Category: Performance

(this has been reposted with permission and was written by Bob Kauflan)

In the past few years, a number of voices have emerged encouraging church musicians to lose their music stands.

I don’t think anyone is saying it’s a matter “of first importance” to put the music stands away. But people have said if you really want to serve your church, you won’t use them.

Reasons to Strike the Stands

Here are some of the most common reasons people give for losing the stands.

• In many churches, a separation already exists due to a stage. Removing the stands removes the visible barrier.
• Musicians and vocalists tend to stare at their stands. When you remove them, musicians look up, look out, and are more engaged.
• Singing and playing without stands forces you to memorize music and communicates a higher standard of preparation and excellence. It’s unprofessional and uncaring to use them.
• If you’re nervous about forgetting lyrics, you can use a confidence monitor, i.e., project the lyrics on the back wall.

A Few Thoughts

While I appreciate and even applaud the impulses that lie behind church musicians going without music, it seems unwise to make it the rule or even the most-preferred practice.

We’re working with volunteers. Asking musicians to memorize the music each week assumes they’re full-time, specifically dedicated to that role in the church, or have enough time during the week to commit songs to memory. Those aren’t the kind of people I normally serve with at my church! While I appreciate musicians who know their music well, I’d rather have them free from anxiety when they’re leading.

We’re freer to make Sunday morning changes. Due to the limited amount of time our band rehearses, we come up with arrangements on Sunday mornings when we practice. That allows us to make last-minute changes, adjust arrangements to the musicians that are actually there, and make music rather than simply play it.

We want to sing the right songs. Memorizing all the songs tends to push us toward using shorter, more repetitive songs, or songs we’ve been singing for years. It doesn’t have to have that effect but often does. I shouldn’t determine the songs I lead on Sundays by how easy they are to memorize (think Psalm 119). God tells us the word of Christ is to dwell in us richly as we sing (Col. 3:16), and that implies at times I’ll lead songs that go beyond popular fare.

We want to identify the real causes. Singing with stands doesn’t communicate a lack of care, love, or engagement any more than a pastor using notes for his message does. It becomes a negative factor only when he reads mechanically, rarely looking up at the congregation. But I’d rather have him be sure of what he’s going to say than try to commit his message to memory and stumble along the way. And I’ve been ministered to in profound ways by both singers and preachers who have notes in front of them.

We sing in community. Finally, it’s participation, not performance, that should characterize our meetings. We’re singing with the congregation, not to or at them. Rather than being a barrier between us and the congregation, music stands can actually be a unifying element. They communicate we’re not musical professionals, that we can forget lyrics, and that we too can get distracted. Our congregations look at a screen (or a hymnal), but we’d never say they’re insincere or “unprepared” to worship God. Needy, imperfect, and dependent, we look to Jesus to perfect all our offerings of worship (1 Pet. 2:5). (HT to Allen Dicharry for this last insight)

Some Questions We Can Ask

If this is an issue at your church, these questions might help you reach some conclusions, whether that’s to go with stands or without them.

Are we allowing the use of music stands to be more of a focus than the God we’re worshiping and the people we’re singing with? 
If so, get your head out of the stands. Go over the music in advance and use it simply as a reference. Develop the skill of looking at the line you’re about to sing, then looking up and singing it with the congregation. Try flattening out and lowering the stand, or moving it to the side, to reduce the physical barrier. Using music stands only separates you from the congregation when they’re a visual obstacle or you’re overly dependent on them.

Are we seeking to serve our congregation well? 
Maximize whatever limited time you have to prepare. During rehearsals, sing and play as though there was a congregation in front of you. Sing to the empty seats. In a few days or in a few minutes, they’ll be filled with God’s people. If you do choose to go without stands and can afford it, consider adding a “confidence monitor,” lyrics projected either on the back wall or a television monitor. Besides helping the vocalists with the lyrics, a monitor also helps the leader know when the projectionist is putting the lyrics up.

