6.8.6 iambic. What this means is that it consists of four lines, one and three having eight syllables and two and four having six. Iambic means that each line begins on an unstressed or feminine syllable. When I first began writing metrical psalms some three decades ago, I did so, almost instinctively, in common metre, seemingly unaware of alternatives. So thoroughly is this metre bred in the bones of English-speaking Christians that it is nearly second nature to them.

Not quite as common, but still familiar to English-speaking Christians, are long metre (LM) and short metre (SM), which are structured respectively as follows: 8.8.8.8 iambic and 6.6.8.6 iambic. All three of these, of course, can be doubled to make for a longer stanza.

One of the reasons why these three metres are so popular in the English-speaking world is that they are well suited to the language, whose words have fewer feminine endings than some other languages, including French, Dutch and German. Due to the absence of noun cases, which dropped out of use centuries ago, English is not the easiest language in which to write poetry, primarily because word order is so inflexible — one reason why the versifications in the Scottish Psalter sound so awkward to our ears.

More than two decades ago I was given a copy of the 1929 edition of the Scottish Psalter by my late friend Stan Hall. As can be seen in the photograph (above right), it is a split-page edition in which texts and tunes can be easily mixed and matched. This very possibility is, of course, entirely due to the regular metres employed. Any common metre text can be paired with any common metre tune. In this there are parallels with Anglican chant, in which a small number of chants can be matched to virtually any text, although the reason in that case is precisely the opposite, namely, the lack of metre in the BCP psalter.

This regularity of metres is absent for the most part from the Genevan Psalter, which explains why it would be altogether impossible to publish a split-page edition. (See the old Dutch Gereformeerd psalter at left.) Some tunes do share the same metres, e.g., Psalms 12 and 110 (11.10.11.10) and Psalms 100/131 and 134 (LM). Yet many more have unusual metres that appear to have been created specially for certain texts. Such include 9.8.8.9.5 (Psalm 5), 10.11.11.10.4 (Psalms 14 and 53) and the quirky 9.8.9.8.6.6.5.6.6.5 (Psalms 33 and 67). Some have very long stanzas, such as Psalm 19 (6.6.6.6.6.6.6.6.7.6.6.7), which would make them difficult to replicate elsewhere.

As those acquainted with my website know, I myself prefer the Genevan tunes, which strike a marvellous balance between simplicity and complexity, vividly conveying the unique message of each psalm and imprinting it in the heart of the believer. Indeed whenever I hear reference to a specific psalm or hear that psalm read, even in prose translation, the proper Genevan melody inevitably pops into my head. May God continue to be glorified in these sturdy tunes, nearly 450 years after they were first sung.

Update: new videos

2009-10-02T09:44:00.015-04:00

I have just posted several more videos to the video section of my website, including the following of a congregation singing Psalm 124 at l'Église Saint-Pierre in Geneva, the church John Calvin himself preached at during his stay there. I was privileged to visit this church during my first trip to Europe more than 30 years ago.

This choral arrangement of Psalm 128, sung by the Vocalconsort Berlin is especially beautiful and worth listening to. The German text is from the Lobwasser-Psalter of Ambrosius Lobwasser (1515-85).

Seerveld's psalms

2009-09-28T10:10:00.035-04:00

At the weekend I participated in the Refresh & Renew conference on worship at Redeemer University College. I was invited by Calvin Seerveld, Senior Member Emeritus in Philosophical Aesthetics at the Institute for Christian Studies (ICS), Toronto, to serve as cantor for his two workshops on the psalms. The first was titled "On Slipping Gutsy Psalms into Worship Services," and the second, "Biblical Psalm Lament, Curses and the 'Blues'." Cal (as everyone affectionately calls him) has long been setting the psalms to verse, pairing them with existing tunes or composing his own. In fact, until two days ago I had quite forgotten that my own interest in the psalms was sparked three decades ago when, as a student at the ICS, I heard him play his own versification of Psalm 128 set to the proper Genevan melody. I was hooked.

