Sing my Soul

R4 Announcement:

It’s ten past eight and now time for Sunday Worship from Oldham Parish Church which on this Music Sunday celebrates the power of choral music. It begins now as the Diocese of Manchester Choral Scholars sing a work by the American composer Ned Rorem, “Sing my soul, his wondrous love”.

MUSIC: CHORAL SCHOLARS - Sing my Soul (Ned Rorem)

SPEECH: DANIEL BURTON

Welcome to Sunday Worship from Oldham Parish Church in Greater Manchester. My name is Daniel Burton and I am vicar here. I am joined for today’s worship by our assistant curate Hannah Currin and members of our congregation. 

We are worshipping in our magnificent Georgian Parish Church which will be celebrating its bicentenary in 2030. 

Oldham has a fascinating history as the one-time cotton capital of the British Empire and as a town whose fortunes have reflected Britain’s post-industrial history over the past 50 years. Today the church is home to a strong multi-cultural congregation with close links to civic institutions, four church schools, community organisations supporting local residents, and our beloved Oldham Athletic Football Club.

Oldham also has a great tradition of choral music, brass bands, and theatre, and we are celebrating something of that inheritance in our worship today. 

In this service, we give thanks for the power of choral music through Sing My Soul — a pioneering new project in the Diocese of Manchester that builds on that tradition while opening fresh opportunities for mission through music. At the heart of Sing My Soul is a group of choral scholars based here in Manchester, who opened our worship this morning.

Here in Oldham, as part of the project, we have also been privileged to nurture a children’s choir at Holy Cross Church of England Primary School. Over recent months, the children have given their time, energy, and enthusiasm to learning new music together.

They now lead us in worship with the much-loved hymn Give Me Oil in my Lamp - a song full of energy, hope, and thanksgiving.

MUSIC – Holy Cross Primary School Choir - Give me joy in my heart

SPEECH: HANNAH CURRIN

God of all creation

For whom the church, in liturgy and song,

Has borne faithful witness through the centuries;

Let us be your instruments of praise,

That in us may be found that new dimension of sound

Which tunes our souls and bodies

To the infinite beauty of your truth

And the profound glory of your eternal light.

For you reign, Trinity in unison,

God in harmony,

Now and forever. Amen. 

SPEECH: DANIEL BURTON

The choirs and congregation now join together in the much-loved Victorian hymn “Angel voices ever-singing”.

MUSIC: ALL SINGERS

Angel Voices Ever Singing

SPEECH: DANIEL BURTON

The Sing my Soul project is a collaboration between the Diocese of Manchester and St Martin-in-the-Fields in London. Andrew Earis, Director of Music at St Martin’s, tells us more.

SPEECH: ANDREW EARIS

Sing My Soul is a fresh and imaginative approach to church growth, using the power of choral music to reach new audiences, build community, and create meaningful connections through shared musical experience.

At the heart of the project are ten choral scholars: talented young singers recruited from Manchester’s universities who participate in a year-long singing programme. Alongside them, a group of choral leaders, who receive their training and support from the St Martin’s music team, and work to establish adult community choirs, junior choirs, and school choirs, with all activity carefully tailored to the context and needs of each individual church.

What makes Sing My Soul distinctive is that the project has two parallel aims.

Firstly, it adopts a clear, mission-focused approach in which each church explores how newcomers might journey from their first encounter with music to deeper engagement with the church community. Music is then intentionally woven into this journey as a means of connection.

Secondly, the project sustains a high-level choral training programme – both for singers and directors - nurturing the next generation of church musicians. new junior and community choirs have been formed, concerts have been hosted, new patterns of worship have begun and existing worship has been strengthened.

This flourishing of music and participation finds a natural expression in Psalm 150, where all creation is called to praise God with exuberant and varied sounds. The Choral Scholars now lead us in this joyful hymn of praise, which invites everyone to glorify God through music, singing, dancing, and every kind of instrument.

MUSIC: CHORAL SCHOLARS - PSALM 150 chant by Talbot

SPEECH: EIBHLIN

My name is Eibhlin and I’m one of the Sing My Soul Choral Scholars.

MUSIC: CHORAL SCHOLARS - All for thee, Paul S Kellner

READING: EDIN THAMBI

COLOSSIANS 3:12-17

SPEECH: HANNAH CURRIN

When I was a child, I remember one Sunday our parish priest boldly asking the congregation to sing the first hymn again, because, he declared, “God made the nightingale, and God made the crow, I want to hear everyone’s voice!” 

Not every voice is polished. Not every note is perfect.

But every voice matters.

Because singing, in the life of the church, is not really about performance.

Singing is about participating in the song of the whole of God’s creation which has been going on long before we join in.

When we sing together, we step into something much bigger than ourselves.

St Paul has likely never met the Christians in Colossae, the Colossians, but he knows enough about them. They are a young and fragile community, struggling with competing expectations, religious and political pressures, anxieties about who belongs, and the exhausting demands placed upon them by others. They are trying to work out what it means to live faithfully together.

And so Paul writes to encourage them. He tells them to “clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience… and with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God.”

After everything Paul says to the fractious Colossians, he offers a solution in something beautiful: singing.

Because singing does something words alone cannot.

Singing gives us the tools to articulate the full range of human emotion. Joy, yes, but also lament, anger, longing, protest, hope. When speech fails, song remains. It reaches places in us that ordinary language cannot touch.

And in doing so, it turns our hearts to God.