What’s determining the kinds of songs we feed our church? 
Take stock of what factors figure in to your song choices. We can consider ease of memorization, repetition, and simplicity, but they shouldn’t rule what we sing. God is too great and awesome, and our responses too deep and varied, to limit our songs of praise to what we’re able to memorize.

Which is more important to us: visibly engaging with a congregation or leading them to a deeper knowledge of God in Jesus Christ?
Those two ends aren’t necessarily opposed. When we lead a congregation to lift up their hearts and voices to praise God, it should be an emotionally engaging event. But emotions aren’t our focus – God’s glory in the face of Christ is (2 Cor. 4:6). God wants the real events of the gospel to move people, not the fact that they don’t have to look at us over music stands.

Like most secondary matters in congregational worship, using or not using music stands isn’t an either/or issue. We just want to make sure we’re asking the right questions.

Today I was pondering the question of what dB change the average human can detect (its approximately 1dB) when I did a web search and found this excellent web page. The page is actually from a book titled “The Scientist and Engineer’s Guide to Digital Signal Processing” written by Steven W. Smith, Ph.D. I liked it so much I decided to link to it here.

-Ted

This podcast is a discussion with opinions on how loud the music should be in a contemporary Christian worship service.  YMMV

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I have found most people in the audience do not know that the soundman controls how the performance sounds in terms of volume and mix and don’t appreciate his role.  In this podcast we examine the soundman’s role and how as a performer, you can make his or her job easier.  The end goal is to get a great mix – whether for a live performance or a recording.

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I have a theory about old sayings.  My theory is this,  “old sayings that still hold true, do so because human nature hasn’t changed much for thousands of years”.

Because of the consistency of human nature, the old saying, “you can’t teach an old dog new tricks” is still applicable today.

kind of

It has a grain of truth.

As we humans age, we accumulate experiences.  Some experiences are from success, others are from mistakes, others are benign.  To those people whose experience is dominated by successes, there is a danger in thinking “I was a success then, I will be a success now” while not making any fundamental changes or at least entertaining the thought of them.  Sometimes this works, other times not so much.

I think the combination of experience based on success and pride is at the heart of “you can’t teach an old dog new tricks”.

Why all this talk about experience, learning and tricks?  I’ve heard from several worship leaders recently that is more important to them that someone on their team is teachable and a team player than someone skillful and hard to work with.

Being teachable means being humble enough to take positive criticism objectively rather than subjectively.

So while I agree there is a grain of truth to the old saying about old dogs, I would modify it as follows:

“you can’t teach a dog who doesn’t want to learn new tricks”

So let’s all (myself included) strive to be teachable on our Worship Teams.

Now where’s that dog bone of mine?

 

Imagine a garden salad. 

A perfect garden salad. 

A nice plate with the right proportions of lettuce, olive oil, salt, pepper, tomatoes and olives.

Now imagine a plate with one cup of salt, a single leaf of lettuce, no tomatoes, no olive oil and no olives.

Which would you want to eat?

* * *

Imagine a worship band. 

A great, cohesive band performing a song with the right proportions of low, mid and high frequencies.  A song where you can hear each instrument clearly weaving in and out at different times with different musical parts.

Now imagine a song where the lead guitarist is soloing over the singer, the bass can’t be heard, the beat is wavering and the cymbals are like a drill to your head.

Which would you rather listen to?

Each musician in a worship band (imho) should have a musical part to add to a song –  like ingredients to a salad.  Not all salads need the same ingredients – not all songs need the same instrumentation.

Just like the best chefs don’t overdo flavors, the best musicians don’t overplay.

Don’t use every seasoning you have in your pantry for your salad.

Don’t play every technique and sound you know in a song.

make space – make music

Today I talk about items to bring to a musical performance (aka “gig”).  I wanted to share a list to help others avoid mistakes I have made through trial and error.   Consider this a suggestion for what to bring to a gig for live performance or a recording session:

1. Instrument (and preferably a backup.  I have never needed for bass but for guitar it is very helpful if there is a string break and no time to restring).  Preferably in hardshell cases.