The most challenging pieces were his own blues psalms, only one of which we had time for. Written in a blues scale, his versification of Psalm 92 (very different from my own) called for a young female voice to effect the style of the African American singer, which is difficult for someone not steeped in the genre. I myself was called to sing the antiphon for Cal's Scream 88 Blues, a rendition of Psalm 88, the darkest by far of all the psalms: "LORD God! my God, I scream to you! Can you not hear my cry?" I doubt I was able to scream out the word "scream" with quite the intensity he was hoping for. Nevertheless, he was very gracious, as always, and expressed appreciation for my feeble effort. Of course, hearing him speak is always a treat.

Seerveld's Voicing God's Psalms, along with his other books, can be purchased here.

Gaelic psalms

2009-09-18T20:51:00.016-04:00

A colleague of mine recently returned from a conference in St. Andrews, Scotland, where he heard sung the Psalms in Scots Gaelic, with a precentor leading the congregation. Here are three samples:

To my untutored reading eye (I know nothing of the Celtic languages) it appears that the psalms sung above are from this Scots Gaelic metrical psalter, on the website of St. Columba's Church of Scotland in Glasgow, where there is a Gaelic Psalm Singing School.

Update: As far as I can tell, the second tune above, MARTYRS, to which Psalm 79 is sung, is the same as PLAINTIVE MARTYRS, as found at the Cyberhymnal website. Note the much brisker pace of the latter.

Chanting the Psalms

2009-09-04T10:45:00.001-04:00

Imagine, if you will, what it would be like if Christians were to hold competitions in chanting the Psalms similar to what we see below.

If Suzanne Haïk-Vantoura (1912-2000) is correct (which is disputed), it is possible that the entire Old Testament was once chanted. Listen to this NPR report below:

Here is Haïk-Vantoura's rendition of Psalm 23. Is her thesis plausible? I wouldn't presume to judge, but it is intriguing, if nothing else.

Worship music

2009-08-18T11:12:00.009-04:00

I am cross-posting this with my other blog, Notes from a Byzantine-Rite Calvinist.

It is not difficult to find Christian theologians and liturgical scholars commenting on what makes for a good hymn text. For example, I recently read J. Gresham Machen's Christianity and Liberalism, in the course of which he discusses the merits of three familiar hymns, Nearer, My God, to Thee, In the Cross of Christ I Glory and When I Survey the Wondrous Cross, the last of which he judges superior to the other two, due to its obvious grasp of the place of the cross in the economy of salvation. Similarly, following the church fathers, the reformers and many others, I myself am persuaded that the psalms must have a pre-eminent place in the church's liturgy. So much for texts.

But what of the church's music? Is there better or worse music by which to worship the Triune God? Are some genres better suited than others to the liturgical assembly? Does it really matter whether we use organs, unaccompanied voices or electric guitars? Isn't it all finally a mere matter of personal taste? That's what many would argue. I strongly disagree. Although one could write an entire treatise on the subject, I will limit myself to putting forth a few principles for consideration.

1. The tune must fit the text. Even if their metres are identical, not every text necessarily goes with every tune. A particularly egregious violation of this principle is found in the 1957 edition of the Christian Reformed Church's Psalter Hymnal. Number 158 is a metrical versification of Psalm 83 set to FOREST GREEN. The text is one of the imprecatory psalms, calling down God's wrath on his enemies, which would seem to require something less obviously cheerful than FOREST GREEN. (Happily, this unfortunate pairing of text and tune did not make it into the 1987 edition.)

2. Avoid pairing texts with a tune too obviously associated in the popular mind with another text or occasion. The Scottish Psalter's The Lord's My Shepherd, I'll Not Want could conceivably be sung to Lowell Mason's ANTIOCH, but given that the latter is a familiar Christmas tune, it is probably not wise to do so. It may also be illegal in some cases. About three decades ago, some churches were singing a liturgical benediction to Richard Rodger's tune for Edelweiss, from The Sound of Music. Rodgers himself and, later, the executors of his estate were definitely not amused.

