Category: Psalms

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Church Congregational Songs Psalms Rock and/or Roll

Psalm 149 at Cardiphonia

Update 3/12/22: Sheet music for this song is now available at gregscheer.com.

Exactly one year and a day after its premiere at Church of the Servant, “Psalm 149: Let God’s People Sing a New Song” is appearing on the latest Cardiphonia release.

Bruce Benedict and the Cardiphonia gang are taking on the ambitious goal of producing a series of albums that cover the whole Psalter. This time around they are tackling Psalms 135-150 in a two volume collection. I contributed two songs, the first of which is a setting of Psalm 149, “Let’s God’s People Sing a New Song.” My goal was to make the recording sound like something by Polyphonic Spree. I don’t know that I achieved that, but it’s certainly more epic than my usual fare. Here are the fine folks who helped me bring on the epic:

Joel Klamer, alto saxophone and trumpet
Becca Klamer, harpsichord and backing vocals
Kurt Schafer, accordion
Cal Stapert, recorder
Johnny Simmons, drums
Sarah Bratt, Lis Hatfield, Erin De Young, Marie Bloem, Sine Nomine String Quartet

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Church Congregational Songs Psalms

Psalm 80: Restore Us, O God! (Guitarchestra)

The FDA says: Limit your use of 80 mg Simvastatin. But you can use Psalm 80 all you like.

Update 10/1/20: Sheet music for this song can be downloaded here.

After a sluggish round of correspondence (due to travel for me and a new teaching position for Naaman) we’ve finally brought “Restore Us, O God!” from draft into final form. I think it was worth the wait. Particularly unique is its Klezmer-ish feel that captures the lament of the Psalm well.

I was excited enough about it that I didn’t let the Guitarchestra leave rehearsal last night until they recorded it with me. Two times through and you get a pristine recording like this: that’s the magic of Gstra!

I think you’ll be excited enough about it that you won’t want to wait until December 20, 2015 when it comes up in the lectionary next. Go ahead. Sing it now. MP3

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Arrangement Choir Church Congregational Songs Live Psalms

Kimbrough’s Psalm 104

Update 12/11/21: Sheet music for this song is now available at gregscheer.com.

I’ve featured the music of Wendell Kimbrough before, and today he makes a return appearance. An honor to be sure…

Earlier this year his setting of Psalm 104, “Oh, Rejoice in All Your Works,” won the COS New Psalm Contest. It had its church premiere in January and we’ve sung it a few times since then. This Sunday, Pentecost, the lectionary called for Psalm 104. As fate* would have it, the choir, piano, and a brass quintet were scheduled to lead that morning, so I arranged the song for those instruments.

I was really pleased with how it sounded. Sometimes the transition from guitar-driven folk song to piano-led congregational hymn can be awkward, but in this case, it brought out a whole new majestic side to the song. I hear a best-selling choral anthem in this, don’t you?

*or providence, depending on how you roll theologically.

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Arrangement Church Congregational Songs Live Psalms

Psalm 133: Behold the Goodness

james_guitarchestraIn Psalms for All Seasons is a setting of Psalm 133 (Behold the Goodness of Our Lord, PfAS 133A) that seemed just right for the Guitarchestra this past Sunday. The melody, DETROIT, comes from the Kentucky Harmony hymnal. Like a lot of early American hymn tunes, it has a rugged beauty that just won’t let you go. These tunes often benefit from a more rustic arrangement, rather than the smooth voice leading you find in hymnals, so I provided one.

Here you can see me rehearsing the song this past Sunday, shadowed by the youngest member of the Guitarchestra, James.

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Arrangement Church Congregational Songs Global Psalms

Psalm 137: By the Babylonian Rivers

Update: This song is now available at gregscheer.com.

“By the Babylonian Rivers” is one of my favorite songs from Global Songs for Worship and one of my favorite Psalm settings in general. We used it at COS last week and I decided that the line “Lord God, hear your lonely band” fairly demanded an instrumental interlude. I wrote one, and Kurt (accordion) and Emily (violin) took it home: MP3.

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Church Congregational Songs Live Psalms

People of the Lord in Madison, IN

One of the fun things about having a few songs in hymnals is that I’m introduced to new people via my music. I recently got an email from Jonathan, a music director in Madison, Indiana, asking for permission to introduce “People of the Lord” to his congregation. “Sure,” I said, “as long as I can add the newsletter article and recording to my blog.”

It’s fun to see churches using my music, but what I was most impressed by is that this music director is committed to teaching his congregation new music, introducing a new hymn from Glory to God each month! You can read his monthly updates here: http://www.madisonpresbyterianchurch.org/page/music_ministry.

