Music

Music enriches our worship and, for many of us, is a spiritual practice that draws us into an awareness of God’s presence. Our liturgical music helps the congregation reflect on and engage Christ’s work in our lives and in the world around us. The practice of singing together as a group helps to make incarnate God’s unifying presence in the liturgy.

Our adult choir sings from September to May at the 10:45am service. The choir is an intentional community for its members and ends each evening rehearsal with Compline. Parishioners, high school age and up, are welcome to join. The choir rehearses from September to May on Wednesdays at 7:00pm and on Sundays at 9:15am prior to the 10:45am service.

The children’s choir introduces children of the parish to sacred music as well as age-appropriate repertoire. The choir rehearses music that the congregation will sing on Sunday mornings and builds a sense of Christian community for young people in our parish. The children’s choir practices Wednesday evenings at 6:00pm, and those in kindergarten through 6th grade are welcome to participate.

Taylor Sparks, our Choirmaster and Director of Music, holds music and education degrees from Samford University and William Carey University.  Taylor currently serves as an elementary school administrator after many years teaching music in the public schools. Additionally, he plays horn in the North Mississippi Symphony Orchestra and is a member of the board of the Mississippi Conference on Church Music and Liturgy.  His skills as a leader are evident in the continued commitment of the parish to strong musical efforts.

All Saints’ organ is a Möller instrument built in 1952 and installed in All Saints’ nave in 1992. The organ has the equivalent of 39 ranks and has 1550 pipes. The organ is a recital-quality instrument capable of playing the great organ literature, in addition to very ably accompanying congregational singing.

In 2011 All Saints’ engaged Gregory P. Koziel of Memphis to extensively renovate the organ. This project included, among other renovations, completely refinishing the console, adding digital voices, reconfiguring all of the wind chests so that the pipes’ speech is directed down the length of the Nave, increasing the size of the tone openings, and installing new sound-proof blower enclosures. A generous bequest by Dr. Allen Cooley made this renovation possible.