3. The music should not overwhelm the text but ought to be ancillary to it. There is something to be said for unaccompanied unison singing, as found in, e.g., the Orthodox Churches and 16th-century Geneva. Reformed Presbyterians allow for part-singing but without musical instruments. While most Christians do not see fit to embrace such seemingly austere practices (and for good biblical reasons; see Psalm 150), it is nevertheless true that excessively flashy organ-playing or loud guitars and drums come dangerously close to violating this principle. Instruments should precisely accompany singing, not dominate it.

4. Music for the congregation must be fairly simple in structure, both rhythmically and musically. It certainly should not distract from the text being sung. Here a distinction must be made between those tunes meant for congregational singing, on the one hand, and solo and choral singing, on the other. I leave aside the latter for now, except to note that choirs and soloists generally take on more challenging music than the typical congregation can be expected to.

Several years ago I wrote a metrical version of the Apostles' Creed, which I titled, Credo in Septuple Metre. The tune I came up with, LUSIGNAN, is actually a fairly simple one, but the time signature, 7/8, may make it unsingable by an ordinary congregation, except perhaps by one belonging to the Greek Evangelical Church, where such rhythms would be familiar. It would thus probably make a better solo piece. On the other hand, the moving hymn, Gift of Finest Wheat, is included in many hymnals and is beautifully sung by congregations, despite its alternating 4/4 and 3/4 time signatures. This demonstrates that the musical ability of many congregations should not necessarily be underestimated.

5. While the melody should be simple, it must also be memorable, which is to say, distinctive enough to stick with people. This implies a certain degree of movement in the tune. For example, Lowell Mason's HAMBURG is well-known and easily sung, though in my view it is not an especially strong melody, consisting entirely of a series of ascending and descending partial scales. Ascents and descents invariably move one step at a time, and the entire tune spans only five notes. This gives it the undoubted virtue of not unduly taxing the singer, but leaves it with the corresponding defect of not being very interesting.

By contrast, Edward Miller's ROCKINGHAM, which has the same metrical structure, is a much stronger melody, spanning a whole octave, with the movement reaching two obvious climaxes in lines 2 and 3. The motion of the tune sometimes moves by thirds and fourths, and even drops by a sixth after the second high note. ROCKINGHAM is simply a more dramatic tune and better communicates the story of redemption.

When I was a graduate student at Notre Dame in the early 1980s, I wrote a versification of Psalm 137 and came up with this tune. When I showed it to a professional musician who was a member of my church congregation, he told me there wasn't enough movement in the melody. I took his critique to heart, scrapped that tune and came up with this one instead: HICKORY ROAD, which many would likely judge superior to my initial effort.

There is more to be said on this topic, so I shall return to it later and explore specific genres of liturgical music in light of the above, including traditional chant and contemporary christian music.

Worship wars

2009-08-06T15:23:00.064-04:00

Chuck Colson's latest Breakpoint commentary raises an issue of concern to many Christians, at least in North America, where we have the luxury of time and energy to dispute such things: Worship Wars. Although his piece is subtitled "How Do We Determine Musical Excellence," he addresses the subject of music only in passing, mostly focussing on hymn texts. Citing one Donald Williams, he offers these criteria for evaluating worship songs: (1) biblical truth, (2) theological profundity and (3) poetic richness. I can agree with all of these, which derive from the following observation:

Much of today’s music is of poor quality, [Williams] writes. But so was some music written centuries ago. The difference is the old hymns have endured a centuries-long weeding-out process. If we hope to identify the best new music, Williams writes, we must know “those marks of excellence that made the best of the past stand out and survive so long.”

