Embedded Files
by Rebecca Mebert, Music Coordinator/Accompanist
Music is such a critical component of worship together. As we all begin to emerge from the COVID crisis which changed us all forever, the questions come from music colleagues, friends from other congregations, and choirs as to what we do about masking for safety. It is great to know that we have just engaged with it as a normal part of life for the protection of the most vulnerable among us. Singing, at the beginning of the pandemic, was responsible for the rapid spread of the virus for obvious reasons. So, we continue and have learned to still sing with feeling, production, and spirit!
Through the Easter Season, Ernest Backus led us as interim Choir Director. Aimée Backus took a planned 6-week maternity leave and has now returned to lead us through the rest of the choir year that will end in June. We welcome Imogen Ines Backus, born March 24, into our choir and church family!
One of the joys in our church life is the acceptance of children in our worship service in whatever way the parents find helpful. Aoife, now 4, began being a part of mom’s work as director, snuggled in a wrap as Aimée directed. She has continued to be a part of our music as mom and dad led us in singing hymns and anthems. Creative motion & dance is now a natural part of music in worship with Aoife’s joyful dance.
We often hand out rhythm instruments to anyone who wants to use them as we sing songs that invite this sound. Including children and their families in ringing chimes for hymns from time to time invites them to be a part of our worship without extra rehearsals that become so challenging for already-packed family lives.
Easter Sunday, the children’s area was full of families with young children and we hope they will always feel welcome and included. We want to invite any suggestions for how we can include and encourage your families in our music. We welcome your volunteering to do something musical by just speaking to one of our directors or me as coordinator.
On Pentecost Sunday, June 4, we will celebrate Pastor Kimberly’s 10-year anniversary with an outdoor service/picnic (next to our building) with lots of opportunities for joining in our music with rhythm instruments on some of the hymns! We will also have vocal choir and handchimes. IT IS NOT TOO LATE to join in one of our choirs in the next few weeks. Voice choir rehearsal: Wednesdays 6:30–7:30 pm in the choir room at the end of the hall on the main floor. Bell choir rehearsal: Sundays following worship in the sanctuary. No prior experience necessary. Directors: Aimée Backus, Voice; Austin Shadduck, Bells.
A Small Step Toward Justice
A Small Step Toward Justice
The session and the music leadership of our congregation has been wrestling for a while with the question of how to acknowledge the creators of the Negro spiritual tradition. As a predominantly white congregation who benefits from and makes regular use of their compositions, we are beginning to reckon with the knowledge the enslaved people who composed this music were never paid for their art, and looking for ways to offer compensation to Black inheritors of this musical tradition.
To make a beginning, the session has voted to commit $250, approximately what we pay each year to copyright managers for our worship music, to an organization or a cause that supports the ongoing work of the Black church and its musical traditions. This year we will send the money to the Samuel DeWitt Proctor Conference, Inc. (SDPC), a national organization known to and supported by Pastor Kimberly. The mission of the Samuel DeWitt Proctor Conference, Inc. (SDPC) is to nurture, sustain, and mobilize the African-American faith community in collaboration with civic, corporate, and philanthropic leaders to address critical needs of human rights and social justice within local, national, and global communities. SDPC seeks to strengthen the individual and collective capacity of thought leaders and activists in the church, academy, and community through education, advocacy, and activism.
Matt Johnson has reached out to Professor Anne Bailey, Director of the Harriet Tubman Center for Freedom and Equality at Binghamton University, about other opportunities closer to home for us to support with future contributions, and about how we can better educate ourselves to work for justice between Black and white Christians in Binghamton and in our nation. We look forward to the next steps on this important journey.
Organ concerts at Northminster Presbyterian Church
Organ concerts at Northminster Presbyterian Church
Northminster Presbyterian Church is excited to announce that the historic pipe organ from the former Ross Memorial Presbyterian Church is now ready to be celebrated! After over a year of restoration, upgrading, and installation work, the organ was dedicated in a special worship service on Saturday, April 15. There will be a concert of a few different small ensembles and organ on May 13 at 3pm. And on June 11 at 4pm, the local American Guild of Organists will hold a members’ recital.
Both events are open to the public and all are welcome. Northminster Presbyterian Church is located at 711 Farm-to-Market Road, Endwell, NY 13760.
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