The Revised Common Lectionary - Years A, B and C
based on Hymn Tunes & Other Familiar Melodies

How can St. Martin’s Psalter enhance your congregation’s worship?

• Has your parish recently switched to the Revised Common Lectionary and are you looking for resources?
• Has your congregation been struggling to chant the Psalms, and needing something more practical?
• Has your choir been chanting the Psalms for years while your congregation sits idly in the pews?
• Has your choir or congregation been chanting the Psalms, but would like something new?
• Have Psalms not been sung by your choir or congregation?

If you answered “Yes” to any of the questions above, St. Martin’s Psalter may be for you.

The reason St. Martin’s Psalter is so practical and sing-able is because the music is based upon hymns and other familiar melodies. It can be adapted to sung by a cantor, the choir or the congregation in any number of combinations. The Psalter was developed by a 30-year veteran in church music who has served full-time with Episcopal, Lutheran and Catholic churches, part-time with Presbyterian and American Baptist churches, and who thoroughly understands congregational song and assembly singing.

The new pointing system, tested for ten years in Lutheran and Episcopal parishes and a seminary, is very intuitive and easy to sight-read. Both choirs and congregations will find the accents and phrases fall naturally in the right places. Clergy and church musicians will find their congregations chanting the Psalms with as much enthusiasm as they would sing a well-known hymn, due to their familiarity with the tunes.

FOR EPISCOPALIANS

Carl Daw and Kevin Hacket’s Hymntune Psalter has enjoyed tremendous use and popularity since it was released by Church Publishing in 1998. Thomas Pavlechko actually began his hymn-based Psalter in 1994. After ten years of testing, it was published in book form by St. James Music Press in 2004. The Psalter is now available on SJMP.com.

St. Martin’s Psalter is based on the Psalms in The Revised Common Lectionary and includes both Ecumenical and specifically Episcopal options offered in that Lectionary. Different than the Daw/Hacket Psalter, St. Martin’s Psalter matches antiphons with hymn-based psalm tones that are a happy medium between Anglican Chant and Simplified Anglican Chant.

FOR LUTHERANS

Pavlechko thoroughly understands congregational song and assembly singing. Some of his very practical hymn-based Psalm refrains were published in Augsburg-Fortress’ first Psalter for Worship. In St. Martin’s Psalter, not only does he offer antiphons based on hymntunes and other familiar melodies, but he also includes corresponding hymn-based Psalm tones in the same meter as those originally introduced in the Lutheran Book of Worship and Lutheran Worship, and continued in Evangelical Lutheran Worship and The Lutheran Service Book. Several of his settings are included in Augsburg’s new Psalm Settings for the Church Year.

FOR ALL DENOMINATIONS

Whether you are an Episcopal Church whose professional choir has been singing Anglican Chant perfectly since 1650, a Lutheran Church whose congregation learned to chant the Psalms in the late 1970’s, a Catholic church which has been successful at introducing Gelineau or other Psalm settings, or a Methodist, Presbyterian or Baptist church who wish to be chanting the Psalms, but are not, St. Martin’s Psalter is a practical addition to your congregational service music.