Psalm 137 - Musical Settings

Musical Settings

The psalm, generally under variants of its title By the waters of Babylon, has been set to music by many composers.

Many musical settings omit the last verse. John L. Bell, a hymnwriter who writes many challenging texts himself, comments alongside his own setting of this Psalm: "The final verse is omitted in this metricization, because its seemingly outrageous curse is better dealt with in preaching or group conversation. It should not be forgotten, especially by those who have never known exile, dispossession or the rape of people and land."

• Latin settings (Super Flumina Babylonis) by Palestrina (1525–1594), Orlando di Lasso (1532–1594) and Nicolas Gombert (c. 1495 – c. 1560) as 4-voice motets.
• A Hebrew setting (עַל נַהֲרוֹת בָּבֶל, Al naharot Bavel) by Salamone Rossi (1570–1630) for 4 voices.
• 19th century French pianist-composer (1813–1888) Charles-Valentin Alkan's "Super Flumina Babylonis" Op. 52.
• Franz Liszt wrote a setting for soprano, harp, violin, choir and organ. A performance can be found at "Pipedreams" for October 10, 2011.
• It was the inspiration for the famous slave chorus Va, pensiero from the Giuseppe Verdi (1813–1901) opera Nabucco.
• The second of the Harry Partch (1901–1974) "Two Psalms" (1931) is "By the Rivers of Babylon" (1931–41), originally for adapted viola & intoning voice, with kithara and chromelodeon added in 1955.
• In the William Walton cantata Belshazzar's Feast a version of the opening section is set to music, as if sung by the Israelite captives in Babylon.
• An English setting ("By the Rivers of Babylon") by David Amram (b. 1930), SSAA (S-Soprano).
• It was set, as On the Willows, in the Stephen Schwartz Broadway musical Godspell.
• "Rivers of Babylon" is a rastafarian song written and recorded by Brent Dowe and Trevor McNaughton of the Jamaican reggae group The Melodians in 1970. It is featured in the film The Harder They Come and well known through its rendition by Boney M in the 1970s. In 1992, the rock/reggae group Sublime released a live cover of the song on their 40 oz. to Freedom album.
• Psalm 137:5–6 is the basis for the chorus of Matisyahu's single Jerusalem.
• It was the inspiration for Leonard Cohen's "By the Rivers Dark" on his 2001 album Ten New Songs.
• The first two verses were also used for a musical setting in a round by English composer Philip Hayes. Don McLean covered the song as 'Babylon', which was the final track on his 1971 album American Pie. Another cover of the round was featured at the end of the episode Babylon during the first season of Mad Men.
• The artist Fernando Ortega based the song "City of Sorrows" on Psalm 137.
• "I Hung My Harp Upon the Willows" is a song by The Trashcan Sinatras about poet Robert Burns