To be sure, poor-quality hymns have been written for centuries, and these are the ones that generally do not survive the passing of their own generation.

However, conspicuous by its absence in Colson's commentary is any reference to psalm-singing, which was standard throughout virtually all protestant churches until the 18th century and, in some cases, much later. If Williams is right about this "centuries-long weeding-out process," what accounts for the loss of metrical psalmody in so many communions? Surely the biblical Psalms were sturdy enough to survive this darwinian struggle?

I think three factors can be cited here. First, the influence of confessional liberalism during and after the 18th century made the Psalms seem primitive and unenlightened. With many professed Christians revising Jesus' status to that of a mere teacher of morality, there seemed little point in continuing to sing the psalms in church, as they seemed to do little in support of this new "enlightened" religion.

Second, at the Reformation there arose a kind of liturgical constructivism that made the church's liturgy seem endlessly revisable. The Reformed were more radical in this than the more liturgically conservative Lutherans and Anglicans. Although the nonlutheran Reformers sought to reform the liturgy according to their understanding of the teachings of scripture, their heirs often sought revisions either for the sake of mere novelty or to conform the liturgy to new ways of thinking.

In the 17th century Anglo-Celtic Presbyterians ill-advisedly moved away from set liturgies, allowing the minister or presiding worship leader to make up their own prayers as they saw fit. This was the point of the Westminster Directory of Public Worship, which had a subsequent influence in the later development of liturgical life in the free churches. Of course, this approach depends very much on the skill and confessional integrity of individual ministers. When these begin to waver, they take the church with them.

Third, because the Psalms were sung to verse, their quality was dependent on the skill of the versifiers. If the latter emphasized literal accuracy at the expense of comprehen-sibility and literary grace (e.g., the Scottish Psalter), congregations would likely weary of trying to sing them at some point. By contrast, if the versifier emphasized literary quality at the expense of accuracy (e.g., Isaac Watts), there was always the danger of imposing one's own understanding and interpretations on the metrical versions. At that point the boundary between versifier and hymn-writer became fuzzy indeed, and the psalms were eventually abandoned for the more popular hymns of Watts, Wesley and many others.

But what of the role of music? Here's Colson again:

A fourth mark is musical beauty. In great music, “there are certain contours, structures, and cadences that make for a singable melody.” And the right harmony “can make that melody more memorable . . .,” [Williams] writes. For instance, “Be Thou My Vision” “rises and falls like an ocean wave or a sine curve.” Tragically, Williams notes, “more recent praise choruses seem to ignore all the rules of good composition, giving us not well-shaped melodies but just one note after another.”

It is not a simple matter to articulate the norms that make for great music, although I think it would be the height of folly to suggest from this that norms do not exist. I'll come back to this at some point, because the issue deserves separate treatment.

Singing the Psalms: Presbyterian Church in Canada

2009-08-04T11:03:00.050-04:00

During a recent holiday to Grand Bend, Ontario, our family visited the marvellous Lambton Heritage Museum, which proved to be much more interesting than we had expected and is definitely worth seeing if you get out that way. In addition to the indoor museum, boasting quilts, old furniture and other regional artefacts from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the large grounds host a reconstructed rural village, complete with, among other things, a blacksmith shop, a slaughterhouse, an old schoolhouse and a church. The church building once housed the former Cameron Presbyterian Church, which was founded in 1867, the year of Confederation, and lasted until the very end of the last century, when it closed due to an ageing and attenuated membership.

One item caught my eye on the pulpit: an ancient copy of an early edition of the Presbyterian Church's Book of Praise, a small volume containing only the texts of the psalms and hymns therein. (The opening pages with the publication date are missing.) On the cover is the Burning Bush, the nearly half-millennium old symbol of the Reformed Churches.