2. Extra strings (never needed for bass but useful on guitar)

3. Batteries for active instruments and possibly effects

4. Direct Box (for bass and acoustic guitar)

5. Tuner

   1. (or Sonic Nuance TDI)

6. Multi function screwdriver with different size bits for phillips and flathead screws

7. Any sheet music or charts

   1. Music stand

8. Pen and paper for notes

   1. Alternatively a laptop computer, notepad or smartphone

9. Smartphone, tablet or other computing device

   1. helps to get directions to gig, contact band members, get sheet music, etc

10. At least two instrument cables with one being a backup

11. If used, amplifier and cabinet with backup

    1. backup can be in the form of direct box or going direct out of effect boxes prior to amplifier, etc

12. Pain meds, bandages and cough drops

13. Ear protection

    1. In ear monitors, ear plugs, headphones, etc for loud gigs.  Protect your ears!

14. Gig bag or backpack to carry gear

Extra Credit:

1. Accessories (bows, rosin, picks, string cleaner, bridge pins, etc)

2. Backup clothing and grooming accessories (comb, electric shaver, ties, mouthwash, etc)

3. Snacks and/or list of nearby eateries

   1. Bananas and trail mix are my favorites

4. Book to read between sets

5. Full tank of gas in vehicle

6. String winder, bridge pin removal tool (steel string acoustic guitar) and cutting tool for string changes

What have you found to be important to bring to gigs?  Please share your thoughts.

If you find your performances or songwriting is in a rut, one way to add diversity is to use a bit of music theory.  Let me start out by saying this is an absolutely huge topic and I will only go over what I consider the bare minimum to help performers and song writers.  There are people who have whole careers dedicated to this topic.  So, for anyone who wants a more rigorous treatment of the subject, I would refer you to one of the many excellent music schools and teachers throughout the country.

For the basics of Western Music, let us first make some definitions:

• Given two sounds of different frequencies, the higher frequency one is higher in pitch.

• Given two pitches, the distance between them is called an interval.

• The smallest interval is the half step (denoted H) , the next is the whole step (denoted W and made up of two half steps).

• A scale is a pattern of intervals (or groupings of half and whole steps).

• There are 12 notes available to make scales and chords – A, A# (or Bb), B (or Cb), C (or B#), C# (or Db), D, D# (or Eb), E (or Fb), F (or E#), F# (or Gb), G, G# (or Ab) .  Each successive note is separated by a half step.

• The degrees of a standard major or minor scale start from one and go to eight by counting notes sequentially.

• A chord is a grouping of (typically three or more) notes or scale degrees played simultaneously.

• A major scale is defined by the pattern of intervals W W H W W W H

• A major chord is defined by the simultaneous playing of degrees 1, 3 and 5

• A key is a shorthand way of describing how many sharps & flats are used.  The key of C has no sharps or flats.

Application 1: Performance

Let’s say a song has a C major chord in it and the performer is trying to decide what to play.

Written as intervals, notes and degrees, this chord can be examined as

The C major chord is defined by simultaneous playing of the degrees 1, 3 and 5 (or the notes C, E and G)

So as a performer deciding what notes to play for a solo, bass-line, guitar lick, or a keyboard line it would be helpful to emphasize the 1, 3 and 5 degrees of the scale as this defines the chord.  However, any of the notes in the C scale will work when played during the C major chord.  By way of contrast, if the performer were to play an Eb, it would sound out of place (or “dissonant”) because it is not part of the C scale and would clash with the E of the C major chord.

Application 2: Songwriting

For the ending melody of the song “Happy Birthday” which is sung “Hap-py birth-day to you”, the notes are as follows when played in the key of C:

Notice that all of the notes are within the C major scale and that the 1 and 3 degrees of the scale are used (among others). This is part of the reason the melody is pleasing to the ear.  Thus, it can be helpful to know the basics of music theory to come up with melodies which sound pleasant over chord progressions.

In conclusion, using basic music theory can help make performances and songwriting more interesting.  A bit of study of this topic will go a long way in making your music sound more pleasant, engaging and interesting.

This is merely scratching the surface and I plan on going into more detail in the future. For further reading, check out:

Kerman, Joseph. Listen: Second Edition. New York: Worth Publishers, 1992.

