Music life - future directions
Within churches and other organisations which rely heavily on voluntary and unpaid
office-bearers, there is a perhaps regrettable tendency to give no thought to relief and
to accept the status quo as long as the incumbent is breathing. The alternative is
quickly assigned to the “too-hard basket”.
These issues are by no means unique to church music. Other members of our
congregation may identify with them.
Our church instrumental musicians are sliding gracefully but inexorably into their 77 th
year. Both still enjoy reasonably good health but, as we all know, anything can happen
and often does – suddenly and unexpectedly. They confess to feeling the passage of
the years and, because playing can be so taxing, they are frequently left feeling
physically and emotionally drained.
Each is now asking some searching questions:
for how much longer will I be able to keep doing it?
for how much longer do I want to keep doing it?
for how much longer should I be expected to do it?
It is perhaps timely for the congregation of St Margaret’s, and the church council in
particular, to ponder upon the future directions of our church musical life.
What form should the music component of our services take, say, 5 years hence?
Who would provide it?
For example, should use be made of prerecorded music to accompany singing?
(Some of the tunes for the hymns in the “Together in Song” hymn book are available
on CDs.)
If reliance is to continue to be placed on a live musician or musicians - who?
(Editor: Similar questions probably could be
asked with respect to other roster tasks
and, indeed, other church activities. It has
already proved difficult to fill all rosters and
to organize things such as Luncheon Group
and Fork ‘n Talk. This doesn’t mean we
should be negative about the future though;
it may well mean that we have to identify
new approaches or solutions. Certainly, the
issue raised by our musicians needs to be
considered—not just by them or by Church
Council but by us all.)
Photo by Brian Rope
St Margaret's News
2
December 2015