Week commencing 29th April 2024

Sara Trickey & Stephen Kovacevich - Music on Mondays concert

Time: 7:30 pm 9:30 pm

Location: St Mary's Church, Luton (map)

About: This will be an evening in the company of two remarkable musicians. Long-standing friend of Luton Music, the violinist Sara Trickey and legendary international pianist Stephen Kovacevich join forces in two great sonatas by Beethoven and Brahms. Stephen will also play some solo repertoire in the remainder of the recital.

The Brahms sonata is perhaps of special interest regarding our season’s theme of The Relationship between Literature, Art & Music. With the nickname of Regensonate (Rain Sonata) its melodic material is derived from two songs by the composer – Regenlied and Nachklang (his Op 59 settings of two ‘rain’ poems by Klaus Groth). The sense of yearning that informs these lines is clearly reflected in Brahms’s treatment of the texts, entirely appropriate when we consider the composer’s biographical circumstances as he worked on the piece in the relaxed atmosphere of the Carinthian lake resort of Portschach over the two idyllic summers of 1878 and 1879. Brahms was godfather to Felix Schumann, the youngest child of Robert and Clara (named in fact in memory of their dear friend Mendelssohn); and indeed had made a setting of his 19 year old godson’s poem about a nightingale (Meine Liebe ist grun wie der Fliederbusch) as a Christmas gift for Clara one year. It had become Brahms’s annual habit to retreat to the countryside every summer to concentrate on his writing and this liberation from the daily round of city life was inspirational for him. He would rise early every morning and walk for hours through the woods, communing with nature and then returning home to compose with a fluency that he seldom found in the rest of the year. It was under such a regimen that in Portschach during the summer of 1878 Brahms began to work on what was to become this first violin sonata. He had already destroyed at least three earlier efforts to write such a piece, so the free-flowing ease of this composition bears witness to the comfort that he found in his glorious summer retreat. Sadly before Brahms was able to return the following year to finish the work his beloved godson Felix had died of tuberculosis at the age of only 25. This tragedy touched Brahms deeply and yet this sonata (perhaps originally to have been a simple sonatina for Felix himself to play) seems to me to resist any obvious sense of melancholy, celebrating perhaps the simple beauty in that young life, even in the jagged funeral march of the slow movement which leans instead towards the heroic. Felix’s mother, Clara, loved the work, declaring that she wished the final movement could accompany her into the next world. This piece , with its origins in those emotive lines of the Romantic poetry of Klaus Groth, further modulated by a celebration of the young life of Felix Schumann and then kissed by the summer sunshine of those contented morning walks in Portschach, is a wonderfully layered work with Brahms clearly at the summit of his compositional power.

Richard Sisson (Chair of Luton Music)

Zoom Prayer

Time: 4.30pm - 5pm

Location: Digitally on Zoom

Leading: Ulrike Hunt

About: We pray together for St Mary's on a Tuesday afternoon. You are more than welcome to join us. For more information or to get the zoom link, please email the office.

Bible Study Group

Time: 8pm - 9.30pm

Location: Digitally on Zoom

Leader: Angela Symonds

About: This week we will continue our study of Hebrews as our Small group. You are very welcome to join us on Zoom on Tuesday nights at 8pm prompt. We finish at 9.30pm also prompt.

Email the office for the login details.

Welcome Wednesday

Time: 10.30am-1.30pm

There will be a service at 11 am

Location: St Mary’s Church, Luton

Devotional service (11am): Revd. Chris Adams

Youth Minecraft Project

Time: 6.30pm-8.30pm

Location: In the new youth Bedrock Minecraft Server

About: The Youth Minecraft Project is back! We have a new server and are ready to go. The Youth server is open to all young people that are school aged year 6 - year 13. To join, please contact our Youth Minister, Adam by clicking the button below.

Deeper Impact

Time: 4.30pm-5pm

Location: In the Underground @ St Mary’s Church, Luton

About: Want to learn more about scripture and what it means to us today? Deeper Impact is for those in school years 7-13* that want to delve into the Bible. In this group we take a piece of scripture and discuss in a safe manner the meaning and impact of this on our lives.

Contact: youth@stmarysluton.org

*year 6’s are invited from the easter term.

Bible Study Group

Time: 7.30pm - 9pm

Location: Small meeting room @ St Mary’s Church, Luton

Leader: Angela Symonds

About: This week we will be continuing our study of Hebrews as our Small group.  You are very welcome to join us  - REAL PEOPLE in a REAL PLACE. We meet in the small meeting room at church at 7.30pm. We finish promptly at 9.00pm. 

Thanksgiving Service

Time: 10.30 am

Location: St Mary’s Church, Luton

Service Leader: Revd. Joseph Adewale & Ulrike Hunt

Preacher: Revd. Joseph Adewale & Ulrike Hunt

There is no Youth today as it is All Age. Youth will remain in the 10.30 service.

Sunday Youth

Time: During the 10.30 am service

Location: Starting in the hall before moving to the Underground @ St Mary’s Church, Luton

Session leader: Casper Muller

About: The youth are currently looking at a multi-denominational resource, ‘Your faith, your online world.’ Youth is for young people ages 11-18.

*year 6’s are invited from the Easter term.

There is no Young Church today as it is All Age. Children will remain in the 10.30 service.

Young Church

Time: During the 10.30 am service

Location: Hall @ St Mary’s Church, Luton

About: Young church is for children aged 3-10.

Session leader: Angela Symonds & Katie Smith

There is no Crèche today as it is All Age. Children will remain in the 10.30 service.

Crèche

Time: During the 10.30am service

Location: In the meeting room @ St Mary’s Church, Luton

Age range: 0-3 year olds

Note: Parents must remain with their Children during crèche. A live stream of the service is shown here so you will still be able to watch what is happening in the Church. Holy Communion will be brought to crèche during the service.