United Benefice of Thornhill & Whitley Lower
Serving our local communities
Director of Music Post July 2023
United Benefice of Thornhill and Whitley Lower
Director
of Music
Still available
We are looking to recruit an experienced organist and choir leader as our Director of Music.
Set in this lovely part of West Yorkshire, the person appointed will be responsible for music provision at our two churches – Thornhill St Michael and All Angels (service at 930) and Whitley Lower ( service at 1115). In addition there will be an opportunity to be involved with all our musical activities with schools and the local community.
We use the organ for most of our services but once a month we have a small guitar and piano band which lead the service at Thornhill. We have an enthusiastic small choir at Thornhill who rehearse every Wednesday at 1800.
You must have an interest in traditional and modern hymns and songs.
Enthusiasm to lead us from the rigours of Covid 19 and losing our previous Director to a bright future is important,
The Thornhill J. J. Binns organ was restored in 2015 as part of a Lottery funded scheme. The organ at Whitley is also by Binns and is almost in it’s original form but needs work doing to it. Our wish is to develop all aspects of the music of the church and develop the community choi r and interest in the organ.
Salary about £4.5k p.a.+ weddings and funerals.
Closing date for Applications -as soon as you can
Please see our website for Job Brief and more details of our churches.
https://www.thornhillparishchurch.org.uk/music.htm
Job Brief click
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Applications should be returned as soon as possible to
Brian Pearson Churchwarden
click here
Contact 07947722385 for further information
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The Community Choir meets every Tuesday at 4.15 and remains FREE and open to all --in Church until 5.30 each week in Term Time.
Musical Director of the Community Choir - is Charlie Murray
Some of our services are available on You Tube- here is the link to one of them
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Music at Thornhill
The Thornhill Song The Only place to be
Together a song expressing the idea of Being Together- very popular in school.
A generous grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund has made it possible for the organ to be restored, and we plan to have the whole community learning and participating in live music in the church. For more information on the scheme, please click here.
Music development
We have just comp[leted a project to develop the music offered at Thornhill Parish Church. This includes developing the exisiting choirs in the Benefice churches, setting up a community choir, and building on our musical links with local schools.. There is some Admin support available. The Project ended in July 2019
Children regularly come into the church. Here are two photos when two local schools came to hear the restored organ demonstrated.
Community choir. After lsoing our MD through illness during the pandemic we are currently looking for a new MD to start as soon as we can do so.
UsuallyPractices on Wednesdays at 1615. No auditions, no age criteria just come and enjoy singing together.
Work in schools there are regular visits to church from local schools covering many different topics run by our specialist group of colleagues. In the Let there be Music project wasa major project in place at the two Primary schools which will culminated in two concerts on 26th June 2019.
Church Choir
The choir in the Benefice is a friendly group of singers who meet for the love of singing, anyone can sing with the group, and it does not matter how much experience you have. There is no need to audition.
The choir rehearses at Thornhill church on Wednesday evenings, 6.00-7.00 pm. Everyone is welcome to join - just come along and give it a try!
Worship Group
Concerts and Recitals
The church has an active concert series and welcomes artists and performers from across the region. For details of upcoming performances, please click here.
Organ
The recently restored organ at Thornhill is a fine two-manual Binns instrument. It was restored by Malcolm Spink in 2015. The opening recital was given in May 2016 by the renowned organist Gordon Stewart. A professional recording with Gordon as artist is now available as a CD . For more information, please click here.
Contact
For more information about music at Thornhill Parish Church, please contact Brian at webeditor@thornhillparishchurch.org.uk