Click on October for mine, or read below:

As I continue to sing through our new hymnal, Glory to God, this month another Psalm paraphrase struck me as being particularly well constructed.  “People of the Lord,” #632, is a setting of selected verses from Psalm 78.  I think my favorite aspect of this setting is the asymmetric meter.  This is just a music-speak way to say that the beats are not all of the same duration.  The time signature for this piece is 7/8 (cleverly apropos to a setting of Psalm 78) and is broken down 2+2+3 or short-short-long.  The use of asymmetric meter in a Psalm paraphrase hearkens back to the Genevan Psalter.  Another wonderful aspect of this Psalm setting is that the verses work in canon.  The verses are written from the Psalmist’s perspective and sung in unison (or canon).  Unison singing indicates the singular perspective of the Psalmist.  The refrain is sung from the perspective of the people of God and is sung in parts.  The part singing, then, indicates the plurality of the people of God.  Here is a link to a youtube video of the Psalm.

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Church Congregational Songs Demos Psalms

Restore Us, O God! (first draft)

Update 10/1/20: Sheet music for the final version of this song can be downloaded here.

Has it really been a month since my last post? Shame on me! Also shame on me for telling Naaman Wood back in August that I wanted to collaborate with him, and not doing anything about it until now.

One of the things he sent me was a setting of Psalm 80, still in draft form. My first attempt at setting it to music sounded too Getty. My second attempt was just a little lackluster. (You know, it’s not easy to write something that sounds fresh, but that is singable by a congregation!) But the third time was the charm. I went with more of a folk ballad feel. It reminds me a little bit of the Yiddish song “Donna Donna” by Aaron Zeitlin and Sholom Secunda, made famous by Donovan, Joan Baez (video below), and my new favorite, Nehama Hendel. I thought the minor feel fit the pleading nature of Psalm 80 well.

This is as much of a demo I could create on an Advent morning before most of the church staff arrived. It starts out Donovan and ends up Jack White: MP3

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Arrangement Choir Church Congregational Songs Live Psalms

Psalm 47: Clap Your Hands, for cantor, choir, flute, and percussion

When I was working on Global Songs for Worship, I found a Yoruban song in the collection Ẹ Kọrin S’Oluwa, edited by Godwin Sadoh. It was published as “Psalm 47: Clap Your Hands” in both Global Songs for Worship and Psalms for All Seasons, as well being recorded on the GSfW CD.

I’m pleased to say that as of Sunday morning, it is now also an anthem for cantor, choir, flute and percussion. Take a listen to the COS choir leading it: MP3. It is surprisingly simple to sing, which isn’t always the case with African songs and arrangements. In fact, because the congregation had already sung the song on a number of occasions, I had them join the choir on verses 2-4.

 

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Choir Church Congregational Songs Psalms

Psalm 105: Give Thanks to the Lord

105cementThere are various traditions of Psalm-singing: Metrical, Responsorial, etc. My church generally feels most comfortable with the metrical Psalms that are part of our Reformed heritage. However, there are merits to each approach, so I try to include as many song styles as possible in our psalmody.

Last week the lectionary called for Psalm 105:1-6, 37-45, a Psalm which opens with praise, then follows with the story of God providing manna, quails, and water in the wilderness. Existing settings are slim, seldom mentioning Meribah and Massah, which are an essential connecting point to the Old Testament reading. I decided that the world needed a new responsorial setting of the Psalm.*

Responsorial singing, you’ll remember, is when a leader sings/chants verses and the congregation responds with a refrain. The key to a good responsorial setting is to have a quickly learnable, highly memorable refrain for the congregation, and a chant tone for the choir that has a logical, flowing harmonic progression. In this case, I decided to include a light rhythmic piano accompaniment, which is pretty unusual in this style. (Out of the box: it’s where you’ll find me.) I’ll spare you the gory details of Joseph Gelineau, the Grail Psalter, and sprung rhythm, and simply let you listen to a recording from the service or take a peek at the music.

*The need is deep, so you may not yet have felt your need of my new Psalm 105 setting. It will come.

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Church Congregational Songs Psalms

Psalm 149 at COS

149My sabbatical ended, fully and officially, as I returned to worship leading at Church of the Servant this Sunday. I wanted to make sure people noticed that I was back–and had warm feelings about continuing to pay my salary–so I wrote a new setting of Psalm 149 for the service. You can read more about the song in a previous post.

Below is a recording from the service. I had the idea for the repeated notes in the strings while I was running the day before and was quite pleased with how they sounded. With all those talented musicians and a congregation that sings better than most choirs, it’s hard to go wrong!

Psalm 149, MP3