Conway FUMC Music Department

04/26/2026

Congratulations and many thanks for a splendid singing this afternoon of the Mozart Dominicus-Messe, K. 66. The Mass was sung in concert format by the combined choirs of First United Methodist and St. Peter's Episcopal. The stellar solo quartet: Kyla Blickenstaff, soprano; JoAna Rusche, mezzo; Gregory Church, tenor; Benjamin Thorburn, bass.

Choral music and in particular sacred choral music bridges and unites. An outward expression of God's kingdom now. This is the power of worship in the beauty of holiness: it seeks not to mimic the secular, but truly to be counter-cultural by offering a glimpse of something far beyond ourselves, a blessed opportunity to enter into sacred mystery.

12/24/2025

The Liturgy and Sacred Music of Christmas
Jason Saugey, Director of Music and Worship Ministries

“But Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart” – Luke 2

Worship is a response of the soul to the quiet economy of the Holy Spirit through the encounter with sacred mystery, an outward expression of the Trinitarian life. Christ-followers gather for a sacred meal, prayers and song — for the liturgy — in which we come face to face with God: God making themselves real to the human senses and to the intellect though Word and Sacrament.

We are no mere visitors observing a sacred rite, but active participants, witnesses to God’s salvific work which itself transcends time, ever on-going in God’s eternal and glorious Now. The eve of Christmas Day anticipates the birth of the miraculous, and in these final hours of our shadowy Advent waiting, we are afforded the first glimpse of the wondrous Luminescence begotten of Light. Such a light like a precious pearl formed from the shimmering, prismatic inner surface of its shell.

Apart from the liturgy, sacred music is of itself not worship, but in combination with it, music expands the spoken word, magnifies it, and gives it dimension, shading, and color. Through gesture and word, the liturgy manifests the beatific vision, and it is in this resulting participation with the Divine who speaks through and meets us in the liturgy that worship logically follows.

The music of Christmas Eve guides our hearts and minds as we, through the working of the liturgy, come to kneel in the stable with the shepherds. Peter Warlock (1894–1930) brings us to the City of David with our introit, Riches Everlastingly. The 11th century text recalls the birth of our Lord, that he came into the world a noble King, yet lapped in rags, a King both human and divine, his royal chamber a stable, his bed a trough. Before us: God revealed. An exhortation to worship.

Stephen Paulus (1949–2014) paraphrases Christina Rosetti’s timeless Christmas poem in his anthem Snow had fallen; Christ was born. Rosetti’s depiction of the nativity is decidedly European with a cold December, snow, and ice. Far from what we know would have been the conditions in the Middle East, at whatever time of year historically Christ entered the world. Nonetheless, the bitter cold of Rosetti’s verses gives us a sense of the adversity into which the Child came, not only the austerity of the stable, but more broadly, the agony ahead: his important work for our salvation, his passion and death. We rejoice today, for tomorrow, this newborn Savior King dies upon the gibbet of the cross. We bring him gifts at Christmas that will soon line his winding path to the Skull Place, including us ourselves, his death the price for our human disobedience.

Pablo Casals’s (1876–1968) breathtaking anthem for women’s voices, Nigra sum, sed formosa, sets a beautiful text from the first chapter of the Song of Solomon. The Beloved, ruddy, yet shapely, is invited by the King to arise and enter into his bed chamber. Through their union, the winter passes, the rains cease, and flowers spring up in the land. Yet with this floral abundance comes also the pruning season (tempus putationis advenit). Here in the Scriptures, we encounter our Lord Christ with his Bride, the Church, recognizing in this text at Christmas, what will be. And, that, despite the resplendent manifold blooms, cutting them back will be necessary: there is still penance to do, soul-reflection, making amends. The work is not done. But: all gardeners know that judicious pruning ensures greater and constant abundance. Through pain and sacrifice there is growth. Here is our faith-journey, a journey that begins in Bethlehem.

