Worship: Metrical Psalms
My good friend Bernard Bell introduced me to the Trinity Psalter this year. It contains all 150 psalms written in metrical form so that they can be sung to the same tunes we use for hymns. It is an enormous benefit to be singing the scripture, which gives us even greater assurance that we are worshipping in "spirit and truth" and aids in memorization.
The first one I tried with a congregation was Psalm 92, to the tune of "Rejoice the Lord is King." Each item in the Psalter includes the meter and suggestions for tunes at the end. Since it was a familiar tune, and we sung it through for them once, the congregation sung it very well.
An innovative idea is to use the new tunes available through RUF. That would bring the Psalter into the 21st century in a powerful way.
Happy Psalming,
The first one I tried with a congregation was Psalm 92, to the tune of "Rejoice the Lord is King." Each item in the Psalter includes the meter and suggestions for tunes at the end. Since it was a familiar tune, and we sung it through for them once, the congregation sung it very well.
An innovative idea is to use the new tunes available through RUF. That would bring the Psalter into the 21st century in a powerful way.
Happy Psalming,
posted by Patrick at 1:03 PM
5 Comments:
As a former choir director, I was always interested in introducing new hymns to my congregation and did so by choosing one hymn that was new to the congregation and featuring a short blurb in the weekly bulletin and then using that hymn during the service each week for one month when I'd stand out in front of the cogregants and loudly fill their ears with the melody as we sang together.
Just found a new web site that might be of interest to you.
It is: http://www.musipedia.org
Just play or sing a fragment of a tune into your computer and the search should turn up the song (melody) that you are looking for and then you can download the sheet music. I tried it with Happy Birthday and it worked just fine.
It would be interesting to see how your Trinity Psalter would be handled by this site.
Cheers.
Pete Kennedy
Pete,
Thanks for sharing your experience with hymns.
Also, that site you gave is really neat. The only problem is that no matter what tune I sing, it gives me the same results when I click "Search." Is that happening to you too?
Patrick
Patrick
Patrick,
I din't try the singing aspect as of yet. Just used the piano keyboard and played happy birthday on the keyboard and then clicked search.
As you "play" the keyboard you can delete wrong notes by highlighting them above where you see the note names pop up as you play them.
I'll try the singing part at some point soon and see how that works.
Pete
As I've just taken a larger role in the worship for our congregation, I'd like to try this--now if only we used the Trinity hymnal--well maybe I can get my hands on my own copy...
(And we already do some of the RUF stuff--In many cases I prefer the older arrangements, but sometimes they keep those.
Still they make for some good variety and rebirth of some great God centred worship
Thanks for your comment.
I suggest checking out "Great Commission Publications" to obtain a copy of the Trinity Hymnal, Trinity Psalter or other valueable resources.
I've found that all RUF tunes/settings aren't created equal. It's great that they've included so many aspiring arrangers in their hymnbook, but to be honest only a couple dozen are really very good and only a handful that have made it into my worship leading (I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say, What 'ere my God ordains is right, Let Us Love and Sing and Wonder, etc.)
If you're willing, I'd love to hear which you use the most.
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