Music
. . . with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God.
Collosians 3:16
NEW CHOIR SEASON
From end of August 2010
We are looking for more people to sing with us this season. All voices, soprano, alto, tenor and bass very welcome. Rehearsals are on Friday evenings in the choir vestry and we intend to keep up our proud tradition of supplying a choral motet at all sung eucharists. Do come along and help us!
Our church services would lose much of their beauty and ordered dignity without music. At the main 10:30 service on Sundays, our Eucharist is generally sung by choir and congregation with organ accompaniment.
We are quite a traditional congregation and this fact moulds our music making. The principal Sunday morning service is a Sung Eucharist. Evening services are rare, although we usually sing Compline on a Friday evening throughout Lent.
The church is fortunate in possessing a fine three-manual pipe organ, rebuilt in 1981. A small choir delivers quality settings of the Eucharist by composers like Richard Proulx (A Community Mass), Alan Wilson (Mass of All Saints), Anthony Greening (A Mass for Unity) and Richard Shephard's ubiquitous Addington Service. Special occasions provide excuses for more flamboyant settings, from Viennese Masses in Latin to joyful 21st Century settings. Normally, however, we are mindful of the need to sing music that is accessible to the congregation.
Our small numbers restrict the repertoire of the weekly Communion Motet, but our resources and determination are sufficient to deliver an anthem most Sundays throughout the year.
A Music Group including guitarists, violin and viola players, keyboard and
other instruments, works happily on its own and with the organist and choir. The group usually takes responsibility for one service a month – usually an all-age Eucharist, and often makes other important vocal and instrumental contributions as well. The main hurdle to even closer co-operation between the Music Group and the more "traditional" organ and choir is that the organ is tuned slightly below concert pitch.
Our main hymn book is Common Praise, with Common Ground and other modern publications providing important input. Needless to say, we are signed up to CCLI and pay our dues.
Several music-related downloads are available here.
Finally, dear reader, if you live within travelling distance and can sing, we want to hear from you. We are a small but very welcoming congregation and it is always a struggle to maintain high standards and the numbers needed to deliver them.
