…with gratitude in your hearts
sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God.

Colossians 3:16

Music matters

Music is vitally important to worship, refreshing it in ways that words alone cannot do and helping to enable worship that renews and inspires.

Those who sing, pray twice (St Augustine)

At Holy Trinity, we use music in varied ways to enable all present to take part fully, consciously and actively.

  • Some of the music is unaccompanied, allowing the natural beauty of the human voice to be heard.
  • Most of the music is led by the organ or by other instruments, especially when the Music Group leads the singing.
  • We draw our main hymn resources from Common Praise, Sing Praise, Hymns for Prayer & Praise, Common Ground and Church Hymnary 4. These and other contemporary publications provide a rich and varied diet to our services.
  • Holy Trinity Church supports Church Music Scotland and is a member of the RSCM (Royal School of Church Music).

Resources

At Holy Trinity, we have:

  • a congregation that loves to sing and respond to new texts and tunes, often unaccompanied
  • a music group (4 – 6 in number) leading the music for all-age worship and other special occasions, featuring strings, flute, guitar, piano and occasional light percussion
  • an occasional choir singing for special services, using RSCM’s Voice for Life choir-training programme
  • a group of cantors who help lead the singing
  • organ students, progressing through stages of the Scottish Churches Organists Training Scheme (SCOTS), and who play for parts of services to gain experience before going on to play in other churches
  • a highly experienced Director of Music (pastoral musician, organist and choir director), in post since April 2012

Our building

The church is a training centre for Church Music Scotland (successor to RSCM Scotland), with

Circle with vertical lines, representing a waveform or perhaps organ pipes

festival rehearsals, events for young people, and music-reading skills.

Music team

  • Alistair Warwick Director of Music
  • Sarah and Alistair Shaw Music Group co-leaders
  • Laura Lyons, Robert Nellist, Gail Lamb, and Sally Boa cantors
  • Ulrike Wutscher cantor and soloist
  • Christoph Wutscher occasional organist & conductor
  • Laura Buxel was our Organ Scholar until 2024, and still plays occasionally at Holy Trinity.
  • Malcolm Allan† played for our weekday Eucharist and other occasions over 20 years. We are most grateful for his loving dedication and service. May he rest in peace.

Keyboard Instruments

We currently use the following keyboard instruments in the church:

  • a large pipe organ with pipework by William Hill and Peter Conacher (3 manual & pedal), rebuilt by Hill, Norman and Beard, and latterly by David Loosley in 1981, with a wide and varied range of sounds suitable for leading, accompanying and performance pieces NPOR
    (Like most pipe organs, it needs work – and more funds!)
  • an Ibach grand piano (1908) in the south transept, on loan from the Director of Music
  • a grand piano in the choir vestry, gifted by Piers Jones, our previous organist
  • a Roland C-30 digital harpsichord, fortepiano, and chamber organ