WANTED wedding psalm

[organist]

Wanted in 1 week's time please a simple setting of this wedding psalm for solo, response and organ.
Psalm 148:1-2, 3-4, 9-10, 11-13a, 13c-14a
R. (13a) Let all praise the name of the Lord.

Praise the Lord from the heavens,
praise him in the heights;
Praise him, all you his angels,
praise him, all you his hosts.
R. Let all praise the name of the Lord.

Praise him, sun and moon;
praise him, all you shining stars.
Praise him, you highest heavens,
and you waters above the heavens.
R. Let all praise the name of the Lord.

Mountains and all hills,
fruit trees and all cedars;
beasts, both wild and tame,
creeping things and birds on the wing.
R. Let all praise the name of the Lord.

Kings of the earth and all peoples,
princes and all judges of the earth,
young men and maidens as well,
the old and the young together.
Let them praise the name of the Lord,
for his name alone is exalted.
R. Let all praise the name of the Lord.

His splendor above earth and heaven.
He exalts the strength of his people.
R. Let all praise the name of the Lord.

[Southern Comfort]

You do realise that the psalm version you have given (which I have not identified) is not the one authorised for use in this country, i.e. Grail I (1963) ? Also, the response is not the usual one for this psalm in our Lectionary.

All that being so, it seems a little unlikely that anyone in the UK will have a setting you could use.

[Nick Baty]

The refrain is so short it would be very difficult for an average congregation – and weddings usually attract many who aren't used to singing.
A very wedding-y psalm, is Paul Inwood's Psalm 127 O blessed are those who fear the Lord – although the words are mostly addressed to the bloke and there's the assumption they'll have kids. Content aside, it's the length of the refrain which makes it so singable – plus the fact that the tune moves where you'd expect it to. Of course, it all depends on the reading to which reading you are responding.
As a general rule, I avoid weddings – terribly depressing. Funerals are much more fun and there's much more delicious music available. But I digress.

[JW]

I assume the booklet is finalized so the words can't be changed? Of course the hymn 'Praise my soul the King of Heaven' is a paraphrase of this...

[JW]

I don't know if this helps but the refrain to the Taize chant 'Adoramus te Domine' fits 'Let all
praise the name of the Lord'. Though it's best if you include the hum before the words start!! Then for the verses you could use any Psalm tone chant in a suitable major key. If the refrain is sung twice each time (cantor/congregation), I suspect it could work quite well musically.

[AGM]

The first two verses are similar to those in “Twenty Psalms and Three Canticles” published by the Grail to the psalmody of Joseph Gelineau. The original does not have “you”. It is added five times here. What was “praise him shining stars” has become “praise him all you shining stars”.

For a Gelineau psalm it has an unusual number of accents: 3 + 2 + 2 + 3. In the 1966 book “The Psalms a New Translation Singing Version” (now available as ISBN 0809116693) it provides Gelineau Psalm tones for 3 + 2 + 3 + 2 and 3 + 3 + 3 + 3 and 4 + 4 + 4 + 4. But for Psalm 148 it refers you back to the book “Twenty Psalms and Three Canticles” for the music.

The third verse is from “The Ecumenical Grail Psalter Singing Version” published by GIA in 2015. The number of accents is: 3 + 3 + 3 + 3.

The last two verses are from “The Revised Grail Psalms a Liturgical Psalter Singing Version” published by GIA in 2010. After “exalted” a comma has been replaced with full stop. It has them as three stanzas: four lines ending with “together”; three lines ending with “earth”. The last line begins a third stanza. It would make sense to make them two stanzas of four lines. The accents are: 3 + 3 + 3 + 3.

The psalm is labelled “Mode: Soh. Tonic: F” and in Bb major in “Twenty Psalms and Three Canticles”. It is similar to Psalm Tone II28 in C Major in “The Psalms a New Translation Singing Version” which is “Mode: Soh. Tonic G” for psalm 23 in the Grail Gelineau Psalter (GIA 1972, G-1703). Psalm Tone II28 has been put in Bb major for Psalm 3 in the Grail Gelineau Psalter (GIA 1972) making it “Mode: Soh. Tonic: F” as well.

To summarise: first two verses as in “Twenty Psalms and Three Canticles”. Last three verses to Gelineau tone II28 put in Bb major.

The Antiphon in “Twenty Psalms and Three Canticles” is “Let all creation praise the Lord.”

[AGM]

The Revised Grail Psalm text is at https://www.giamusic.com/sacred_music/R ... alm_id=383 . Their licensing policy at https://www.giamusic.com/sacred_music/R ... icense.cfm includes: "... The Revised Grail Psalms are available at www.giamusic.com/RGP. For websites of a religious or devotional nature that wish to include parts of the RGP in their content, this must be done through a link to the appropriate text on giamusic.com/RGP. Each of the psalms is on a separate link; devotional sites may conveniently link to whichever, and as many, psalms as they choose, but may not include the texts on their own websites without permission. This policy is in place to assure the integrity of the texts. ..."

[Peter]

Welcome to the Forum, AGM! Any relation to the AGM credited with some of the response tones in the Grail Psalm collections you mention?

[AGM]

Thank you, Peter. He came to mind when I was trying to think of a name.

[Southern Comfort]

Just so that those reading this thread are clear:

The version of the Grail psalms authorized for use in England and Wales, Scotland, Ireland and Australia is Grail I, the 1963 version. It is contained both in the Lectionaries of those countries and in the Divine Office used in those countries. NB: the actual version approved is the original version, not the "Singing Version" (1966) which contained a few minor textual alterations by Dom A. Gregory Murray for the purposes of singing.