The service concludes with Francis Poulenc’s (1899–1963) beloved motet for Christmas, O magnum mysterium, O great mystery. It offers a most intimate text taken from the Matins of Christmas. We are called to ponder on the scene in the stable: what wondrous sign is this? What mystery is taking shape here? What is this that has taken on flesh? And of what worth am I that this should happen? Certainly a weighty personal inventory to recall in the dusty light of the manger. Our answer does not come from Joseph or the shepherds or even later from the magi of the Orient, but from the child’s blessed Mother, who holds all these things in her heart. From the time of the annunciation when the angel appeared to her, her Yes made of her the handmaiden of the Lord, the Theotokos, the God-Bearer. The vividly worded Latin text speaks of viscera, customarily translated “womb”. But this word is so much more: Mary’s insides, her innermost parts. Such a precise image, clearly expressing that the Child, both divine and human, was intimately part of his Mother’s body. Mary was the human vessel that held God, a miraculous child. Indeed a great mystery. And here also the animals look on, themselves important aspects of God’s creation. Mention of them here harkens to another similar liturgical text, customarily sung on Good Friday, when, at another place, many, including his Mother, gather around to witness our Lord in adversity. At Golgotha, where animalia refers to the two crucified with him. A notion rudely shocking to our modern sensibilities. Yet, with deeper reflection, we come to realize that the two with Jesus in his final hours were outcasts, seen as less-than, accused and found guilty. But nonetheless they too bear witness to his life-bringing death, just as the beasts in the stable watched as hope was born. At the manger we witness not just hope for some, but hope for all. For everyone. For all of creation.

At Christmas we hear announced to us angels’ message. We gather with the animals, the shepherds, with Joseph, and with Mary at a splintery, rough-hewn manger. Through Word and Sacrament we are made active, full participants in the mystery of the incarnation as the liturgy and her sacred music open up to us in majestic splendor all which we currently see only in part. It is the heralding of God’s kingdom. The start of our journey with our infant Lord.

The Chancel Choir, the First Service Singers, the Chancel Ringers, the Bells of Grace, and I wish you all peace for a merry Christmas and a blessed and prosperous new year. Like Mary, the Mother of God, may your time spent in quiet adoration of our rag-lapped King for ever remain in your hearts throughout your journey with Lord Christ and in relationship with the Most Holy Trinity.

10/22/2025

This was the start of a wickedly fun Chancel Choir event this morning: taking the Messiah on the road to sing a flash mob Hallelujah at the Conway Pink House ribbon cutting. Blending in (somewhat) as colorful house guests to view the fabulous restoration, we brandished our Novello (TM) scores when CSO string players started the introduction and offered a rousing chorus in the upstairs hall! Many thanks to Emily Walter for inviting us!

10/18/2025

All Saints Day: Perceiving the Cloud of Witnesses through the Stillness
Jason Saugey, Director of Music and Worship Ministries

Growing up, November was a particular month unlike any other. In my family, we called it “der Monat der Stille”, the month of stillness. That descriptor has stuck with me all my life, and it’s true: November marks the start of winter preparation. Leaves begin to whither, turn colors, and fall from their trees to gather in dry crunchy drifts along the ground. The green, brilliant hallmark of the previous two seasons, fades and weakens as plants consider their impending winter sleep. Animals too seek shelter from coming cold. The world turns inward, conserving heat and energy to persevere through the approaching snows, blustery winds, and rigid ice. Human beings are no different, part ourselves of this seasonal process. As nature around us slows to rest, our hearts and minds too yearn more closely for the deep warm earth, as the world unseen draws closer to us. In the month of stillness,the veil grows thin. Those who’ve gone before are nearer, as we ourselves become ever more aware of the nurturing soil from which our Creator formed us.

There is no coincidence then that the Liturgical Year in its infinite wisdom appoints for us the first and second days of November to be twin days set apart. Both to celebrate with those who enjoy eternally the “fullness of felicity”, (as British poet Edmund Spencer described it) and to recall in living memory those faithful departed, the most recently dead. These days are the festivals of All Saints and All Souls. In many Protestant faith traditions both days are combined into one celebration
and observed on the first Sunday of November, a day marked with joy for those who stand at the throne of God and with solemn remembrance of those whom we’ve just bid farewell. Our local tradition at Conway First is no different. Although we always participate with the entire Communion of Saints whenever we gather for worship, the Church visible and invisible, on Sunday, November 2, we take more keen notice of that vast part of the faithful no longer with us physically, but who are with us always in spirit, in memory, and especially in prayer. For just as we pray for each other here on earth, they too pray for us and watch over us. More powerful prayers there are none than from them that stand before the very face of God. What unimaginable splendor this must be!

