With the “retirements” of our long-time music director, Marian Augustine, and our pianist and choir accompanist for over 20 years, Deb Galvin, we find ourselves with a blank slate, ready for and open to new shifts and changes in our Sunday musical offerings. As your new Co-Music Directors, we want to recognize the contributions that both of these women have made to the fellowship, and express that we will find it challenging to fill their shoes. Please bear with us as we experiment and try out some new approaches and styles. We welcome any and all suggestions and feedback about the music program, as we go along.

We would like to share with you some of our ideas and goals for the year ahead. We know that many of you enjoy our choir, The Fellowship Singers, both as singers and listeners. However, without a director, conductor and accompanist, we don’t see it continuing on a regular basis in the foreseeable future. If a group of singers want to get together to present choral music for special holidays and services, we highly encourage it and we will do all we can to support that. For instance, we do plan to have some festive choral music presented as part of our Christmas Service. In lieu of a more formal choir, our goal is to coordinate live music for Sunday morning that is presented by one, two, three, or even four singers, working together (on their own schedule that is convenient to them) to arrange and rehearse their piece of music. Another long-term goal is to develop a “house band” that will periodically present contemporary music with an upbeat, uplifting message. In particular, we are seeking a bass player and a drummer that can play a drum kit (we may be able to get the drums if drummer doesn’t have their own) or a multi-percussionist (hand drums, shakers and other percussion). Know anyone? Other trends will be the use of more pre-recorded music, recorded accompaniments and on-the-spot group song teaching during the service.

We want to engage the TPUUF members and friends by using your suggestions of material and having you participate in presenting music. We are looking for hymns and songs for congregational singing, preludes and postludes, musical mediations, and featured offertory musical presentations. One way we will be communicating to the singers and musicians of TPUUF will be a group email list. We will supply information about upcoming themes of the services and make suggestions of music that could be presented. If you would like to be on this list to receive periodic messages about coordinating upcoming music, please email us at [email protected] or talk to us at the fellowship and let us know how you would like to participate.