Music

MUSIC PLAYS a central role in life at Christ Church and St Luke's.

On this page you will find information regarding the music in and around the parish. To jump to a specific topic please click one of the links below.

Choir

Organ

Monthly Concerts

The Organist and Director of Music is Graham Walker, who arrived on the Isle of Dogs in 2003. For more information please see his website, www.grahamwalker.org.uk

Choir

THE CHOIR AT CHRIST CHURCH numbers around eighteen, and shares several members with local choral society the London Docklands Singers. The choir sings every Sunday Morning and at monthly choral evensong. Repertoire centres around the English tradition, with occasional forays into more adventurous pieces - in recent years the choir has performed Vierne's Messe Solenelle as well as Haydn's Nelson Mass (with professional period-instrument orchestra), as well as a wealth of smaller pieces.

Organ

WE ARE LUCKY TO HAVE two fine organs by English builder Noel Mander, a one-manual chamber organ at St Luke's and a large three-manual at Christ Church. The instrument at St Luke's is built in the English 18th-century style, has eight speaking stops on three ranks of pipes, and is controlled by an electric action. Christ Church's organ was built in 1953, as an expansion of an earlier instrument by Lewis, which in turn incorporated work by Walker. It has thirty-three speaking stops, together with a large selection of couplers, and is tonally speaking in the English Romantic school of organ-building. It dominates the upper storey of the South Transept, with the detached console located opposite, in the west corner of the North Transept. It is unfortunately nearing the end of its useful life, and ambitious plans are underway for a new organ at the west end of the church.

Monthly Concerts

AS PART OF THE CELEBRATIONS of Christ Church's 150th anniversary, a monthly concert series was started. This has showcased some of London's most promising professional musicians, from Alex Ashworth (currently singing at Glyndebourne) and Edward Lyon (with an emerging international career on the opera stage) to the Early Music Faculty of Trintity College of Music, just across the river. The concerts take placeon the last Friday of each month (except August and December) at 7.30pm, and entry is free. Please contact the Director of Music at directorofmusic@parishiod.org.uk for more information about forthcoming recitals.