What is God stirring in your heart this Holiday Season for
your congregation? Maybe you will highlight a few of those Christmas Hymns that
are so near to your church’s heart. Maybe you will have a celebration service incorporating
the worship of your church through the arts. Maybe you will have a Christmas
choir, a powerful retelling of the meaning of Christmas, a group of carolers
singing through your neighborhoods, or maybe you will share a meal with your
church - all in honor of the birth of our King. This King came as a lowly
newborn baby in a humble manger in a little town long ago. What an incredible
paradox! The King of Kings and Lord of Lords entered this earth humbly. I can’t
help but think of Matthew 23:12.
This Christmas Season let us ‘make much’ of our King and
welcome Him with great celebration and joyful hearts! Let us exalt Him through
our singing and join with the Angels as the ‘official messengers of His good news’ or the "herald" worshipers:
Hark! The herald angels sing "Glory to the newborn King!
Peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled."
Joyful, all ye nations rise. Join the triumph of the skies.
With the angelic host proclaim: "Christ is born in Bethlehem."
Hark! The herald angels sing, "Glory to the newborn King!"
It is pretty cool what we can do with technology these days. We can put literally $1000s of dollars of outboard gear, computer hardware and network capabilities into these devises we call "smartphones."
Sound techs, now if you go digital you can mix from anywhere in the room with your ipad. Oh, and if you have enough Aux sends to support individual monitors for musicians and singers they can mix their own monitors from stage without even bothering you!!!! Then once you get some basic levels you can switch over to an app that allows you to analyze the sound in the room to get your EQ dialed in. Ever heard of Smarrt??? You can have that in on your iPad for under $100. INSANE!
Visual Techs, there is a world of stuff for you as well. Lighting magazines are filled with new apps and programs to function as a lighting control. And for your screens... here is a fun new projection system that is designed solely to be mobile.
Worship Leaders, there are endless tools for us as well. My favorite are:
Planning Center Online's mobile app for scheduling and live events. Great for those conversations on stage of "am I playing next week" for someone as scatterbrained as me.
Evernote!!!! Love this one as a songwriter. I can type out some lyric ideas, record audio clips and photo/videos to hold on to that melody line or lyric that junps out.
Shazam. This is a first generation app that still holds it's ground because it is so useful. Listening to the radio or something when you are out? Shazam it and share it to your email inbox. Perfect.
Bible App... nuff said.
Metronome - This will help any worship team if you can utilize it well.
Dropbox - free cloud sharing is great for storing large files that you may need to access from anywhere.
There are so many more...
One recommendation if you are using your iphone in a live worship setting... "airplane mode." The other day I heard a call/text (don't know which one) come in when someone was using their phone for click track... not fun.
Playing with other musicians is part of being a musician. Yet, musicians have a stigma about always seeking the spotlight and being flashy, kind of the 'one man band' mentality. However, one of the first things you realize (okay maybe the second or third) as you play with a band is that not everyone can be highlighted 100% of the time.
Finding your space in the group is key.
Good musicianship starts when you can learn how to find your space when playing with others. I've heard people give tons of analogies for this concept. The most common one I can remember is the 'pie' analogy. Music, or the overall sound, is a whole pie. Each player is a piece of the pie. If there are 5 players in the band and 2 vocalists then we need to divide the pie into 7 pieces. This is NOT saying that they are equal pieces. Part of the strategy behind creating a unique sound is using the space in a way that isn't "cookie cutter" or predictable. The Rhythm section, in more contemporary or modern worship settings, holds a larger piece of the pie along with the lead vocals. If all musicians took that size of a slice of pie we wouldn't have enough to go around and if we all took equal slices it would sound like a huge wall of sound taking out anyone in it's way!
