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Welcome to Psaltery and Harp

Hello! I'm Becky Mynett. I'm Director of Music at an ordinary parish church in Bedfordshire. Our church has a psalm at the Sunday morning communion service most weeks. We use responsorial psalms, where a soloist sings the psalm text and the congregation respond with a refrain. But it proved difficult to find easy settings with meaningful refrains that were also musically interesting. So I decided to write my own, using skills learned both when I studied liturgical composition for my MA in English Cathedral Music and when I worked as a professional translator. I am delighted to offer my settings here at Psaltery and Harp, alongside some of my other compositions. I hope you enjoy encouraging your congregation to sing the psalms in worship as much as I do.

A 1618 painting of King David in a suspiciously church-like temple. He is wearing a blue ermine-lined cloak and playing an ornate gold lap harp. He is accompanied by singers and musicians. There is a bass viol on the right of the painting. Pieter Lastman,
Epiphany 3 - Verses from Psalm 27
This Sunday may be observed as either the Conversion of Paul or Epiphany. For the sake of compiling a complete set of responsorial psalms for use in future years, I am providing Psalm 27 as set for Epiphany 3. This is verses 1 and 4 – 11 (numbered ...
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A double page spread of a 1625 psalter showing the Latin and Syriac translations of Psalm 40.
Epiphany 2 - Psalm 40
Apologies for a rather lengthy post this week (a 5 min read). Psalm 40 has a lot of words, so it gives me an opportunity to show you how I approach making psalms easy to sing and understand. I hope you find it interesting. Before I get going on that...
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A sixteenth century painting of the Baptism of Christ. Jesus is kneeling on a rock with one foot in the water as John the Baptist pours water over him. There are lots of people in varying states of (modest) undress who have also presumably been baptised.
Baptism of Christ - Psalm 29
Coming hard on the heels of the feast of the Epiphany, and therefore skipping about thirty years of Jesus’s life, I always feel that the Baptism of Christ comes rather too soon! Especially if you kept Epiphany on Tuesday. In which case Sunday-only c...
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Piero della Francesca - Procession of the Queen of Sheba; Meeting between the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon
The Epiphany - Verses from Psalm 72
Happy New Year! I hope you are still enjoying Christmas, whether you are keeping the full twelve days and celebrating the second Sunday of Christmas this week, or cutting it short and transferring the Epiphany to this Sunday. Either way, I’ve got yo...
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A photograph of a painted ceiling depicting the Ark of the Covenant - a box topped by two cherubim (angels) facing each other and praying. The Ark is in a blue circle surrounded by silver decoration. It is above the Altar of the Holy Family in Saint Barth
Advent 4 - Verses from Psalm 80
Psalm 80 is one of seventeen ascribed to a poet named Asaph. The text is dedicated to a chief musician – presumably someone with a role something like Director of Music at the Temple in Jerusalem – and there is a description, the precise meaning of ...
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Illuminated letters taken from various medieval manuscripts spelling Alleluia.
Advent 3 - Verses from Psalm 146
Psalm 146 begins with a section praising God, so I have taken this theme for the refrain, which is a simple Alleluia. We then join the psalm at verse 4 (in the Common Worship and Coverdale psalters, it is verse 5 in other translations). In the first...
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Illumination from a medieval Hebrew manuscript showing a minstrel playing a lute on the left and King Solomon seated on a throne under an arch. There is some Hebrew script between them and the page is decorated with flowers.
Advent 2 - Verses from Psalm 72
Psalm 72 is headed ‘A Psalm of Solomon’ and is a prayer for the king and his heir. This could be a dedication: a prayer for King Solomon. This is Robert Alter’s view. He states in his commentary on the Psalms, ‘The editorial linkage with Solomon … ...
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Psaltery and Harp: Advent Sunday, Year A - Psalm 122
Advent Sunday - Psalm 122
Psalm 122 is one of fifteen psalms (120 – 134) prefaced by the words ‘Song of Ascents’. There are several theories as to what this means, but it seems most likely that they were traditionally sung by Jewish pilgrims visiting Jerusalem for the three ...
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The Advent and Christmas Collection is now available
I am delighted to introduce the first set of responsorial psalm translations and settings for ordinary churches, which is now available in the shop section of this website. This collection includes the Sunday morning psalms for the Sundays of Adven...
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Why 'Psaltery and Harp'?
You may be wondering why this shop is called 'Psaltery and Harp'. Well, there are several reasons! Firstly, the phrase comes from Psalm 150 verse 3 in the Authorised Version of the Bible (also known as the King James Version): Praise him with the so...
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Introducing Psaltery and Harp
Welcome to Psaltery and Harp! I'm really excited to be launching my new shop. Over the next few weeks I will be starting to add sheet music for my translations and settings of the psalms set in the Church of England's Common Worship lectionary. Over...
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