In the month of stillness, the unseen Church comes more clearly into focus than at other times. As we approach the conclusion of the year, as nature ebbs toward seasonal slumber, we are more mindful of our own eventual eternal slumber in Christ Jesus, a comfortable rest surrounded by the
limitless cloud of witnesses. All Saints is not a day of sadness or despair, but one of hope-filled assurance. A day on which we come to realize that we are not alone in the Trinitarian Life, that the
Communion of Saints is not just a collection of living persons in physical bodies, but that as we journey with the Holy Trinity, we are partnered with the multitudes of souls who partake in that Life fully and completely.

St. Thérèse of Lisieux, a 19th century French Carmelite mystic, when asked about dying, replied that she is not afraid of it, that after her death, she intends to do so much more good for the living. On All Saints Day, we give thanks for the Communion of Saints, for our part in it, for their companionship, their solidarity with us, especially for all the good they do for us in prayer, and on this day, we look forward even more fervently to joining the ranks of them who no longer see only in part, but who live in the fullness of God’s transcendent love.

10/06/2025

Our five FUMC choral scholars sang last night at the ecumenical Prayers for Peace service in Veterans Plaza here in Conway. Being Christ in the world on World Communion Sunday.

10/03/2025

World Communion Sunday: A Challenge to be the Church
Jason Saugey, Director of Music and Worship Ministries.

On World Communion Sunday, we recognize not only the interconnectedness and cooperation of diverse communities of faith throughout the world, but even more importantly, we celebrate and seek to enter more fully into that interconnectedness through the Sacramental life of the Church. All works the Church undertakes are grounded in and find their source in worship, central to which is the real presence of our Lord in the Sacrament of the Altar. Worship, then, is an outward expression of our interior Sacramental Life, of our journeying together in relationship with the Most Holy Trinity. Our acts of mercy, service, and praise enabled through the work of the Holy Spirit and witnessed to in our baptismal covenant, emanate from and are enlivened through this sacred Mystery. Holy Communion is not a reward for good behavior, a gift for the pious, but strong medicine and nourishment for all souls, the way we enter fully into God’s new covenant with us and all persons in Christ’s Body and Blood.

But the day is far more than a tidy celebration. It places a particular and often difficult challenge before us to undertake the hard work of bringing the profound message of World Communion to others, not only within our congregation, but outside its walls. Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer, murdered for actively living out his baptismal covenant for the benefit of the entire body of Christ, captures the spirit of this day so succinctly: “The Church is the Church only when it exists for others…not dominating, but helping and serving.” World Communion reminds us of our baptismal covenant, our pledges to resist evil, injustice, and oppression in any form; to serve Christ Jesus and the church which he established for all people regardless of age, nation, and race; to serve as Christ’s representatives in the world; to proclaim the Gospel; to surround all with a community of love and forgiveness; and faithfully to serve others.

This day is a call to action. So easy it is for us to fall into a routine, seeking out our spiritual comfort zones: neglecting to proclaim Christ crucified, to be Christ in the world, and to serve as a voice for the voiceless, choosing to hide behind the cross, hoping beyond hope that its mute wood might speak on its own for us. A grotesque calling card. Such a cross is nothing more than meaningless, dead wood that both insulates and isolates. The family of God is not the country club of the ultimately redeemed. Our salvation is in progress, and there’s work to do. Always.

Reflect on the message of World Communion and the difficult questions asked of you this day. When have you not striven to uphold the pledges you took at your baptism? When have you chosen to remain silent in the face of injustice? When have you looked away when others were in need? When have you been unwilling to acknowledge the rejection of others with empathy and compassion? When have you been inclined judgmentally to apply your own experience of ease at fitting in universally, while others seek to belong, yet are turned away time and again? When have you not spoken up for the stranger? When have you cowered idly behind the cross instead of spreading the good news, speaking actively of the the love of God for all persons, and carrying the light of God’s love out into the world? When have you been tempted to abuse scripture in order to avoid loving your neighbor? When have you felt that serving and ministering to others might stigmatize you or cause those around you to reject you? All these questions: various forms of the same: When have you chosen not to take action such that you emulate our Lord?

