So then, avoiding anything technical, we set out to discover what music actually is. What is it that makes a "tune"? And what is it that makes that particular tune into "St. Paul," or "Orlington," or "Glasgow," or "Naomi" ? If you look at a Tonic-Sol-fa Psalmody, you will see that every tune in the book may be written down using little more than seven letters of the alphabet - d, r, m, f, s, l, t, along with a few dots and dashes and upright lines! As every letter represents a note in the scale, it may be seen that a tune consists simply of a succession of such "notes" or "tones" following one another in a given order and according to a given pattern. The letters - d, r, m, etc., represent the pitch of the notes. The other markings give us the rhythm. Given a combination of pitch and rhythm, we have a melody.

The music of the Psalms as sung in our church is nothing if not simple, and almost all the tunes fall into one of four classifications. We may use the Common, the Long, the Short or the Peculiar Metre. But what exactly is a Common, or a Long, or a Short Metre, and how are we to recognise them? Let us take as an example - Psalm 23. If we scan a line we find that it works out thus:-

The Lord's my Shep - herd I'll not want.
He makes me down to lie
in pas - tures green he lead eth me
The qui - et wa - ters by.

Here we have, in the first line eight syllables, in the second six, in the third line eight, and in the fourth six again. Thus we see that a Common Metre is an eight, six, eight six rhythm. Now do the same with Psalm 100, and we will find an eight, eight, eight, eight rhythm. This is the typical Long Metre Pattern. Taking Psalm 67 as a typical Short Metre we find a six, six, eight, six. The story is told of a Precentor who began one day to sing Psalm 67 to the tune Old Hundred. His problem was to make a line of six syllables to fit a line of music with eight beats. He managed to meet the situation by singing extra words. Thus:-

"Lord, bless and pity us, us, us.
Shine on us with thy face, face, face.
That the earth thy way and nations all
May know thy saving grace, grace, grace."

Whilst we can admire his initiative, we cannot regard the arrangement as being in any way satisfactory.

The problem of Metres is not really difficult when we understand the pattern of the rhythm. Peculiar Metres are those odd variations which do not fit into our regular Common, Long or Short Metre patterns, but as they are seldom used except in larger congregations, we may leave them for the time being out of our discussion. If you cannot remember what Metre the tunes are, and if you are not sure whether the Psalm you have is a Long, Common or Short Metre version, just run through silently, and find out whether the tune you want to use has the number of beats in each line to correspond with the number of syllables per line in the words. If you run out of tune before you finish the line, or if you still have tune left over after you have finished the words, then clearly you have a Psalm of one metre, and a tune of another. We must be sure they correspond.

So then, having fixed on the question of Metre the next problem is what we may term the "classification" of Psalm and Tune. We must select a tune which is appropriate to the thought expressed in the Psalm. Most Psalmody Books give some guidance in this matter, but it is not required of a Precentor that he follow slavishly the suggestions in the book. The essential thing is that the music should reflect the sentiment of the words. We cannot attempt a comprehensive classification of Psalms or tunes here, and even were we to do so we should only be laying down another arbitrary rule which would not be in the best interests of congregational praise. It is the privilege and responsibility of the precentor to select his tunes, as it is of the minister to select his Psalms. The range of tunes will perforce be limited to those familiar to the congregation. But let them be selected with every care and consideration. The Psalm may be "Joyful," "Triumphant," "Jubilant," "Penitential," "Prayerful," "Confessional." - It may be a song of adoration, or it may be merely a narrative poem recording the history of God's people. Let the tune reflect the thought expressed. Take, for example, Psalm 126 -

"They 'mong the heathen said, The Lord
great things for them hath wrought.
The Lord hath done great things for us,
whence joy to us is brought."
The whole Psalm echoes the joy and exultation of freedom and deliverance from bondage; and yet for many years this Psalm was traditionally sung to the tune "St. Agnes," a tune in slow, plaintive measure eminently suitable to that great Song of the Captivity, Psalm 137:

"By Babel's streams we sat and wept
when Sion we thought on.
In midst thereof we hanged our harps
the willow trees upon."

Some few Psalms of course will be inseparable from what we have come to regard as their "own tune." Among them will be "All people that on earth do dwell"; Psalm 121 to "French," or Psalm 122 to "St Paul." But generally speaking the Precentor will be on his own in selecting the tune, and it is here that his own innate sense of music have to come to his assistance.

Is it a marching song? Then let us have a marching tune:
"I joy'd when to the house of God
Go up they said to me . . ."

Is it a Psalm of supplication?
"Lo, I do stretch my hands
To Thee, my help alone? . . ."

Again, let us have a tune to reflect the prayerful expectancy of the thought which finds expression upon our lips.