Berle, Arnie. Theory & Harmony for the Contemporary Musician. New York: Amsco Publications, 1996

I am often reminded watching great worship teams how much communication and experience comes into play.  Worship teams are strange beasts – you can have varying musical, volunteer commitment, leadership experience and spiritual maturity levels all combining into a potential nightmare.  These two articles do an excellent job addressing these issues and gives suggestions in how to deal with them.

The first article from WorshipU focuses on worship team communication.  I like what it says about there being no manual for leading a team.  Read about it [button style=”btn-primary” url=”http://www.worshipu.com/blog/brave-communication-for-worship-teams/” size=”” block=”false” target=”_self”] here [/button]

The second article by Jamie Brown describes eight ways to not treat your worship team.  I particularly appreciated the section about not giving the team music that is too easy or too hard.  Read about it [button style=”btn-primary” url=”http://goo.gl/Qcxwno” size=”” block=”false” target=”_self”] here [/button]

Recently I had a discussion with a worship leader friend regarding how we mix our personal monitors while performing.  Early in the discussion it became clear that our mixes would sound very different, and mine would not sound very pleasing to the average listener.  My friend leads teams by singing and playing guitar.  Naturally, in his mix he has vocals (including backing vocals) and guitars prominent.  However, most of the other instruments were relatively balanced compared to my mixes.  His approach was to “make it sound good in his mix” while being able to hear his vocal pitch for accuracy.  I tend to intentionally set my personal monitor mix in a way that most people wouldn’t find enjoyable to listen to.  Both approaches are valid.

You may be scratching your head thinking, “why would this guy intentionally make a bad sounding mix?”  I should explain that most of the time when I am performing in a band situation, I am either playing bass guitar (fretted, fretless), upright bass or acoustic rhythm guitar.  In all cases I mix quite differently.

When playing fretted bass, my mix will be more like my friend’s mix but I usually keep lead guitar and drums at a minimum.  I do this because most of my musical cues come from a rhythm guitarist and/or keyboardist.  The lead guitar won’t often help with this, so I keep it down in the mix.  The drums are usually naturally loud enough that I can hear them even through in ear monitors which block out most external sounds.

When playing fretless bass guitar or upright bass, my mixes sound particularly unpleasant.  In these cases I mix to help me hear the intonation of the bass notes as prominently as possible with reference to an instrument setting the chordal structure of the song (usually the keyboards).  So I tend to have a LOT of bass and keyboards in my mix at these times and almost all else minimized.  I find this approach to work  well as I work with talented soundmen who make the FOH mix sound great while i focus on giving them the best sounding musical channel I can.

The mix changes further when I play rhythm steel string acoustic guitar in a band setting.  In these situations I usually minimize the bass and lead guitar while keeping the acoustic guitar, drums and lead vocals prominent.  Again, to the average listener this would not sound very even.

So whatever your approach is to your personal mixes, I suggest you consider your strategy before a session and experiment.  Ask the soundman for his feedback after a performance to see if your strategy helped the FOH mix or made it more difficult.  Over time you will narrow your approach down and be able to focus on what matters most – giving an inspirational performance.  Oh and don’t forget to save or write down your settings for future reference.

Even though musical performance is not a sport, it does share a similarity in terms of the importance of a warm up.  The more challenging the musical performance, the more beneficial a warmup will be.  There may be a lot of different approaches but here are some that I have used:

Stringed instruments:

• if a cold winter day, *physically* warm up the hands

  • hand warmers, breathing hot air into cupped hands, etc

• stretching fingers

• remove instrument from case to acclimate to environment, tune up

• doing scale exercises and finger patterns slowly then increasing tempo

• bowing scales slowly to warm up the bow and work in rosin

• waving hands vigorously

• stretching, back and legs

• sight reading (depends on genre)

Wind Instrumentalists:

• Wind instruments get sharper as they warm up

  • this is due sound moving faster in warm air than in cold

  • realize that the temperature of your breath has an affect on this

    • the greater the differential of your breathing temperature and the temperature of the instrument, the greater the affect

    • the larger the instrument the more the effect

• slow scale exercises

• lip buzzing

• finger stretches

Keyboardists:

• finger, palm, neck and leg stretches

• wiggle all fingers

• shake hands vigorously

• slow tempo scales and patterns playing lightly

  • gradually increase tempo and/or note attack as you warm up

Vocalists:

• be conscious of the difference in temperature of the vocal chords and the venue temperature.  The greater the difference, the more time should be spent in warmup.