Into that reality, we Oldhamers have been invited to sing in new ways as part of the Sing my Soul project in Manchester Diocese . Just like the Colossians, we are being encouraged to seek new ways to live as a whole people caught up in the resurrection story, by singing the Good news of Jesus Christ.

Oldham knows something about the depth of human experience. This is a town like many here in the North known as post-industrial. It holds a cultural diversity and richness, but is also marked by food and fuel poverty, poor health and life expectancy, unemployment, racial tension, and division between neighbours and political parties.

And yet, it is also where our places of worship strive to be communities of peace, diversity and inclusion, where people continue to hope, to share life, and to build better lives.

That’s part of what makes this diocesan Sing My Soul project so powerful, especially here in Oldham. We gather to rehearse. But not to impress, rather to offer something together to God that none of us could offer alone. A bold act of praise that gathers every kind of voice. It’s intergenerational, and offered to people of all ability and stage of faith.

This boldness has deep roots. Tracing as far back as 1701, Oldham Parish Church claims to be the first in England to have allowed women to sing in the church choir even if, at the time, they were hidden behind a screen. Imperfect as that was, it was a step toward a fuller, richer, more truthful song. And that journey continues whenever we widen the circle of whose voices are heard.

We see that same spirit in many traditions the world over: in gospel music born out of suffering and resistance, in protest songs that cry out for dignity, in communities, including LGBTQ+ voices who sing themselves into visibility and truth. Song becomes a way of saying: we are still here, we always have been, and God is at work through us.

Here in Oldham, as we strive to be a place where All are truly welcome, singing is a move towards this greater vision of inclusion. We catch a glimpse of this in our links with our local school. The children have enjoyed singing and leading every month at a mid-day choral praise here and I love to hear the joy in their voices as they sing together.

Colossians says: “Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts… and be thankful.” Singing forms that peace in us. It binds us together across difference. It teaches us to listen as well as to speak.

And more than that. it gives us a foretaste of heaven.

The Bible’s vision of heaven is full of song. Not perfect solos, but a joyful and riotous multitude. There’s not necessarily uniformity but there is harmony. Every tribe, every language, every story is woven into one great act of praise.

So when we sing here in Oldham amid all the complexity and challenge of this place we call home, we are not trying to escape the sometimes harsh realities.

We are warming up our voices to join in with the work of God in this place.

And we are rehearsing for eternity.

We may not all be nightingales, but we are all God’s beloved.

Let the word of Christ dwell in us richly as we sing.

Alleluia, Amen

MUSIC: CHOIRS

Eternal God, we give you thanks for music - John Rutter

SPEECH: DANIEL BURTON

John Rutter’s setting of “Eternal God, we give you thanks for music,” sung by the choirs here at Oldham Parish Church, a prayerful expression of gratitude for the gift of music itself. Our intercessions will be led by two of our authorised lay ministers Susan and Sally:

SPEECH: SUSAN AND SALLY

In the quietness, aware that we are only part of a great multitude, on earth and in heaven, who share in the Church’s offering of worship, let us join ourselves with them and bring to God in prayer our own hopes and needs, together with those of all his children. Through silence, spoken word and music, let us be open to the God who both listens and speaks to us. 

For your Church here in Oldham, throughout this land, and throughout the world, seeking the renewal of her unity, drawing people to Christ, and proclaiming your love in all the world…… 

SPEECH ALL: Lord hear us

For the leaders of the churches, for all who share Christ's ministry in this place, and especially for those who order the worship of your people, that many may draw close to you in prayer and praise…..

SPEECH ALL: Lord hear us

For all whom you inspire to compose music, for all to whom you give skill and devotion to perform it, and for all your children who are enriched and renewed by it….. 

SPEECH ALL: Lord hear us

For the nations of the world, seeking the path to peace and justice: for this country, for Charles our King, and for all who strive to build here a free and just society 

SPEECH ALL: Lord hear us

For those who suffer in mind and body, and for those who dedicate their lives to caring for their neighbours

SPEECH ALL: Lord hear us

For all who have gone before us in the faith of Christ, for those who in past generations have enriched your Church with fine music, and for all who have served as musicians in this parish

SPEECH ALL: Lord hear us

We sum up all of our prayers as we listen to the Lord’s Prayer sung by Holy Cross Junior Choir.

MUSIC: JUNIOR CHOIR

The Lord’s Prayer - Lucy Walker

SPEECH: DANIEL BURTON

To close our worship today,, the choirs and congregation lift their voices in the uplifting hymn “How shall I sing that majesty.” With words by John Mason, this reflective yet joyful text draws us into awe and wonder at the greatness of God. As we sing, may psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs continue to unite us with one another, and draw us ever closer to the God from whom all good things flow.

MUSIC: ALL SINGERS

How shall I sing that majesty

SPEECH: DANIEL BURTON

May the songs of the angels sustain you, may the praises of the saints inspire you, may the silent music of the Unseen Trinity be in your heart, and the blessing of God almighty, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, be among you and remain with you always. 

Amen

ORGAN VOLUNTARY

Karl Elert – Nun Danket

Closing Anno from Radio 4:

Sunday Worship came from Oldham Parish Church. The service was led by The Reverand Canon Daniel Burton and the preacher was Reverand Hannah Currin. Andrew Earis was the musical director and was joined by the Sing My Soul Choral Scholars, the Choir of Oldham Parish Church and of Holy Cross Church of England Primary School. The organist was John Hosking. Sunday Worship was produced by Abi Thomas.