World Communion is a festival day marked with international color, a Sunday of beautiful music, and acts of worship spoken in foreign languages. A celebration of unity in diversity, of the world family, of God’s kingdom now. But central to this is the responsibility we all carry from our baptism: our obligation (not option) to fulfill what the prophet Micah reveals as counting among the highest goods: Do justly; love mercy; and walk humbly with God.

Shirley Erena Murray touches on the spirit of World Communion Sunday in her poem “For everyone born”, set to a melody by Brian Mann. This Sunday, the Chancel Choir will sing a stirring setting of the hymn by Tom Trenney, accompanied by piano and cello. Murray speaks to the challenges placed before us on which we are called to reflect today: being creators of justice and joy, actively welcoming all to the table, to speak up and speak out, that all persons are our neighbors, that all persons are to be part of community and must be actively welcomed in. Notice the poet’s use of action verbs throughout this text. Our faith is not such that we are afforded luxuriously to rest on our spiritual laurels. Just claiming to be a Christian isn’t enough. Christians are called to action, to love radically and to make sure everyone has a place at the table. Pray this text throughout the month of October, considering ways our Lord is calling you to action this World Communion Sunday.

“For everyone on born, a place at the table. For everyone born, clean water and bread. A shelter, a space, a safe place for growing, for everyone born, a star overhead. And God will delight when we are creators of justice and joy, compassion and peace: yes, God will delight when we are creators of justice and joy. Woman and man, a place at the table, revising the roles, deciding the share. With wisdom and grace, dividing the power, a system that’s fair. For young and for old, a place at the table. A voice to be heard, a part in the song. The hands of a child in hands that are wrinkled, for young and for old, the right to belong. For everyone born a place at the table, to live without fear, and simply to be. To work, to speak out, witness and worship. For everyone born, the right to be free!”

As we approach the altar this Sunday to receive our Lord in the Eucharist, let us also recall the promises we made first on the day of our baptism. Those promises are hard, yet the Lord nonetheless requires us to keep them. Acknowledging that we often fall short, and that our God is merciful, let us strive always to do better.

Go. Help. Serve. Speak up. Speak out. Love radically.

Be the Church.

09/23/2025

On this date in 2016, our organ console was dedicated as part of a festival concert played by my friend Tom Trenney. It was a terrific program, capped off with J. S. Bach's magnificent C Minor Passacaglia and Fugue. I was there that evening, and sat in the mezzanine opposite the organ. It was my first time ever to worship in this space and to hear our Hoffmann/Nichols & Simpson.

09/20/2025

The FUMC Choral Scholars Program
Rooted in Living Tradition, Firm in Faith
Jason Saugey, Director of Music and Worship Ministries

For centuries, the Church has been a center for education. Academic formation is intertwined with faith formation: nourishment for the mind, the heart, and the soul.

The music department at First United Methodist Church, Conway, follows this ancient tradition of the church, dating back at least to the 11th century, by offering a unique opportunity to students of music. Now in its third year, our Choral Scholars Program opens five singing positions to university and college undergraduates and graduate students to expand their educational experience in applied music within the context of an ecclesial setting, different in many ways from typical choral preparation within a solely academic environment. Whereas a typical choral program builds its work around several concerts each semester, the demands required of a church choir are far more rigorous with multiple choral works to be prepared for each week of the term, holy days, and for special musical events and services.

Each week, the Chancel Choir rehearses 9-12 choral items during their ninety-minute session. In one choir term, August through May or June, the choir will have offered over 150 choral works from all historical periods from 9th century plainchant to modern anthems of our time. Very rarely are any of these repeated within the same year. Preparation each week is therefore not only for the coming Sunday, but for several weeks in advance, allowing ample time for study and detail work from basic rhythm and notes to diction, phrasing, and dynamics. Each Sunday’s offertory is the result of weeks of work, scheduled such that it is service-ready according to the music list set down each year in late summer. Preparing for the service requires dedication, focus, and a spirit of evangelization.

