The Need for Competent Church Choir Committees

by E.N. Miller

It is a deplorable fact that the direction of music matters in churches is usually left with committees incompetent to judge what is best. There are exceptions to this, of course; but generally speaking it is true. The part music can play in the spiritual life is becoming more and more realized every day, and for this reason, if for no other, tile music should be under the direction of those who have a higher conception of musical art and thought than the average church member.

The incompetent church committee member is about on a level with an illiterate man, who might pick up a book of a light and perhaps trashy nature and say, "I am perfectly satisfied with this book, and others like it. It is entertaining, amusing and interesting. It's good enough for me." A well educated man might pick up the same book and say. "It will do you no good to read this. It is superficial in character, low in its ideals, and of no benefit; in fact, not being good for you it may even do you harm." Few people would dispute the judgment of the educated man in a case of this sort, and if he were to select another volume and say "Read this, study and reflect over it, and you will be elevated, helped and made better.", most people would follow his advice rather than that of the illiterate.

If advice is needed in the selection of books, it is even more necessary in the case of music. People are taught to read books from their childhood, and even if their judgment as to what is bad in literature is not to be depended on, they at least know what is good. The works of Dickens, Shakespeare, Mark Twain, etc., are regarded by publishers as "best sellers," and they are continually in demand. The vast majority of people, however, are not taught anything about music. All they know of it is what they hear at home, at concerts, and at church. Surely they should be given only the best music in church, and only those who know something about music are competent to say what is best.

Possibly the time is coming when we shall have a minister or master of music in church. One who is qualified by education and by lofty ideals and a high conception of the power of music to attend to the needs of the congregation. This would be as great an advance as the present method of having an educated matters of the gospel instead of the old style "church meetings," where the lay members themselves did the preaching.