Personally, the style of music that I end up enjoying more is simple in it's mix. The drums, bass, and lead vocals stand out strong and the others support that "core" sound. To all you non-music producers out there, yes, that is what I said. The main things people complain about should be the most present in the mix. If you listen to about 90% of pop music (and worship music) you will find a similar structure. The bass and drums carry the music and the vocals stand out to grab your attention. Before you tune out, hear me out. We get more complaints about the drums and bass when the mix is more flat. Most people don't realize that their ear wants to hear those (well EQ'd) as the foundation for the sound. If the vocals do not stand out, then drums are the first things to complain about. If the drums are not present enough, then we take it out on the bass player. If the bass is not full enough we complain about the overall "loudness" of it. Most people don't understand the 'sonic landscape', as a friend of mine puts it. But, in that basic mix, the acoustic, electric, piano/keys and BGVs support and bring color to the sound. That is when we can truly shine as a whole!
This video is a great example of sharing the sound-space. It is really a cool way to demonstrate this because of the fact that they are literally sharing one instrument. The more important thing is that they are sharing the audio area or sound space. Notice how simple each thing they are playing is... but when combined with each other it is full and complete.
As worship leaders, we need to not only realize that it will sound better to work together. But, that it is biblical! In Romans 12:10 it says, "Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another. (NKJV)" In the Message translation, it really sums up this verse with a musical analogy... it says "practice playing second fiddle." Jesus talks about serving, in fact, He serves us even to the point of giving His life! So, as we are finding our place in the mix we need to learn how to serve each other and support each other best in our roles. In doing this we will learn to serve the congregation as well, allowing them to worship without hindrance or distraction.
The common and famous saying "less is more" truly applies in leading worship. If we bring simplicity to our individual sound it will actually add more to the sound of the group as a whole.
However, there is a time when you do need to be 100% of the sound as a solo musician. I love this next video as an example of that! This is Phil Wickham doing his Singalong 2 album and you'll see that he creates a huge full sound with just vocals, guitar & delay. This video doesn't quite capture the fullness that we felt sitting in the room hearing it live.
Basically, as it says in Ecclesiastes 3, "There is a time for everything." Or you could say, a time to bring forth a full sound on your own, and a time to find your space with the rest of the band.
I've been wanting to highlight a friend and show some new creative elements that are being used in Visual Worship Arts and I got an email from him about a session he is leading at the Song DISCovery Creative Conference in Nashville. So, I figured I would pass it on. Take a look. This is pretty fascinating stuff and really brings a new element of creativity to our worship.
Thanks for all that you are doing Stephen. Take a look at his website: http://worshipvj.com/
The Church used to be known for being the most creative, artistic force on the planet. Centuries ago, the Church commissioned visual artists to paint its ceilings, create stained glass images, and architect the most provocative buildings in history. Of course, many agendas, motivations, politics and power struggles were involved in the creative process (which is the same case today)...but at the end of the day, some of mankind's most stunning art was created...art that tells the Story of God!
But along the way, something happened. And a large portion of the Church threw visual art out the window. Beauty no longer had a place in the world of theology...and the Word of God was limited to text on a page and the academic preaching of a sermon. But things are changing.
The Church is welcoming art and beauty back home into it's mission & worship. And it's very exciting to see it unfold. And it's pretty messy, as well.
Pastors are trying to figure out how to manage and lead artists. Artists are learning to be pastors and visual prophets. Churches are making films. Worship leaders aren't leading with just songs anymore...they're leading with visual media! More eyes are on HD screens these days than they are on the cross, baptistry, or pulpit. And with "environmental projection," you can turn your once blank worship center into an image-filled cathedral of Story!
A generation of visual artists is rising up... and it's full of storytellers, film-makers, painters, media directors, graphic designers, VJs, lighting designers, photographers & more! The artist is the new pastor. And the media director is now the visual worship leader.
More than ever, there must be time & space to have conversations about what is happening... and to receive training and teaching so that we can lead and create in ways that bring glory to The Creator. And it's important to have these conversations in community with our musical worship leaders, songwriters and authors.
So all you visual worshipers out there, this is the summons. Come to the Song DISCovery Creative Conference in Nashville this April, and interact with others who are in the same boat as you. Click here to register today! And use code "VJ25" when you register to receive $25 off registration!
Sincerely, Stephen Proctor
General Session Speaker
Song DISCovery Creative Conference
[Text & Images from: Worship Leader Magazine, Email - Subject: Hone Your Craft as a Visual Artist. Copyright (C) 2012 Worship Leader Magazine All rights reserved. Used by permission.]