A version of Grail I with some rather further-reaching but unauthorized changes was used in the USA version of the Divine Office.

Grail II (1983) was only ever published in the USA and was never approved for use in any country, while Grail III (1993) was authorized for use and is the version used in the Psallite project.

Grail IV was produced by Gregory Polan and the monks of Conception Abbey, Missouri, adapting Grail I in the light of more recent biblical scholarship but interfering with the rhythmic feel of Grail I. It was sent to Rome for approval in 2008.

RGP, the Revised Grail Psalter, is what Rome sent back in 2010. It contained several hundred changes from Grail IV. It is approved for use in the USA, but has not appeared in any published lectionary there. It is not approved for use in England and Wales, though the Bishops' Conference have announced that they will use it in a forthcoming new Lectiionary (no date available for this).

RGP is available at the links cited by AGM, but what AGM did not say is that this is in fact not the final text.

The US bishops applied to Rome to have all the 2010 changes to the 2008 text undone, and it appears that their request will be granted. Since those changes are well known, that ought to be the end of the story, but it is not. The US bishops also asked Rome for other, larger, unspecified changes to improve rhythm and musicality of RGP. It appears that not only will permission be granted for these, but the same changes will be imposed on all other English-speaking countries. The problem is that no one yet knows what those additional changes are! Anyone setting RGP to music may well have to revise their work at some future date. It also means that when the Bishops of England and Wales say they are going to use the RGP, they don't actually know exactly what it is they are approving since the "final" text is not yet available!

It appears that other factors are delaying the release of another "final" RGP text. One of them is the whole issue of copyright. RGP was an adaptation of Grail I, which is the copyright of the Ladies of the Grail. GIA was the US agent for Grail I, which made them a “natural” choice to be the sole world agents of RGP. Unfortunately, not everyone agrees. It appears that Rome does not feel that a publisher should have control of this adaptation of the Ladies of the Grail’s text throughout the English-speaking world, and negotiations are apparently in progress.....

Therefore anyone clicking on AGM’s links hoping to find the final text will have to wait a while longer. The text at the links is the 2010 text, i.e. the one with all those changes to the 2008 text which will eventually be reversed.

[AGM]

Southern Comfort wrote “The version of the Grail psalms authorized for use in England and Wales, Scotland, Ireland and Australia is Grail I, the 1963 version. It is contained both in the Lectionaries of those countries and in the Divine Office used in those countries. NB: the actual version approved is the original version, not the "Singing Version" (1966) …”.

But while some approved translations of the liturgical books use the text of the 1963 Grail Psalms, others do not.

Divine Office Volume I (my edition has “First printed 1974 Reprinted 1996”) has on page 657*: “Psalm texts are translated from the Hebrew by The Grail, (c) The Grail (England) 1963, and published by Collins in Fontana Books, London, 1963. They are reprinted from the Singing Version first published in Fontana Books in 1966. …. The practical needs of choral recitation prompted a number of revisions in the psalms and canticles of this Breviary. These revisions are made with the agreement of The Grail.”

So there is a 1966 Singing Version and a slightly different 1974 Divine Office version of the Grail psalms. An example of a difference is Psalm 4:7. In 1966 Singing Version page 20 it has:
“Líft up the líght of your fáce on us, O Lórd.”

In the Divine Office it has:
“Let the líght of your fáce shíne on us, O Lórd.”
(From Volume One, page [573]. Night Prayer After Evening Prayer I of Sundays …).

Australian Lectionary Volume 1 page 453 (using 1963 Grail Psalm):
“Lift up the light of your face on us, O Lord.”

The 2011 Roman Missal published by The Catholic Truth Society has on the page before the Table of Contents: “The English translation of Psalms 23[24] and 46[47] from The Revised Grail Psalms (c) 2010 Conception Abbey/The Grail, ….”.

Psalm 23 is on page 305 and Psalm 46 on page 306 for Palm Sunday of the Passion of the Lord. Psalm 115 is on page 1513.

[Southern Comfort]

I'm not quite sure what point AGM is making.

Yes, there are variations of Grail I in the Divine Office, but it is still essentially Grail I. And yes, the Divine Office did use the 1966 Singing Version of Grail I with Gregory Murray's few changes as a basis, even though the prior approval was for the origin and not the singing version; but it is still essentially Grail I.

My two basic points were

(1) RGP is not yet authorized for use in England and Wales as an integral text for a psalter in liturgical use (e.g. for Responsorial Psalms or in a future version of the Divine Office) in the same way as Grail I is. Yes, small bits of RGP do already appear in the 2011 Roman Missal, not only in the places cited by AGM but also in the Entrance and Communion Antiphons whenever those antiphons use a direct quotation from the psalms rather than a modified quotation or paraphase, but the entire psalter itself is not yet approved.

(2) More importantly, RGP is still not finalized, since further revisions are in process. When it eventually is finalized, and depending on exactly what the changes are in the final text approved by Rome, it is quite possible that those texts that derive from it in the 2011 Roman Missal will have to be revised as well in order to conform with the integral psalm text. That in turn may mean that settings of the antiphons — e.g. those by Columba Kelly, Christopher Walker, John Ainslie and a number of others — will also need revising.

[organist]

An Anglican organist friend produced one thank you Facebook! I rehearsed it with the congregation before the bride arrived and they sang like birds!!