Ultimately the role of the choir is to enliven the liturgy by leading the people in congregational hymnody and, through the singing of the portions assigned to them, to magnify the Word proclaimed in Scripture and to underscore the lessons gleaned from sound preaching. Together, these elements comprise collectively the Sacrifice of Praise all persons, whether in the choir or the congregation, lay or ordained, bring to the altar each week. In a broad sense, an act of worship is not merely any demonstrable, physical response or activity, a visible movement, shout, or a gesture. Worship speaks to and feeds the heart and the soul, yet is framed and governed by the mind and the intellect, which are the soil supporting the very roots of an authentic Sacrifice of Praise. Worship requires both spirit and intellect. As Thomas Aquinas describes, sacred mystery, truth, perceived by the intellect finds confirmation by faith.

Within any purely academic setting, naturally, many well-known works of the sacred repertoire find their ways onto concert programs. Musically and professionally, there is much to learn from them. Historically, many demonstrate the hallmarks of musical development through the centuries, many define compositional forms of their eras and reveal the origins of countless modern forms. Yet, within a secular context, sacred music remains the sum of its parts. Palestrina sung in a concert hall presents a monument of Renaissance polyphony, resplendent layered harmonies, marvels of artistic creativity and innovation. However, a small ensemble singing Sicut Cervus, “As longs the deer for the waterbrooks, so longs my soul for you, O Lord”, one of Palestrina’s most magnificent shorter motets, takes on a new dimension when the music fills the church at the offertory, the preparation for the celebration of Holy Communion. Here, this is sacred art offered within its natural habitat, offered in its own context liturgically as a Sacrifice of Praise. The notes and the textures are transformed into a stunningly beautiful framework, not art for art’s sake, but to deliver through the perception of the human senses to the heart the thirsting fervor of the psalmist’s words as the active listeners (the worshipers!) themselves anticipate the reception of the Body and Blood of our Lord in the Eucharist. Add to that the unfathomably sonorous chorus of centuries of singers who have sung the motet since it was first heard by human ears. Every work in the sacred music repertoire carries with it the infinite choirs of the Communion of Saints.

It is from the love of sacred music in this parish and thanks to the importance of education, both academic and faith formation, to so many here, that our Choral Scholar program was established. To offer young musicians in our area who may study some of this repertoire as part of their educational regimen in music an opportunity to work within a community where this music is naturally at home and within the context for which it was composed, to experience first-hand this music created for liturgical use as it is used liturgically. Further, choral scholars experience the complete process involved in preparing a large volume of music through systematic scheduling and prioritizing works and sections of works for rehearsals. Besides the professional and musical learning and its time-management and operational aspects, our scholars also grow familiar with the cycles of the liturgical year, the importance of certain holy days throughout the term and the repertoire associated with them. As the liturgy changes and transforms to reflect each liturgical season or time, scholars enter more fully into the routined nuance of the church’s liturgical life and how the liturgy’s progression itself reflects God’s Kingdom, and how we too are part of it, daily, even outside our times of worship. Overarching all of this is John Wesley’s notion that there is no solitary Christian. We live and worship in community. We experience together the Kingdom of God. And no other way is the Kingdom made more perceptible, more real to us, than in the celebration of the sacred mysteries, the Divine Service, when we gather, setting time apart to join with one another in the continual and eternal worship offered at God’s throne by the angels and saints.

The Choral Scholars Program of First United Methodist Church seeks to train church musicians of the future to recognize both the historical and spiritual function and inestimable value of the sacred music repertoire within the context of the liturgy. It compliments their music studies in recognizing the importance of this music in the continuum of musical development through time, while presenting sacred works, their study, preparation, and offering, as a vehicle for personal spiritual inquiry and growth, faith formation, and Kingdom building.

The 2025/2026 Choral Scholars are: Kyla Blickenstaff (soprano, UCA), Fatima Garduno (alto, UCA), Caleb Ellis (tenor, UCA), Nick Dickenson (Bass 2, UCA), and Aubrey Rogan (Bass 2, Central Baptist College).

09/14/2025

Children singing together in choir is not only music education. It's faith formation. It's community building. It builds self-esteem. It encourages creativity and self-expression. Choral music making adds a third dimension to classroom faith education and ensures the faith formation of the whole person.