• lip buzzing

• tonguing exercises

• flexibility exercises

• slow scales

• massage throat

• humming low notes

• range exercises

Drummers/Percussionists:

• if a cold winter day, *physically* warm up the hands

  • hand warmers, breathing hot air into cupped hands, etc

• Stretching palms, heels, arms, hands, neck and legs

• Doing rudimentary patterns at a slow tempo

• Using a practice pad if actual set used at performance not available

Mental warmup:

• Visualize a great performance

• Convince yourself practice time is over and it is time to enjoy the performance experience

Surely I am missing tips so please share what works for yourself.

I have noticed a concern among many worship leaders, team members and pastors as to whether or not the congregation is singing during worship time.  To me, this is a good sign as it shows that the person is focused on what is important.  However, I would argue that the concern should not be on the congregation merely singing.  While it is true that singing is one sign that the congregation is engaged in the service, it is not the only one.  Some other signs are people raising their hands, clapping, having their heads down in prayer and crying.

But it is entirely possible that the congregation is not doing *any* of those things but is in fact fully engaged.

One Sunday I was playing bass for my church and knew that a good friend brought his parents from out of state to the service for the first time.  I was dismayed when they looked like they weren’t enjoying the music while I was performing- they weren’t singing and they looked distracted and bored.  That in of itself distracted me as I felt I was failing in my role as a worship team member (not that they needed to like the music to feed my ego, but I wanted to know that at least they were connecting to the lyrical content).  It wasn’t until speaking with my friend after the service that he revealed just how naive I was.  It turned out his parents had just heard the sermon and the pastor had shared a personal story that they connected with regarding needing a kidney donor.  My friend’s parents had recently gone through a traumatic time where they too were waiting on a kidney donor.  The message hit them so hard they were stunned. They were trying to comprehend how of all Sundays, they came to the one time that the pastor shared this message.  They were trying to digest this spiritual moment.  They *were* having a spiritual moment, possibly more than anyone else in the congregation and the music really didn’t matter.  It only mattered in that it gave them time to digest what had happened.

And there I was worrying that my friend’s parents weren’t singing!  God humbled and taught me a lesson that day.  My perspective of the purpose of the service changed as well.

To me, the goal of a worship service is to provide an environment  that makes it easy for the congregation member to commune spiritually with God.   I look at it like this: most of the congregation had a rough week at work and/or with family and is struggling to get their mind off of those things during the service.  Anything that can be done to facilitate that and get them focused on scripture is a good thing.  This can be accomplished with things like having a comfortable environment, nice lighting, good sound, good musicianship, good sermon, etc.

Next time you are frustrated that the congregation isn’t singing, just remember that you cannot read their minds – you aren’t God.  The congregation may very well be having an epiphany based on meditating silently.  Just do your best to facilitate the spiritual moments and let God do the rest.

I have found over the years that the most obvious problem in a performance to the average listener is with regards to tempo issues.  By “tempo issues” I am referring to the tempo changing unintentionally during a song and also to ensemble performers not playing with the same sense of time.  Even when compared to all but the most obnoxious chordal clashes, tempo issues seem to be the easiest to hear and feel that something is not quite right in a performance.

In a band setting, one approach to battle tempo issues is to practice as a band along with a click track (and better yet to also record the practice and analyze the results).  I warn you that this can be a humbling experience.  It is actually quite difficult as a performer to increase dynamics and not increase tempo.  For some reason it becomes a natural response when getting excited during a musical passage to speed up.

