The function of a musical narrative of AMC is to provide a baseline for evaluation of what our needs in music are, provide an informational narrative to new members, and new staff members.

In putting together a job description for Music Minister it is important to lay out some of the unspoken assumptions that are present but less “objective” than particular items that can be identified and put in the job description. For new members coming into the worshipping community at AMC, it gives a sense of who we are in relationship to our music. For incoming staff it is invaluable to understand the fabric of the organization where they will be employed.

The narrative for the most part will be grouped around several topics. The topics are: singing, instruments, leadership, children and pastoral implications of music.

Singing

Akron is a singing congregation, scratch us and we sing, bruise us and we sing, make us happy and we sing. It is an impulse buried deep in the congregation from the very beginning. Its genesis may be from the first members of the church who were for a large part educated in our church colleges and many of them excellent singers. The passing on of this 4 part-singing heritage is an important part of who AMC is musically.

The selection of songs on a Sunday Morning is given a great deal of thought for the context of the morning both musically and textually. Making the selection fit a mold is less of an issue when you deal with diversity in style as a tool rather than as a goal to be met. Worship planners deal with a rich variety of resources musically for worship planning. The styles mentioned here will be traditional, ecumenical, contemporary and global.

Style-Traditional

Singing at AMC has centered around the 4 part traditional unaccompanied singing. AMC has had six hymnals in its short life, Church Hymnal (CH), Songs of the Church (SOC), The Mennonite Hymnal (MH), Sing and Rejoice (SR), The Worship Book (WB) and the homemade With Many Voices (WMV). Of all the things we do musically at AMC singing together in this style is the most important in the minds of a majority of members. The other important Mennonite hymnal Church and Sunday School Hymnal, never made it inside the doors physically, but was imprinted deeply within the memories of the early members.

Style-Ecumenical

Mennonite Hymnody is based historically on borrowing. It has only been in recent years that honest attempts have been made to find a Mennonite voice in either hymn tunes or poetry, so whether AMC seeks it or not, we are great borrowers from other Ecumenical traditions in our music. We have fed that steam in recent years by involvement in the wider church through participation in the Hymn Society of the United States and Canada and Choristers Guild.

Style-Contemporary

This style potentially contains a wide variety of Christian music. In some areas of the Mennonite Church significant heat over the issue of contemporary music has been generated. AMC has largely been spared a huge debate over this issue; in part because of our use of the music when appropriate and part because we generally are a tolerant congregation and have been accepting of each other's journeys recognizing that what may speak to one may not speak to another. We need to give each other the grace to express our diversity within the family that is AMC.

Style-Global

AMC is a “globally focused” congregation. That is a part of the fabric of the congregation. The close proximity of MCC, the ties between individuals and MCC and our own interest in outreach make it so. Our music reflects this almost every Sunday, whether singing, “If you believe and I believe” or “Ashanti, amen”, we are exposed to the global dimension of our music. This is brought to the congregation in several ways, the quarterly Hymnal Subscription Service and the experience of our members.

Style-Mennonite Hymnody

If there is a developing style of good Mennonite Hymnody it has its roots in two locations and events. First is the annual “Worship and Music leaders workshop at Laurelville, second are the Pastors week events held at Elkhart or other ancillary workshops held at AMBS. Laurelville has evolved to a well-attended event for practitioners of worship and music. The churches that attend are among the leaders in their conference in practice. Mennonite Hymnody is still borrowing, but borrowing with more care and deliberateness for what is appropriate to our Anabaptist orientation. The creation of new music still lags behind the borrowing, but is making great strides; examples can be found quarterly in the subscription service and in the Worship Book.

Song leaders

A song leader leads the singing at AMC. AMC is such a well-trained congregation that it is possible for the congregation to sing with minimal direction. Because of years of using a song leader following a piano or singing spontaneously seems difficult. It is a discipline that could add to our musical richness. Persons joining AMC from other Mennonite traditions are usually astonished at the level of the singing. An example would be the 4-part singing of the Halleluiah Chorus as a congregation at Easter.

AMC has a wide variety of song leaders, with different interests and talents. From time to time there are small workshops for the song leaders dealing with specific issues and methods. These have not been scheduled on a regular basis.

Learning New Music

Learning new music at AMC remains a challenge on several levels first, how much and second, what kind and third, how. Over the years AMC has used various methods to learn new music, the choir, small groups, and total immersion. The single most effective way to teach new music has been one voice to one set of ears, this lining out and repeating brings the listener into active participation.

Acoustics

Moving to the “sanctuary” from the “assembly room” after AMC's building program had a detrimental affect on the singing, because of the superior quality of the acoustics in the “assembly room.” In the new “sanctuary” unless you are sitting far front and in the middle you have the feeling of singing “alone”. From time to time the congregation is asked to stand and move to the middle of the room to sing, this greatly improves the quality of the singing.

