Music of the New Testament

Jesse Erickson:

Psalmody benefits from a continuing legacy left by French and English Protestants and their melodic expressions of faith. In the sixteenth century, John Calvin grasped the profound spiritual power of music, particularly the captivating practice of setting psalms to melodies. Calvin believed that these songs should not be limited to the choir, but rather, everyone should engage in their melodic embrace. He held that through song, one could invoke and praise God with heightened fervor and devotion.

Calvinist psalmody is associated with the metrical psalter, a form of the tradition wherein verse translation of the Book of Psalms is entirely intended for church hymns. Such translations are further characterized by their harmonic arrangements, which are restricted to vocal performance in the most conservative examples. Among the examples of these compositions, you can discover the music for Psalm 1, sung here by the Gesualdo Consort, which is preserved within the pages of the 1647 Charenton New Testament.

Offered by the Parisian bookseller and printer Pierre Des Hayes, Charenton proved to be somewhat of a refuge and marketplace for French Protestants after the Edict of Nantes in 1598 placed restrictions on where the reformed could erect their places of worship. Some of the savvier Parisian booksellers and printers kept their Paris addresses, but set up shop in the area to cater specifically to this community. Des Hayes appears to have had familial connections with the Celliers, further pointing to a Calvinist connection. Notably, Antoine Cellier of Paris and Charenton was the only printer to produce Huguenot historical calendars after 1661.