Music

Music plays an important part in the life of Jesmond URC, both in worship and in our outreach to the community. There are not many weeks when at least one concert, or maybe even a whole festival, does not take place in our church!

We use both the organ and piano in most of our services, depending on the music chosen, and sometimes other instruments as well. We are fortunate to have some very good musicians associated with the church. The music in our services ranges from traditional hymns to Taizé chants and music from the Iona Community. We keep abreast of new music and regularly add new hymns to our repertoire.



A new development in the past year has been the introduction of monthly Taizé-style services on Tuesdays at 6pm – an opportunity to light a candle, leave a prayer on our prayer board, and to spend some quiet time listening to beautiful music. We have been very much encouraged by the number of passers-by who have come to join us for these services.

Our buildings host meetings of ‘Let’s Play the Piano’, on the first Sunday afternoon of each month, and Newcastle Rock Choir, Newcastle Musical Theatre Company, Northumberland Orchestral Society, Newcastle Bach Choir, Newcastle Piano Festival, Royal Northern Sinfonia and other choirs and orchestras use our buildings for concerts and rehearsals. We also usually host some concerts during the Jesmond Community Festival.



We take our music out into the community as well, by monthly visits to a local care home for ‘Singing for Fun’, through our community choir, ‘Jesmond Sings’, which is run by two church members, and with our ‘Saturday Sings’ at the church once a term, when we learn new repertoire and generally have fun! We welcome all members of the community to these events.