Do you have children and young people for choir? FUMC Conway offers programs for all ages.

https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2025/12-september/features/features/education-can-singing-evensong-encourage-pupils-to-engage-in-worship?fbclid=IwZnRzaAMzi7dleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHqafRODIBkWpCwkBuBkX-SMuP13BjRxdOIsKJEMCHD1KjoxayZsLq0VMwJQ8_aem_KRU7pdLIJyBdtMilze97wQ

Clive Price hears about a successful church-school initiative

08/31/2025

One Service Sunday means blended worship, short pants, Frida Kahlo socks, and a Pride T-shirt! An excellent service of music today followed by a terrific community project assembling UMCOR packets (United Methodist Committee on Relief) for those in places needing assistance due to natural disasters and other catastrophic events.

If you're not yet participating in the Music Department, join us!

First Service Singers: 8am Sunday rehearsal, 8:30 Service.
Chancel Choir: 7pm Wednesday rehearsal, 11am Sunday Service
Bells of Grace: 4:30pm Monday rehearsal
Chancel Ringers: 7pm Monday rehearsal

We have room for everyone!

08/28/2025

One in mission, One in Service. Of Airplanes and Ministry
Jason Saugey, Director of Music and Worship Ministries

Years ago when I was the associate director of music at Trinity Cathedral in Little Rock, I selected a curious, but utterly majestic work as the Sunday’s postlude: Sir William Walton’s Spitfire Prelude. Strictly speaking, the work is movie music, used in the 1942 Leslie Howard film “The First of the Few”. It’s a wartime documentary about the development and building of the famed British Spitfire fighting planes of World War II. But, with the pedigree of composer Sir William Walton, whose compositions count among all manner of repertoire both secular and sacred, I supposed playing the Spitfire in this context would, after all,…fly.

The Mass ended, all going in peace, I launched into the opening fanfare of Spitfire, state trumpet in the back of nave blaring out the opening theme. Then, that grand march, jaunty, inspiring. Critics of the movie had commented that it was one of Walton’s most excellent — amazing, since he had also composed two quite famous coronation marches (Crown Imperial for George VI and later Orb and Scepter for Elizabeth II ). The prelude ends with a suspense-building drum beat in 5ths delivered by the pedal. Then, swell shades shut down just enough, comes one last tiny fanfare ending on a single triad. It’s during this solitary chord that the swell shades are swung open fully, releasing the entire mighty force of sound into the room: the approach and fly-by of a swarm of Spitfires! Exciting stuff.

The thrill of flight!

When I released the final chord, I noticed a couple had come up to stand in the choir to be fully enveloped by the sound of the Walton. They walked over to the console, both in tears. They went on to thank me profusely for offering this music — of all the possible music, a famous work from a 40’s era movie, unknown to many — on this very day of all days. They commented, having lived in the United States for some time, that they hadn’t heard it much here at all, but then, suddenly to encounter it like they just had.

The man’s mother, it turned out, had served during the Second World War in the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force, a branch of the Royal Air Force, established in 1939 by King George VI. She was an airplane mechanic during the war, and had repaired and maintained the very sort of aircraft this music evoked: Spitfires. She had died just a few years ago, and today, when her son and daughter-in-law encountered this music, was her birthday. We don’t always know how we minister in music, or whether we are at all. But that day it was clear: I was inspired to send a comforting memory-message to two strangers that day from a person I never knew existed. A gift happily given and one gratefully received. From that day on, Spitfire had become one of my particular favorites.

I have chosen to play Walton’s Spitfire Prelude this Sunday following the parish’s annual One Service on Labor Day weekend. I do so not only because it is such a rousing and majestic work, fitting to close a service, despite its secular origins, but also because of what it has represented and continues to represent.

Naturally I think back on the time I met the English couple after Mass — they’re now very much part of this music for me too. But more deeply, I think about all the men and women of that time decades ago who were united in one mission to work and fight for justice, freedom, and peace. Those persons had not just themselves in mind, but others, people they didn’t know, but whose situations they did know, or which they could imagine, however difficult it might have been to fathom such horror. They united in purpose, joined in the work with keen focus, and achieved what seemed entirely impossible.

And so it is, albeit on much smaller scale, that the parish unites today too in a single mission, which together with similar efforts unites with other groups in other places of like mind to help with efforts to ease and eradicate suffering, help to restore peace, and to aid in rebuilding livelihoods. A small way to help for an enormous benefit. May the strains of Sir William’s majestic march and the the spirit of those who inspired its composition inspire you too to join in and help make a difference in the lives of others, regardless how insignificant it might seem to you now.

Ministry happens, even when we are unaware of it.