One of my pet peeves with drummers is when they focus on interesting fills but “lose” the beat.  I have played with drummers that played drum fills that would stun Neil Peart (Rush), but could never land on the “one” of the beat at the end of the fill.  I liken it to focusing on an amazing dessert but using rotten food for the main coarse.

I am a fan of practicing along with a music track or a metronome.  The metronome has been a tool used by musicians since its invention in 1812.  The classical composer Beethoven was the first composer to use a metronome to indicate tempo of his compositions.  If you don’t have a metronome in your practice room (either a physical one or an app on a smartphone, computer, etc), I recommend you consider getting one.  One of my favorite practice routines is to have a chord patch play over a drum beat or metronome and improvise for 15-30 minutes just focusing on different rhythmic accents, note durations, rest durations, etc.  I have come up with many bass and guitar parts for songs using this technique.

I have found a metronome indispensable for working on challenging musical passages.  What I typically do is focus on the troublesome passage at a tempo slow enough that I can play without error.  Then I run through the passage at that tempo marking for a few times before I increase the tempo slightly.  I continue this until I can play the passage at the desired speed.  This has been particularly effective when learning classical guitar pieces which often have complex fingerings.  I learned this from a fantastic classical guitar teacher and have used it to work on many pieces.

I have been thinking recently on what are the characteristics of a great musical team/band member.  In this writeup I won’t be focusing on the leader (that will be another blog post), rather I will focus on the rest of the performers.  In playing in various bar, wedding, jazz, high school, college, bluegrass and worship bands as well as interviewing others, I have compiled a list of what I consider common characteristics of a great musical team member.

Characteristics of a great band member:

1. Respects the leader

   1. Doesn’t challenge every decision the leader makes and at least entertains the leader’s decisions

      1. Even if the team member is correct in their challenge (as in song choice for a worship service), how the challenge is made and the personality of the team member and leader need to be considered

         1. Some (in fact the best I have worked with) leaders appreciate team members’ suggestions, others do not (dictators)

         2. Enjoys being on a team and doesn’t aspire to take over the team

      2. It is ok to aspire to be a leader.  However, nobody likes being on a team where a team member tries to usurp the leader.  Not everyone is meant to be a leader, not everyone is meant to be a team player, look for complimentary skills.  If you are a team member and don’t have experience to be a leader, ask multiple team leaders for their feedback and ask to be mentored before leading.  Leading requires skills that the team member may not possess or even be aware of.

   2. Listens to himself AND the rest of the band while playing

      1. Single most important aspect in my opinion

      2. Follows the dynamics of the band

   3. Is respected by the other team members

      1. Note choice and rhythmic sense thoughtful and sensitive

      2. Doesn’t drown out other musicians with their volume

      3. Doesn’t tell other team members what to do, rather makes suggestions at the appropriate time.  For example, consider the likely end results of the following scenarios:

         1. During a rehearsal with all other members present, one musician says to the other, “that section sounds harsh, you should play this instead”.

         2. During a break in the rehearsal, one musician pulls another musician to the side and privately says, “you might consider playing that part this way, it could be interesting”

   4. Is prepared for practice and for the gig itself

      1. If all members but one of the team are prepared, the one who isn’t can pull down the level of the overall performance.

   5. Communicates well

      1. Able to articulate at appropriate times their concerns and suggestions

   6. Is on time, in fact, early for practice and the gig

   7. Loves the role they are playing

      1. The bassist doesn’t wish he was playing lead guitar and resent being put in that position

   8. Knows when to play sparsely and when to be busy

   9. Has a good sense of time

      1. Practicing with a metronome can go a long way towards this

   10. Has equipment appropriate for the task at hand

       1. For example, the guitarist doesn’t have a guitar that is buzzing all over the neck if he is playing a part requiring a clean guitar sound

   11. Doesn’t waste the team’s time trying to dial in their sound excessively during practice and/or a performance

       1. A bit of tweaking is to be expected, spending 15 minutes to dial in the tones for a 3 minute song during practice is annoying

   12. Doesn’t treat the soundman as a servant but rather a part of the team

   13. Likes the music they are playing

       1. The audience can usually tell if a performer enjoys what they are doing

   14. Doesn’t gossip about others

   15. Is fun to be around and/or is liked by others

       1. While it is true some amazing musicians are a pain to be on a team with, for the cohesiveness of the team it may be better to have a lesser skilled musician and develop them over time.  I have seen teams decimated by a team member nobody enjoyed playing with even though they were fantastic musicians.

