Music at Pasadena Presbyterian Church is one of the most important ministries of this large downtown multicultural church, which is the oldest in the city of Pasadena. Music and the arts are embedded in the church’s Vision Statement and are integral to the church’s goals of reaching out to the community and surrounding areas as it spreads the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

The church’s music program includes eight choirs and ensembles throughout the church’s three principal language groups (English, Korean and Spanish). These groups involve hundreds of musicians from Kindergarten on up. In addition, the church’s Friends of Music and Music at Noon programs provide performance opportunities for many professional musicians, and the Aeolian-Skinner Sanctuary organ is used both for recitals and as a major teaching instrument.

An unusually committed group of singers, The Kirk Choir serves as the church’s principal choir during Sunday morning English-language worship services. Its diverse repertoire embraces the breadth of traditional choral music, music written in our time, and music from other cultures. The choir is seen weekly on the church’s cable television broadcast and is featured at several concerts each season as part of the church’s Friends of Music concert series.

The choir also sings in locales outside the church. These engagements have included an appearance at Walt Disney Concert Hall with Garrison Keillor and the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra; on the Caltech Concert Series; and in festivals at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in downtown Los Angeles. The choir also led worship for a national convention of the American Guild of Organists.

Members of the choir sang as part of a massed choir in Carnegie Hall and have been featured on the HBO series Big Love under the direction of Timothy Howard. The choir has also been heard on the public radio programs Pipedreams and With Hearts and Voices. The choir’s compact disc recording, New Songs of Celebration Render, is available via cdbaby on the Arkay label.

The Kirk Choir was founded in 1940 by celebrated choral conductor Howard Swan, who served as music director for 20 years. The list of nationally known choral musicians who have led the choir includes William Hall, Jon Bailey and Gregory Norton, along with its current director, Timothy Howard.

Each spring the choir welcomes guest singers into its ranks for the presentation of a major choral-orchestral work at the church’s annual Good Friday devotional concert. These programs have included such choral repertoire standards as Handel’s Messiah, Brahms’ Requiem and Mozart’s Requiem along with major contemporary works, including Karl Jenkins’ Stabat Mater, Samuel Barber’s Prayers of Kierkegaard and John Rutter’s Requiem.

More Info: view a Chronology of past PPC music directors and organists on the Music Staff page.