By the time many of you read this the Bridge St. United Church congregation will have concluded it's "celebration of music" worship. Of course every Sunday is an opportunity for praise, but today we covenanted with our dedicated choir and music director Terry Head. We also thanked former choir members for their years of service. But we focused on how music shapes us and our worship, and we heard two anthems, and the bells, along with including the children in making music. Terry also used our Casavant organ to its fullest, the largest pipe organ between Toronto and Montreal I'm told.
In over thirty years of ministry there have always been choirs in the congregations I served, but we have ventured into other possibilities for leading the community in song, including different musical instruments. While in Halifax a choir member who considered herself the arbiter of musical taste tearfully stormed out of the sanctuary one Christmas Eve when she saw two guitars on stands at the front of the sanctuary. The two accomplished young players accompanied the carol Silent Night --which was written for guitar!
Through the years I have served in congregations using the old blue Hymnary (Newfoundland) to the red hymn book, to Voices United and More Voices. Nothing stays the same musically, even though some wish it would, and we are the better for it.
In our time is there still a place for a pipe organ, knowing that many very active congregations have gone to praise bands exclusively? Does it make sense to have traditional choirs (and choir gowns) or use hymn books? Here we seem to be charting a course between the traditional music of our faith and the fresh possibilities for praise.
Whatever we choose, we gotta sing! What are your thoughts? What are your feelings, because music evokes strong feelings?
2 comments:
I LOVE a good organ and I love singing in a good choir - but I also love variety in church music - including a praise band, rhythm instruments (a guitar for Silent Night ... PERFECT - can we do it????), bells (of course), other solo instruments (trumpet, flute, etc) and solos, duets, trios, quartets, octets, etc - the more variety we have, the more talents we use ! (And we are blessed with a music director at BSUC who is willing to do a variety of things musically, including using more modern music along with the traditional stuff that we all know ands love (we had to learn to love that at one point, so we can learn and love other stuff, too !).
*Now, David, you KNEW I could not keep silent on this one ! ;-)
if music be the words of love play on .... give me a booming majestic organ playing joy to the world christmas morning shivers down the sign, music is a great way to celibrate god... any type
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