   16. Gives positive feedback to other members

       1. Can be publicly or privately done.  Goes a long way toward keeping and/or building team morale.

Please share whether you agree, disagree or have suggestions.

Of all the techniques I have used to improve as an ensemble player, the most helpful has been recording and listening back to band practices. Listening to the playback, even with rough mixes, has given me invaluable feedback in terms of:

1. which musical lines or phrases work in the context of a full mix and/or song
2. which tones blend well with a full mix
3. when to stop playing so busily
4. when to add tonal or dynamic nuance
5. when to stop encroaching on the singer’s sonic space
6. when to stop “pushing” or “pulling” the beat
7. how well (or poorly) the rhythm section “locks” in with the drums
8. intonation (vocally, fretless bass, trombone, etc)
9. focusing on playing root notes
10. focusing on harmonic and/or melodic playing
11. how well the lyrics flow with the melody

Let me warn you that listening to a playback of your performance can be a very humbling experience. There is a big difference between what a player thinks he sounds like and what he actually sounds like. I liken this to looking at a photograph of oneself. The initial thought when listening to a playback is often, “ouch, I thought I sounded better than that”.
As I alluded to in the title of this post, listening to the recording can be a scary experience.

 If I recall correctly, I did not want to play my instrument for a week after listening to my first playback. However, over time I was able to address the issues that were bothering me in the recording.  So don’t be too critical of yourself when listening to the recordings. You will find that over time the feedback that intentional listening to these recordings will help you develop as an ensemble player.

While it has been said that there are no rules in music, in my opinion there are time tested guidelines to help people create music. One such guideline is to follow the leader in a band. This is a topic I find most beginners who play with others struggle with. When playing music with other people, at some point it is important to recognize who is the leader and follow them.

To illustrate why this is important, consider this example. Let us say a band consisting of a singer and a guitarist are performing a song. If there is no predefined leader, the singer could decide to sing in one key while the guitarist could decide to play in another. While there isn’t anything inherently wrong with doing this, the average listener would find that the music would sound out of tune or somehow “odd”. If however the leader who is the singer states the key of the song and the guitarist obliges, the song will sound more “correct” to the average listener.

Following the leader is one way to help a band sound well integrated or playing “as one”. Again, if the singer is the leader and he begins to suddenly sing softly in a part of the song, the band, by following the singer, could also reduce volume, thereby allowing all of the musical parts to be heard.

There can also be different leaders for different parts of songs. For example, lets say a band consisting of bass, drum, keyboards and guitar has the keyboardist as the band leader. The rest of the band could look to him/her for dynamic cues during a performance. However, when it is time for the guitarist to solo, he could be the leader and the rhythm section could look to him for dynamic cues, length of solo, etc. It would be best before the song starts for the keyboardist, as the band leader, to give a song roadmap to the rest of the band stating that the rest of the band will look to the guitarist for direction during his solo.

As a kid I played “follow the leader” with classmates on the playground.  Little did I know that this game would teach me useful concepts in having a great musical performance.

Recently I have been pondering my history of listening to Christian or “church” music.  I grew up listening to hymns in the Catholic Church and then moved more towards contemporary worship as I got older.  In between those extremes, I’ve enjoyed some amazing religious music that doesn’t get played in church at all.  The albums (remember when we used to call them that?)  “Hymns by Johnny Cash” , “The Half Ain’t Never Been Told Vol1&2″ are just some examples of great Christian music.  The album “Saved” by Bob Dylan, the various bluegrass gospel renderings of Bill Monroe, the blues songs of Blind Willie Johnson, not to mention a large portion of J.S. Bach’s music are more examples of this.

