Parish Musician (Mamaroneck, New York)
St. Thomas Episcopal Church, a vibrant, dynamic and progressive parish in Mamaroneck, New York, (Westchester County suburb of New York City on beautiful Long Island Sound) seeks its next Parish Musician to lead our faith community in creative ways to the next phase of its joyful, worship life. There is flexibility in the ways this position might be defined to suit the talents of the musician who would like to join our mission: The perfect candidate may be a great all-around Organist/Choirmaster in the traditional sense, or perhaps a wonderful keyboard artist who would prefer to leave the direction of adult and children’s choirs to other professionals on our musical staff. We are prepared to invite an accomplished musician on a part-time basis with a competitive compensation to be negotiated. We are very eager to hear creative ideas from candidates about how they might best maintain, develop and enhance our program. Advanced keyboard skills, both in organ and piano, will be a strong attribute of our Parish Musician.
The musical tradition at St. Thomas is of exceptional depth and variety for a suburban Episcopal parish, even by New York City standards. The accomplished adult choir, which happily blends professional and avocational singers, is wonderfully devoted to the parish and its worship life. It also is accustomed to (indeed prefers) a very diverse repertoire, honoring the many traditions which define the parish family. A typical Sunday Eucharist at St. Thomas might include music by Byrd, Gibbons, Bach, Mozart, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Vaughn Williams, Britten, or, on a different Sunday, The Rev. James Cleveland, Aretha Franklin, Sweet Honey in the Rock, Sam Cooke, Bob Dylan, Buddy Miller or Andrae Crouch. We love and rejoice in the messages and inspiration of diverse modalities, and we look forward to continuing to do so with the talents of an equally adventurous Parish Musician.
The candidate we seek will be an exceptionally collaborative musician, because our Clergy, Staff and musicians take a great interest about music in worship, and we all like to express our enthusiasm and commitment to music’s fundamental primacy in our worship life. The choir is of a technical ability that they work most efficiently by not encumbering the process with a weeknight rehearsal, getting the job well done on Sunday morning with rehearsal time possible both before and after the choral Eucharist at 10:00 a.m. A Parish Musician who appreciates the efficient use of their valuable time and talents will be very happy here!