As much as I hate apologizing for not having posted in awhile, since it’s been over six months since I last posted I feel I owe you, my readers, at least a little apology. So, I’m sorry I haven’t been able to really dig in and post something solid in awhile. My wife and I recently had our third child and from the end of the pregnancy through our first six months of new baby have really thrown my schedule more than I expected.

Priorities are priorities, and right now family and school are at the top of the list. So blogging had to take a back seat for awhile…

That being said, I’ve had several posts bopping around in my head for awhile now and I feel it’s time I tried to get some of them out, as sparse as their coming might be.

I’m not sure if you have heard of Bob Kauflin, but he is an amazing worship leader. He leads the worship for Sovereign Grace Church – and they have a bunch of awesome worship albums I highly recommend. He does have a worship blog called Worship Matters. He’s also written a great book of the same title. The book is a solid read on worship, and it touches on several different aspects of worship leading….I’m hoping to do a review of it here sooner or later (but I have a few book reviews and papers I need to write for class before I dive into that .

So check out his blog if you have the time and if you get a chance, snag a copy of his book and interact with what he talks about therein – it’s not perfect, but everything he discusses are things every worship leader needs to work through at some point.

I’ve been reading Chris Tomlin’s “Way I Was Made” and he had an excellent chapter on worship leading. You can check out my review of his book, if you so desire. But today I thought I would unashamedly offer up some great quotes which are definitely not my own:

“Being a worship leader means I deeply desire to use the gifts God has given me to lead others in a meaningful response to Him.” (p. 108)

“The worship leader God is after is the one whose heart is captured by Him.” (p. 116)

“Those who are most prepared are the most led by the Spirit of God.” (p. 121) – on why it’s good to plan out services as opposed to playing it by ear.

“New songs breathe life into your ministry.” (p. 126)

A New Song For Your Congregation

Now that you and your team have done all the hard work learning this new song, you have to introduce it to the congregation. Here is the primary caution: since you and your team have been almost breathing this song for at least a couple of weeks, you know it inside and out, and more than likely love it and are excited about introducing it, yet most of the congregation will not know the song and therefore, since it is new, will be averse to learning it. Why? Change is awkward. New is awkward. And they’ll have to think when they sing it (which is not a bad thing…).

But new songs (which contribute to the thoeological health of your congregation) are essentiall. So you’ve gotta have ‘em – how do you make the people as comfortable as possible with them? Familiarity is the key. If the song sounds familiar, they are less likely to reject it blindly. If I know several weeks ahead of time about a song I will introduce soon, I will add it to the playlist of songs which are a ‘background’ of sorts before and after the service. That just gets the song into people’s heads.

I always try to play the song for the congregation at least once before I ask them to sing along. It works great if it fits as an offertory or opener the week before. Also, you can use the song as an opener (in this instance I’m assuming that the congregation doesn’t really sing along with the opener), and then use the song again as your first song of the worship set. Sometimes this latter technique can work pretty well.

The worse case scenario is having to introduce a new song during a worship set. If you have to do that, I would suggest sandwiching it between two songs which are very familiar (and loved) by the congregation. Also, make sure that you sing the first verse twice, whether or not that will be the normal way of singing the song later on – it just gives them an extra chance to get into the groove of the song.

In the end, the real goal when introducing a new song is to make it easy to understand and sing for your congregation. The more quickly they are comfortable with the song  the more readily they will embrace it.

A New Song for You

Okay, first things first. When you’ve got a new song burning in your music library that you’ve been wanting to introduce to the church, and the chance finally comes for you to use it – what do you do? This is a three-part series where we dig a little into the process. This first part focuses on suggestions for assisting you to learn the song properly. The second will focus on teaching it to your team, and the third will focus on introducing it to the congregation/church at large.

Before you try and teach a song to your team, you need to know what’s going on in it yourself. My personal preference is, if possible, to be able to play it either on piano or guitar (or both, if possible). That way I have a solid grasp of the chord progressions, the rhythms, the structure, and the dynamics. In fact, those four points should almost be a checklist in learning the song.

For simplicity’s sake I will assume you are trying to learn a song on the guitar…

1) Chords

The easiest way to learn a song is to have a recording to play along with. So get one (if you don’t have a recording I hope you have a great memory and/or can read music really well!). Secondly, acquire the chords to the song. This is a must. You can purchase chord charts or sheet music (online or in/through a store), or you can probably find it online for free (some publishers like Vertical Music offer their chord charts online for free!). If you can’t find or get the chords, then you’ve gotta figure ‘em out by ear. Good luck! (there is not enough space in this post to cover how to do that…)

Now just play the recording of the song, over and over, first time just listening to the chord changes and following the chord sheet. When you’re comfortable with the chord changes, start trying to do one strum  where each chord is first played or changed to. Be especially tuned to walking bass lines or progressions that walk through the scale – recognising these can be very helpful to your team in learning the song.

When you’re confident and comfortable with these chord changes you are ready to move onto the structure and rhythm of the song.

2) Structure

Now, stop the recording. Take a moment and analyze the chord sheet and how the song fits together. Somewhere on the chord sheet (top, side, bottom…) write down the structure of the song. Is it the classic verse-chorus-verse-chorus(2x?)-bridge-chorus(2x?). Many songs are a variation thereof. Many hymns are only “verses” with a latter section that feels like a chorus, though some actually are just a series of verses followed by a repeated chorus. Primarily here you need to understand how the song is put together so that you can articulate that in a simple way to your team.

