March 20, 2025

By Rev. Rick King

You may or may not have heard the news that our music director, Adam Miller, has a new day job and will be leaving his position sometime in late spring or summer.

I’ve appreciated Adam’s music ministry with us because he stepped into some hard-to-fill shoes when Joel and Karen Johnson retired after 54 years of music ministry at Falcon Heights Church.

With a combination of musicianship, enthusiasm, humor and a keen sense of how to get the best out of our non-auditioned group of singers, Adam has helped us answer the question of what would follow the Johnsons’ long tenure and high bar for an amateur choir.

So now, the search for a new music director is on, and we are searching with the new, merged church’s needs in mind.

Wednesday night, choir members from both New Life and Falcon Heights stayed after rehearsal to share what they believe our priorities should be, both in writing the position description and in looking at candidates. The merger presents us with a unique opportunity to rethink this position in light of the new church and its mission in the future.

Tomorrow night is the initial meeting of the music director search team: Molly Hoffman, Nancy Ellias and Lynne Meyer of FHC; Cynthia Erickson and two yet-to-be-named members of New Life Presbyterian Church; and Pastor Riz and I will also have involvement in various parts of the search process. Tomorrow night, I’ll meet with the group over Zoom with an agenda of organizational and prioritizing tasks, setting deadlines, appointing the group’s lead, and agreeing on roles for each team member and the pastors.

Our goal is to have a position description ready for approval by the FHC Executive Board and the NLPC Session before our April meetings. That way, the position can be posted with a variety of networks in order to receive applications.

Watch this space for further details on the search for a new music director!