It has been a long time since the last article so I thought I'd better fill you in on what we've been up to recently. We've had quite a busy 2008 so far! We have continued to accompany worship songs at 'Praise Services' (3 or 4 so far this year so far). In fact on one of these Sundays, we provided the music for the entire service, giving our organist a rest!

We have continued to lead Taize services occasionally on a Sunday evening which have proved to be very peaceful and spiritual for the congregation who have attended. The next one will be on October 19th at 6.30pm - definitely worth trying out if you haven't done so already.

Once a quarter we've been having what we call 'Upstairs/Downstairs'  services  - during these mornings we have led worship song singing sessions and the closing contemporary worship. They are an opportunity to learn new songs and have a really good sing in a more informal setting.

We have continued to accompany the St Andrew's Singers on occasions and our next challenge is to accompany the singing of Roger Jones' musical 'While Shepherd's Watched' which will be presented on the morning of Dec 14th at 10.30am. Lots of practice will be required I'm sure!

We have had a recent addition to the group in the form of Sam Knight who is our drummer (a first for our church!) - he played for the first time on Sunday morning in our Upstairs/Downstairs service and was great - a real asset to the group and hopefully not too much of a shock for everyone else!!

Helen North (Music group leader)

The Music Group is a group of ten enthusiastic musicians led by pianist Helen North. We play an active part in worship at various times of the year mainly leading the singing in 'Praise Services' when we accompany modern worship songs.

We also accompany the choir in the singing of musicals by Roger Jones, the most recent being 'Pharisee' and 'Saints Alive'. In May this year we were part of the choir's tour of West Virginia, USA which was a wonderful experience.  Taize worship also features occasionally in our evening worship and we lead the singing in those services too.