After you’ve figured out how the song is put together, notice all the chord progressions in each section. Are they the same? How are they different? Usually a song will have one chord progression for verses and another progression for the chorus. Sometimes a completely new progression will be used for a bridge or tag – though sometimes that can be the same progression, just with a different dynamic. Where is the intro to the song derived from? Is the instrumental section’s progression the same as the intro, or is it from the chorus or verse?

Also note repetition and variation. Is the verse four chords repeated four times? Or are they repeated three times, the fourth being a variation on the original pattern? Or is the third time the variation?

Basically, in understanding the chord progressions, you want to try and figure out as many of the connections throughout the song as you can. That way you can break it down more easily for your team when you have to teach them.

3) Rhythms

After getting comfortable with the chords and the structure, take a look at the rhythms utilized in the song. Does the song have a straight rhythm or is it syncopated? Is it the same rhythm throughout? At this point you need to attempt as good an imitation of the rhythm of the song on your guitar as you can.

At this point, as well, make some notations on your chord sheet about what the drummer is doing where (as best you can figure). Having these will help you better direct your drummer.

4) Dynamics

Here is the real heart of a song. Make sure you know when the song is soft, when it is loud, when it builds, how long it builds, and where the climax of the build is. A majority of the music coming out of Hillsongs is incredibly easy as far as the chords and progressions go – and most of the rhythms are pretty simple as well. But they are masters of the dynamic. Every one of their songs is unique because of its own dynamics, and their “powerhouse” songs are such because the dynamics of how they build the song to its climax have been perfected. You cannot play a Hillsongs song correctly without paying a lot of attention to the dynamics.

So there ya go. These are some basics of learning a song, at least in my mind. As you learn more and more songs, you’ll develop your own system which will work best for you.

Also, this just addresses learning a song as it was recorded. If you want to develop your own version of a song, do these first. Learning a song how it was originally written is always essential to creating a new version of it which retains the same ‘heart’ as the original (at least that’s my opinion).

Next I will profer up some suggestions about teaching a new song to your team.

This issue has ripped many a church apart. There is a root misunderstanding as well as a heart-issue that must be addressed when dealing with this issue in a church. Here I am not going to deal with addressing this conflict within a church. Rather, I am going to briefly explore the merits and/or problems of both the traditional hymns as well as the “modern chorus”-type songs.

To me, the primary issue in whether or not I use a song has less to do with its style and primarily to do with theology. What does it say? Is it’s theology biblically accurate? If the answer is ‘no’, then that song will never make a songlist, whether or not it is a hymn or chorus – whether or not people love the song.

So how do I choose between choruses and hymns? Well, first thing to understand is that while hymns, many times, have much deeper theology and tend to more thoroughly explore a theological concept, sometimes they are not as easy to sing. Choruses, on the other hand, just due to the way they are developed and used, lend themselves more easily to repetitive singing. So there is a balance to maintain.Some choruses, though, do have relatively deep theology – so it is always a joy when you can use them in a service.

Let’s say you are choosing songs for a service focused on the crucifixion. You wouldn’t use the classic hymn It is Well, because, though theologically sound, it’s focus would not contribute to the development of the service. In the same vein, the incredibly theologically sound chorus Blessed Be Your Name would also not be a good choice for the same reason.

For a service focused on the crucifixion, I would consider, on the hymn side, It is Finished (Hark the Voice) and Christ Alone, among other hymns. Choruses which would be relevant to the theological development would be Saviour King, How Great is Our God, or even Gospel Song. Of course there are many others (both hymns and choruses) which would also be relevant and contribute to the theological development of the service.

The main thing to remember when considering a hymn or a chorus for a worship service is theological direction as well as your balance of orientation and focus in the worship portion of the service. Hymns and choruses are songs, and each song contributes different elements to the service.

Well, every blog has one, and this is it for this blog. Why have I created yet another blog? Well, I believe in having a purpose or focus for blogs. I have one for my random life, one for when I feel like working out some deeper thoughts, one for my thoughts on the books I’ve read, and also one for keeping track of things I’ve figured out in Linux.

The purpose of this blog is for me to hash out my two deepest passions: God and worshiping him. Also, I wanted to have a place on the web which was representative of perspectives, theologies, and practices of/in worship – mainly for any prospective churches considering me for their worship ministry. As I explored the idea, I realized that in creating a blog, instead of just a factual website, I might actually be able to connect with other worship leaders, sharing what I know and have learned, as well as opening an opportunity for them to share with me.

Eventually, I will have not only posts on various things worship related, but also specific pages dedicated to general worship theology, my denominational background (which is CRRRAAAAAZZZZYYYY), and other related topics.

My goal is to post at least twice a week – Monday and Wednesday. Though what I would prefer to do is actually post three times a week (Monday, Wednesday, and Friday).

The posts will cover everything popping out of my head about leading worship, from theology to practical matters, to reviews of tech, to even album reviews and song analysis. I won’t have a regular pattern of what is posted, though if you would like to only get my posts in specific categories, then you can subscribe to them (categories will show up as I create blogs for them…).

Yep, that’s about it! Please subscribe or just check back regularly – I hope to make this quite a thriving place on the web in the upcoming weeks and months!