The original group, ST AIDAN’S Praise singers, started 25 years ago by Darren Cook at St Aidan’s Church in Seaside, Eastbourne. I took over (1999) just before the church was closed and eventually demolished to make way for St Aidan’s Court. The very first song we did (under Darren) was Lord I come to you (The power of your love) written by Geoff Bullock and still remains one of our favourite hymns. We had around nine people of which five of us are still with the group. Over the years we expanded our numbers to over 20 people but due to deaths and other circumstances we are now around nine people. My primary objective was to encourage new songs to the church but ministers over the years were not in favour of newer songs so it is only recently (thanks to Mona and an opportunity for me to lead worship) that I have been able to achieve my goal. I put a lot of time and effort in writing music digitally and I am running out of steam!! However, my group will not allow me to retire so I have come up with a solution. The St Aidan’s Praise Singers will now be known as The Broadway Praise Singers and will meet on a Thursday at 10am (coffee) and start singing at 10.30am. This may encourage people to come in daylight and have a time of fellowship as well as to sing. Broadway’s pianist, Sue Miller, has been very supportive and is willing to have a go at some new music. The problem with modern arrangements is that the piano part is often over five pages long. We are also trying to put backing tracks to her piano part to make a more fuller sound. Our library contains around 700 PowerPoint presentations, nearly 1000 midi files and over 500 backing tracks to hymns, worship songs and Christian musicals.
The Broadway Praise Singers meet in a side room (side of church) at 10am (for coffee) and 10.30am (in the Church) for an hour of singing on a Thursday. Anyone who is interested in listening/singing newer praise songs please come along.