To me, a great Christian song (excluding an instrumental) has a strong, biblical lyric as well as melody.  I tried to articulate my feelings on this subject but found an excellent post by Dan Cogan did a much better than I could.  So I scrapped my writeup and decided to point you to that [button style=”btn-primary” url=”http://www.dancogan.com/my-journey-away-from-contemporary-worship-music” size=”” block=”false” target=”_self”] post [/button]

I have two favorite Christian themed songs.  The first is “Every Grain of Sand” by Bob Dylan and “Amazing Grace” (words by John Newton).  Both songs have stood the test of time and have fantastic lyrics.  On top of that, the melodies are pretty.  I suggest you check out those songs if you have not had a chance.  One of the “spookiest” worship songs I’ve ever heard is “Dark Was the Night” by Blind Willie Johnson.  It does with instruments and humming a great job of helping me picture Jesus on the cross.

Feel free to post your favorite songs below.

I have great respect for people with one of the most difficult jobs when it comes to live performance – the soundman/woman. (for ease of discussion I will refer to this person as the soundman). I have found most people in the audience do not know that the sound men control how the performance sounds in terms of volume and mix and don’t appreciate his role. I lost count of the times people have come up to me to say “great sound”, “I love your tone” or “its too loud” after I am performing. I always tell them that it isn’t me, the soundman is the one in control. I, as a performer, simply give the soundman the raw material with which he can work with. Thus I want to give the highest quality signal with which he can work with (one of the main reasons Sonic Nuance Electronics was started by me).

In terms of who on a performance “team” has the most influence over the overall sound, my opinion is that it is the soundman. With this in mind, it makes sense for the performer to look at the soundman as an ally and not an adversary in getting the music to the audience. I’ve heard of performers getting upset that “their tone” wasn’t coming through correctly, and I certainly understand the frustration. After all, many musicians spend countless hours trying to get a good tone out of their instrument. However, it is important to realize the soundman is trying to make the overall mix sound good, not just one instrument. To achieve this, the soundman has ultimate control of what the audience hears. For example, on a bass guitar channel the soundman can modify the equalization, volume, effects (reverb, compression, etc) and even mute it altogether. On top of that, the room acoustics come into play in a big way to modify the sound. With all this in mind, I feel it is more important that the overall mix sounds “even” and that the soundman and performer do whatever is necessary within reason (including changing tone) to make that happen. This will be much easier to achieve if the soundman and performer’s vision of the sound is consistent, so I suggest both the performers and soundmen discuss goals before a performance.

Let me explain the importance of this via an example. One Sunday at a church service I was playing bass guitar and the soundman came up to me afterwards asking “is there something wrong with your equipment?” I replied that I didn’t know of any issues and asked what he had heard or didn’t hear. He went on to explain that he was hearing a constant tone with no decay when I was tuning. We tried to debug this issue after the service and could not duplicate the phenomena. It wasn’t until hours later when he sent me the isolated bass track that everything made sense. To give some context, the soundman didn’t have a clear line of sight to all the musicians, especially to me. Also, he used our practice recordings for reference.

It turns out that when the soundman thought I was tuning I was actually performing using an ebow* – hence the long sustaining notes with “no decay”. After I understood what happened I explained it to the soundman and apologized for not informing him before hand what I was planning. You see, the soundman did his homework and I had not used the ebow effect at all during our rehearsal. Thus it was not on the rehearsal recording which he diligently studied. Also, using an ebow on bass is far from a normal thing a soundman would come across, he had no way of knowing (especially since he couldn’t see me) what I was doing. Thinking something was wrong with my equipment he muted the bass channel. I learned my lesson – communicate anything “out of the ordinary” before a performance with the soundman. This includes things like effects on the bass (a heavily distorted bass tone is usually not something a soundman expects, so he may think something is wrong), changing instruments during a set, etc.

The soundman has a hard enough job. So performers, try to help them via better communication and often the music will come out better than you imagined.

2015 Addendum: Mike Sessler at Church Tech Arts wrote a great companion piece to my article.  It gives the opposite perspective of the tech guys helping the worship leader.

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