As I opened it, I was delighted to see the familiar opening words of Psalm 1 from the Scottish Psalter:

That man hath perfect blessedness,
who walketh not astray
In counsel of ungodly men,
nor stands in sinners’ way,
Nor sitteth in the scorner’s chair:
But placeth his delight
Upon God’s law, and meditates
on his law day and night.

Although the metrical psalter does not include every psalm (e.g., it skips over Psalms 135, 137 and — incredibly — 138), it contains more than subsequent editions of the Book of Praise. The 1897 and 1902 editions each carry 122 versifications of psalms or parts of psalms, while the 1972 edition has only 68 such versifications, doubling some psalms and leaving out many more. However, lest one conclude that psalm-singing is on the way out in the PCC, the 1997 edition contains 108 psalms and psalm selections, a definite improvement over its predecessor. May psalm-singing once again flourish in the Presbyterian Church in Canada.

Song of Hannah

2009-07-28T21:59:00.030-04:00

Among the canticles in the Old Testament is the Song of Hannah, which is found in I Samuel 2:1-10. As you may recall, Hannah was one of the two wives of Elkanah and had been unable to bear children. Deeply unhappy, she prayed to God, who granted her a son, Samuel, who would grow up to become one of the greatest of the early Israelite prophets. In gratitude for the gift of a child, Hannah sang this song.

I have now set the Song of Hannah to verse and joined it to the Genevan tune for Psalms 66/98/118. It will be noted that there is more than a passing resemblance between this song and Mary's Magnificat, as recorded in Luke 1:46-55. Indeed Mary's song seems literarily and thematically dependent on Hannah's, which was written possibly as early as a thousand years beforehand.

It might interest some to know how I went about writing this. I had been intending to tackle Hannah's song for some years. I took the opportunity of a family holiday to the shores of Lake Huron last week to make the attempt. I initially wrote a versification in 7.7.7.8 metre, intending to use Orlando Gibbons' lovely SONG 13 as the tune. However, given that there are only four lines in the tune, my versification ended up consisting of 11 stanzas, which is far too many to make it easily sung. The very next day I began writing another versification to the Genevan tune, whose metre is 9.8.9.8.9.8.9.8. This made for a text that runs through slightly more than four verses, with two additional lines to be sung to the last two lines of music.

I would still like to use Gibbons' tune for some biblical text at some point, but I think the latter will have to be much shorter than Hannah's song.

Update: Psalm 2

2009-06-29T14:07:00.005-04:00

Having finally received and heard the Sacred Bridges album, I was inspired to compose my own arrangement of the tune for Psalm 2, along with an unrhymed metrical versification, which I have now posted at the website. I have also posted a brief review of this CD under discography, much of which replicates what I wrote below on 9 March.

Thomas Tallis' psalms

2009-06-25T16:54:00.010-04:00

This takes us back to England, of course, but I think it's worth drawing attention here to the beautiful melodies — nine in number — that Thomas Tallis composed for Archbishop Matthew Parker's Psalter. The most haunting of these is the third tune, commonly referred to as THIRD MODE MELODY (because it's in the phrygian or third mode), to which Psalm 2 is set. Twentieth-century composer Ralph Vaughan Williams famously used it as the basis for his own Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis, a personal favourite of mine. PDF files of the music can be accessed at Free-scores.com.

These tunes can be heard below, as performed by the Renaissance Singers.

A Reformed symbol

2009-06-24T15:48:00.003-04:00

Read about this on my other blog: The Burning (Unburnt) Bush.

Updates: Psalms 23 and 130

2009-06-22T16:04:00.007-04:00

I have just written another versification of Psalm 23 to be sung to any common metre or double common metre melody, in the style of the several editions of the Scottish Psalter. I have chosen DUNFERMLINE as the tune and posted it here.

I have also posted music for my common metre versification for Psalm 130, as well as corrected a printing error in the pdf file for Psalm 137.

Later: I've posted one more item: a double common meter version of the Song of Simeon or Nunc Dimittis, set to the familiar tune BETHLEHEM.