You've Probably Never Heard These Psalms Before

I think most of you reading this could probably list any number of #1 CCM songs from the radio, recall whatever is trending on streaming platforms, and likely have a go-to pool of legacy artists to whom you regularly listen.

For many of you, your experience with “worship music” begins and ends with the twist of your radio dial, a click of a mouse, seeing lyrics projected on a screen with a band playing along, or opening a hymnal pulled from the back of a pew.

But what if I told you there are collections of worship music that go back hundreds of years that people still sing today?

Enter: The Psalter

We all know the book of Psalms; it’s one of the largest single books of the Bible and is quoted by nearly every pastor in a pulpit and worship leader behind a microphone. Some of you have probably even sung a psalm or two in your worship services, set to sound indistinguishable from current radio-friendly tunes.

But before we had radio, streaming, or even mass-produced hymnals, the church used psalters to sing “God’s songbook” during their gatherings.

A psalter is pretty simple: It contains musical settings of the psalms, being as true as possible to the original/translated text. Throughout history, psalters have taken on several musical stylings and languages, but the content always keeps the Biblical text at the center.

The original psalms were written in Hebrew, with some sections in Aramaic. We don’t exactly know how these psalms would’ve sounded musically, but there have been modern settings that allow the syntax and phrasing of the original language to shine. Here’s the Yamma Ensemble with their setting of Psalm 104:

In this setting, Yamma is drawing from musical expression of Near Eastern cultures, using microtonal melodies and irregular meters, which lets the natural pacing of the syllables flow from the ancient Hebrew.

But since most of you reading this are most familiar with English translations of the Psalms, how are these settings made most accessible for you?

Translated Psalters

When we look at English translations of the Psalms, well… they aren’t exactly poetic.

Don’t get me wrong—the imagery and emotions present are absolutely VIVID. But translation experts are more concerned with preserving the meaning of the text with accuracy and precision than matching rhyme schemes and metric organization.

When you look at the Psalms in their original languages, they are organized in a variety of ways:

• Some use familiar rhyme schemes, but with syllables that match in ancient Hebrew/Aramaic. English translations won’t yield the same results.

• Some are acrostic poems, not necessarily concerned with rhyme schemes. Even then, English translations disrupt the acrostic pattern.

• Various other poetic devices/arrangements that, again, are disrupted when translated into other languages.

When these translations came along, music arrangers would be faced with one of two choices:

• Sing the best translation to a free-form melody (i.e., Gregorian-style chant, modal melodies, etc.), little to no rearranging of the text.

• Sing the translation to a written melody (rhythmic or non-rhythmic), but rearrange or substitute words to accommodate for aesthetically pleasing/culturally familiar phrasing.

For a long time, much of the church’s liturgy in singing utilized the first option, first translating the original languages into Greek and Latin, and then expanding into other languages in the early 16th century. (This slightly predates the Protestant Reformation, but it heavily influences the spread of Protestantism because of mass distribution of music books due to the newly invented printing press—another post for another day!)

The 1650 Scottish Psalter

The first complete psalters in English were produced around 1530AD–1550AD, with some incomplete translations available roughly 700 years prior (located primarily in Ireland). These psalters led to increased development that saw creative adaptations of the text to reflect cultural sensibilities and understanding.

One of the psalters developed during this time of the Reformation is the Scottish Psalter, first written in the 1560s, with the 1650 edition STILL USED TODAY in various churches throughout Christendom.

The beauty of this psalter is how well it adapts the translation of the original text into easy, flowing lyrics, which pair well with conventional hymn tunes. Let’s look at Psalm 1 as an example. Here’s the translation from the ESV:

And here is its setting from the 1650 edition of the Scottish Psalter:

For this setting, the arranger heavily relies on inversion, a poetic device where normal syntax and grammar are rearranged to accommodate for rhyme schemes and metric placement. This is where we don’t follow the usual subject–verb–object order in English grammar rules. There are two types of inversions:

• Anastrophe: This a reversal of subject–verb–object. An example would be, "The dew glistens upon the morning grass." → "Glistens the dew upon the morning grass." (Or, basically any of Yoda’s dialogue from the Star Wars films.) The use applies more broadly between clauses, rather than specific words. We see this at work in stanzas 3, 5, and 6 in the Scottish setting.

• Hyperbaton: Like anastrophe, but more word-specific. An example from the Scottish setting would be, “…and his leaf fadeth never…” instead of, “…his leaf never fadeth…”

But What About the Music?

OK—you’re probably wondering, “What does this actually sound like?” Here’s that same setting of Psalm 1 that you’ll typically find in congregational gatherings:

For some of you, this might be a bit… dry, to say the least. The cool thing is that these psalms set in meter only mean that they have a specific rhythmic organization—so that means the melody can be (almost) anything you want! Here’s a synthwave version of Psalm 1, using the Scottish text, but in a cool, neo-‘80s-style vibe:

A Challenge for You

For those of you who are composers, here’s a challenge that will exercise your melody writing chops:

Pick a text from the 1650 Scottish Psalter and write your own melody.

Seems pretty simple, right? The key to remember is that your melody must be:

• Singable.

• Captures the natural flow of the words.

• Creatively uses contour to accentuate the lyrical themes.

Once you’ve done that, try making your own adaptation of the text, maybe switching out the old fashioned “-eths” for suffixes we would normally see today, or figuring out a new metric arrangement.

if you come up something, then please—PASS IT OUR WAY! We love hearing new music, and we know that your local church and others would be blessed to hear your creative abilities being used for God’s glory.

Be blessed 👊✌️