The Speed of Sound

Amp Peavey.
Originally uploaded by fakestar

Some things frustrate me more than others. One near the top is the sound of guitars in sanctuaries. Especially electric guitars.

There are as many sounds that can come out of a guitar as their are broken 1/4" instrument cables. that said there are some basics that from my experience elude most players and FOH sound people. There is nothing like the feel of a creamy, crunchy guitar filling in the dynamic middle of a great mix. nothing. Unfortunately that's what most congregations hear from the guitars in many services I've experienced. nothing.

this post hopes to spark a revolution in how we all think about this slightly dangerous instrument and its over-driven partners in crime.

Here's the chain. In the posts and comments ahead I hope to see this labyrinth of forces navigated and understood by all who play a role in delivering a creamy, nuanced guitar vibe to the ears and hopefully hearts of worshippers.

Milestones along the way include:

1. guitar - pickups - single coils, humbuckers, passive, active, split, parallel,....
2. stomp box - there are countless forums online about this topic. To get a glimpse of how deep this art is check out a study of the Edge's delay.
   
3. amps - my personal crusade is to bless every worship service with the warm goo that emerges only from a nice tube driven amp
4. pods and multi-effect units - I call this out since in many ways they are used as hybrids of stomp boxes and amps
5. cabinets - closed back, combos, silent cabinets
6. mics and mic placement on amps
7. mixing the guitar sound with FOH sound
8. monitoring - floor monitors, the amp itself, how to accurately feel what you are delivering FOH.

Enough Already

Here's the way it work in our church. We get a song list, charts and mp3s in advance of the first rehearsal. There are also brief notes about each song (e.g. "we are playing this in C not Bb like the mp3...") . Each musician goes off and 'practices' (sometimes not) their part by themselves. We then get together on Tuesday nights for the first rehearsal and it's usually pretty rough. Thursday night we have another rehearsal in the sanctuary with the FOH sound guys and lights, video etc. this is where the tech team gets to go through the lighting, video and other cues. The music is getting better but there are a lot of moving parts that are coming together for the first time. Sunday morning we have our final rehearsal.

What I hope is evident is that there is little time for musicians to work on how their parts interact with each other. Its a lot to expect that the musicians will have yet another rehearsal to integrate their parts. What to do?

What I found to be a most bang for the buck option is for each musician to avoid the following traps when rehearsing:

1. Spend more time listening to the mp3 - don't play what you think you hear. listen for YOUR part.
2. Make notes on your chart about when to play and more importantly when NOT to play
3. Avoid over-playing your part. this is the biggest problem with most worship bands. Everybody is banging away at a 10 on their instrument because this is how they have been rehearsing it (by themselves). Now that the band is together its not your job to carry the whole song.
4. Pace your playing to ride the dynamics of the song. Sometimes the band pulls back, slows down, stops playing altogether.
   
5. Practice the song to the mp3 as much as possible during the week or at least play to a metronome. One of the musical elements that needs the most improvement in most worship bands is their collective sense of rhythm. To be a rock and not to roll is a shame.
   

Don't Quit Your Day Job

Originally uploaded by manyfires

It struck me the other day that a bit of context would help with this blog. I believe I am somewhat typical of a worship player. There is the marriage, the kids, the 2 pet birds, the 1.5 dogs, the dozen or so half-finished projects around the house, the movies of the kids that have not been edited, the friends I haven't called back, and , and and.... I'm sure your list is just as long.

Yet if I won the lottery I'm sure I would end up spending my time and money on various musical pursuits. Whether music fits on my calendar or not it is a big part of who I am. So I find myself neglecting other pursuits to rehearse, to chart, to talk about guitars, amps, effects, to record small projects, and, and and...

Its with this context that I think about this blog. How does your average player who's day job is not music, play worship music that is good, that inspires, that doesn't distract the congregation, that is musical? If you are REALLY dedicated to worship there are far better blogs for you that I encourage you to check out. worship matters has tons of great content. But most of the blogs I find are written by worship leaders or other paid music staff. My take on worship is simply that my take. A guy with a day job, who loves music and loves serving my church and my God.

In the posts ahead I will focus on how to get the most out of the time you spend thinking, rehearsing, and playing.

Playing on the Right Side of the Brain

Originally uploaded by Gaetan Lee

Years ago I heard about a book called Drawing on the right side of the brain. It basically teaches you how to really see and draw as opposed to drawing what you think you see. One of the most amazing examples asks you to look at and draw a portrait. Nothing too different here except that the portrait was printed upside-down. An amazing thing happened when I just drew what looked like random shapes. When I flipped over my drawing it was the best, most accurate image I’d ever drawn. For grins, I drew the portrait again while looking at it upside-up. The result was cartoonish, it looked like a 6 year-old drew it. So where I am going with this wrt playing worship music? We need to flip the songs we are rehearsing upside-down. When I listen to a song and start to play it I find that I often play it my way and I have to force myself to actually listen to what the player is doing rather than what I think they are doing. I have no magic technique for how this may play out when you try it, but I encourage you to avoid the trap of playing what think you hear. It’s a nice break to actually close your eyes and surrender to the music and the part as you listen.

It's Different

Like most musicians born in the 60s, I've played music with lots of people, played in lots of bands and have made some great and some not-so-great music in the process. It's from this perspective that I would like to explore the how and why of developing and sustaining a great worship band.

While a band's job is to perform great live music, worship bands differ in some key ways from their secular counterparts. Understanding and harnessing these differences can actually enable a worship band to rock the house and have a great time doing it.

Top Differences I can think of today:

1. We are not 19 with a part-time job with a lot of spare time on our hands
2. Meeting girls (or boys) is NOT one of the primary reasons we are in the worship band
3. Who's in "The band" often changes week to week
4. We don't obsess about the good and bad qualities of the band's name
5. We don't usually have a 'lead vocalist' with a huge ego who writes all the songs
6. Others people tell us what songs to play and often how we should play them
7. Most of the written feedback we get reads "too loud"
8. Our drummer sits behind a wall of plexiglass
9. The 12 page song charts we get work great for a piano and an octopus with a really wide music stand
10. The song list changes EVERY WEEK
    

Any of this ring true for you? I spent most of my life avoiding church. My band roots are embedded in high school dances, college frat parties, acoustic gigs in coffee houses and lots of time in the studio. Bringing these experiences into a Christian church has been interesting to say the least. Christ has flipped my ill-guided life on its head and I am forever (as in truly forever) transformed. Solid as the Rock is one of the ways I hope to give back some of what has been given me.

--
Carl

What Would Jesus Play?

I often get high-centered when I'm trying to figure out exactly how a guitarist is playing a lick on a worship song. What effects and amp settings are being used, which of the three or more guitar parts should I actually play, what will the acoustic guitarist be playing, WHO is the acoustic guitarist???

When I am trying to force it I've learned to simply take a breath and ask myself What would Jesus play? What if Jesus were jamming on a sunburst '57 Les Paul through a 1968 hand-wired Marshall Plexi? How would He play, how would He move, what kind of effects would He use? Would He need sheet music?

The thought that most often comes to me is that the music flowing out of Him would be so amazing that He would disappear. His music would open up heaven for anyone with ears to hear.

In the posts ahead I hope to explore the calling of a player in a worship team. What is good? What is good enough? How are we supposed to sound like these amazing bands that have played together for years? How do we get the best sound out of the current instruments and equipment we have access to? What forces need to come together to play a song with so much soul that we disappear and something eternal is revealed?

I am one guy, please feel free to comment about what musical struggles you face in your worship band and I will guide this blog to discuss what really matters.

thanks
Carl