Off the Charts

Christmas Music Stand 2005
Originally uploaded by joy-z

In what would Jesus Play Ben commented that:

"worship players needs to be like a mirror, reflecting peoples gazes up to God"

amen brother. My question is how do we reflect UP to God if our heads are buried in our music charts? The answers is we can't so we need a way to internalize a lot of music into our frazzled brains in about a week's time.

That's a tall order but if you follow my 3 step plan you will become rich in song memorization and be the proud owner of a complete set of Ginsu knives.

1. Guitarists and bassists: Make your own charts. This one act will glue most of the song in your head. The key is to have the least amount of ink on the page. I often end up with a couple of versions of the chart, the early ones have quite a bit of ink on them, later charts get even simpler.
   
2. Break down the song into sections. Most worship songs rely on repetition. Just remember how to play the verse, chorus and the bridge and combine them together during the service. Breaking out of the chart is not nearly as scary as it seems all you really need are the mileposts.
1. A typical chart would include the following sections:
• Intro, Verse1, Chorus 1, Verse 2, Chorus2, Bridge, Chorus3 -5, Outtro
• If the song requires switching patches note this on the chart as well.
  
3. Practice the song to the CD using your simple chart at home and in rehearsal.
   

This is what works for me. When my act is really together I simply make a one page list of songs using 64 point bold type that I set on the floor by my effects pedals. I usually write in the patch name that I am using as well on each song.

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.