The Christ Church Psalter was assembled in the early 2000s by Michael Lindstrom, organist and choirmaster at Christ Church, Georgetown in Washington DC, and Chris Biemesderfer, a singer and organist who was a member of the Christ Church choir. Our main goal was to make the psalter more easily singable, by providing an edition from which choirs can focus on rendering texts in their best sung form.

Anglican chant is a polyphonic form of chant, one of several such forms that evolved in the wake of the Reformation. Anglican chant was collected in psalter books, a modern example of which is the Anglican Chant Psalter (Wyton 1987).

Psalter books have drawbacks. They are difficult to to sing from: singers essentially have to memorize the chant, and they have to know arcane typographic rules that mark up the text. Psalter books also often assign chants to certain psalm appointments – the Anglican Chant Psalter is an example where this done explicitly – so the chants are not interchangeable. Psalter books were produced this way for reasons of efficiency and cost containment that result from requirements of the printing process.

These days we are not so constrained. The Christ Church Psalter takes advantage of modern digital technology and information architecture practices so that psalm settings can be produced practically as they are needed. New chant settings and psalm pointings can be added as they are encountered. The result is a collection of resources that is quite large yet readily available.

Our hope is that parish and cathedral musicians will find the Christ Church Psalter helpful in worship.

Michael E. Lindstrom
Chris Biemesderfer
February 2007