Choirs

AMC has had a love hate relationship with the church choir for years. It is something universally appreciated when it appears. Getting it to appear on a regular basis has historically been the struggle. Though AMC is not different on that count than many other protestant churches, it would just like to be different. The problem has been variously described as leadership, commitment, lack of interest and many other depreciatingly descriptive phrases. Two areas do stand out at AMC; first AMC is blessed with an inordinate amount of excellent voices. So these voices are in demand and used by Lancaster Symphony Chorus, Wheatland Chorale, Lancaster Chamber Singers, Lancaster/Franconia Singers and Lancaster Opera Company. Second many of our singers already lead extremely busy lives, which make their time a premium.

As a group church choir can pull together and do a credible presentation on Sunday Morning, but it is often rehearsed at the last minute.

The Church Choir has when challenged performed well in performing large choral works. Over the years this has included: Amal and the Night Visitors, Seven Last Words of Christ and Vivaldi's Gloria and excerpts for the Messiah. On these occasions supplemental instruments were brought into expand our resources.

Going against this grain is the AMC Men's choir which started meeting 10 years ago every third Sunday for 10 months each year. The early years were a struggle, since the only rehearsal was on Sunday Morning at 8AM. Due to the persistence and vision of Warren Leatherman that group has matured into a good group of singers. The group consists of about 25 men and has gone to other churches in the area to sing on Sunday Morning.

Instruments

The piano is the instrument most often seen and heard at AMC. The grand piano was loaned to AMC shortly after the new building was occupied and several years later it was purchased. The piano has been used more in the new building, than it was in the original building. There are strong feelings on the part of some members about the use of the piano to accompany singing. For the most part it is used to supplement the singing, although the church has not adopted a formal policy on the use of the piano as some congregations have.

Strings are the next most heard and used instruments in the congregation. That is due in part to the significant impact the Martin family, Eric, Emily and Amy, have had in playing and teaching. Orph instruments came to the congregation some years ago as a vehicle to involve children more easily in the worship service. Several families have gifted to AMC the instruments and they are used frequently. Brass instruments have not played a large role, because we have had few teachers or students of brass in the congregation.

In addition to these instruments we have guitar players, an Oboe player, a Clarinet player and a few other instruments. Drumming is quite popular and we have and are developing a number of good drummers.

Children's Music

Children's music at AMC has not had the same consistency that other aspects of music and worship have had. Children have music time prior to Sunday school and this sometimes results in performance for the larger congregation. A systematic music path has not been developed the way Junior Christian Education has developed. Some have questioned if music time isn't babysitting time for the children whose parents are in coffee hours.

Part of the dilemma has to do with leadership and assigned responsibility and part has to do with getting children's music on the agenda. Lack of an over all plan for how we musically educate our children and pass on the important parts of our traditions has to date not been fully owned by any group in the congregation.

On several occasions musicals have been rehearsed and performed by the children of AMC, with great success. Who could forget the summer rendition of “Godspell” or “Smoke on the Mountain.”? These events require vision and planning and commitment on the part of the entire congregation.

Leadership

For many years leadership of the music program was volunteer and was lodged with the music committee, who spend a good deal of time filling slots for the worship committee. The worship committee had overall responsibility for worship planning. Around 1990 the worship committee was dissolved. The worship committee function was handled by the pastoral team with assistance from the music committee. Around this time AMC had paid leadership with Cheryl Eshleman and Marcy Hostetler. The leadership structure changed and these positions were dropped and volunteer leadership picked up again.

A change from volunteer leadership occurred in 1996 or 1997 when the first paid Minister of Music was brought on staff in the person of Larry Penner.. During the short tenure of the first music minister, the music committee was dormant. When the Music Minister resigned to pursue teaching the music committee filled in. During the tenure of the last Music Minister, Mary Ann Johnson the music committee was basically a sounding board and resource.

The addition of a music minister to AMC changed our music program significantly. It was easier to obtain volunteers, a wider variety of person were mentored and encouraged and the congregation began to feel the “pastoral” nature of the music minister's role. The music minister became much more than slot filler. They were a resource to members and pastoral team in worship planning. Our worship patterns took on more meaning.

Professional Musicians

The narrative needs to say something about “professional musicians.” There are not many persons in the purest sense of the word at AMC that are paid to perform or make a living from music. There are some teachers and performers. There are a great many more that have the ability to be professional, those who have a professional quality trained voice, or who play keyboard to accompany choirs or could sit in the first chair of an orchestra. AMC has been about using all the talents of the congregation. At times people will say, I can't play or sing like…... so why should I try. The role of a nurturing congregation and a sensitive attuned music leadership can be helpful in both recognizing the professional and enabling the less than professional. AMC would be a poorer place, if the bar were so high that Eric Martin hadn't had the opportunity to play a prelude when he was --- years old.

The Pastoral Role of Music

Music is one of the most visceral impulses of the human experience. It touches us where nothing else can and when nothing else can. The ability to be moved in worship by music is a near universal experience. Is it the poetry? Is it the music? How can the notes on the pages jump out and so quickly transport us.

Music touches that hidden memory from years ago, reminds us of a person, and brings the present to the fore in a flash. Music can move us through worship, it is prayer, it is pleading, it is healing and we can't stop it, only be open to where God's grace takes us. This is the ministry of music.

AMC has been fortunate to experience this music ministry. It cannot in a sense be planned, but it doesn't just happen. Our narrative history brings us to these points in worship, as a worshipping people and a musical people.

• Choirs