Go ahead and prepare yourself. I'm gonna' be selfish here. I'm going to speak personally - telling you my opinion and the factors that have created it.
I'm going to write from two perspectives: that of a worship leader/musician and that of a child of God who loves to worship. (Think of these 2 positions as "stage" and "crowd.")
Lately, I've been very grateful for space. Over the past few months, I've come to identify a thing that makes me fall in love with songs: space. I've come to appreciate worship songs that have a lot of space in them. Understand that I'm not talking about simple songs - any musician can tell you that building space in a song is an extremely hard thing to do.
No, I've been impressed by songs that are well done and still have space in them.
WHAT DO I MEAN?
Let me try to share my concept of space as it relates to worship music. I love to hear rocking bass, drums, keys and guitars; I dig sweet, smooth, well crafted vocal parts; I love loops and auxiliary percussion tracks; but what I don't dig is when all of that stuff bleeds right over into the words I'm supposed to be singing.
The best worship songs have lots of cool stuff in them, but make a priority of the actual lyrical content that's being communicated. That doesn't mean I expect every instrument to stop playing in each verse, but so many songs I'm hearing lately have instrumentation that never lets up: the electric guitar is wailing away during the chorus and when the 2nd verse hits, he doesn't play less, but just as much (maybe at a different place on the fretboard.)
So I'm admiring songs where I can tell the instrumentalists and singers are making it obvious to us all that they're main job is to support the words being spoken to or in praise of the Father.
MY PERSPECTIVE(S)
Let me tell you why I'm digging space.
As a worship leader/musician, I just can't do it. I just can't pound my way through a song with 200 words and 8 different chord voicings - because when I play those songs, I'm not able to actually think about what the song is actually about. It makes it harder for me to sing or even think about what I'm saying to God and it prevents me from thinking far enough ahead to plan the places where I'll give the tune space.
As a worshipper, I just can't do it. It's too hard - I can't listen to a band playing all out non-stop for six minutes. I get too distracted. I end up thinking, "Oooh, wow! What is that drummer doing? Holy cow, that bass run is awesome. Man, I'm so buying their CD!" Listen to me - that stuff does not belong in worship. The worship of God has been so abused and commercialized over the past few years that I don't even realize that I've turned worship into a concert. I've turned it into something that turns heads and tickles ears but doesn't lift eyes, hands and hearts.
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Even though I've spoken from a very personal perspective, I'm willing to bet that a renewed focus on space is something you and I (as worship leaders) need in the worst possible way. Here are a few artists that I've noticed do a great job of making space in music.
Chris Tomlin - I think its better on his live stuff, but you can definitely hear that Chris and crew work hard an not cluttering up tunes with overplaying. They're all good musicians and show that by making space for each other and the spoken/sung praises of God.
Paul Baloche - One of the masters of space, in my opinion. I don't think most people realize it, but you'll hear folks talk about how "smooth" or "comfortable" Paul's songs are. That's space. Perfect use of space.
Brian Doerksen - Even at his most complex/weirdest, Doerksen is so skilled at pacing the dynamic flow of his tunes.
Robin Mark - Even this writer of such anthemic tunes leaves tons of wide open space in his music.
I encourage you to listen through some of your most well-loved worship tunes and see how the "space" issue hits you. Too much space or not enough?
Monday, September 03, 2007
Posted by Todd Wright at 10:48 PM
Labels: church, joel gilliam, music, worship
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12 comments:
so then do hymns have a lot of space?
I think that's a great question, but instead of posting some long response, I'll flip it on ya'.
What do you think?
Space is nice. Does acceptable worship require it all the time? I lean toward "no." Worship is an art; art requires the balance of elements. When the lyrics of a hymn are reinforced by the organist pulling out the stops and going for it, there's nothing that makes my heart leap more. It "amplifies" my adoration, if you will. What if I turn the beat around to accent a particular lyric?
I agree that we have to avoid concert-behavior, but at least one of the space-masters you list is a prime, um, "offender." ;) So is it a function of content?
And, is there a responsibility on the part of the congregation to grow in musical maturity to the point of being able to pour themselves into the singing of fully-orbed musical selections? It's part of our sanctification.
Side note: some of your posts aren't showing up in the blog feed. Weird.
The catalyst for this post actually came from a conversation I had with a fellow musician who played a gig with a great band blazing their way through a set of very complex, very busy songs with a high level of artistic quality.
The thing was that after it all said and done, my pal hated it. He didn't dig the fact that he couldn't even think about what the song was saying, he didn't have time to "turn any beats around," because he was working so hard to emulate the rock/worship set.
That conversation reminded me of some of my worst experiences leading worship where we sounded great but I was miserable because I had to stay so focused on not screwing up. It also reminded me of worship when I've been so amazingly distracted by the overdisplay of skill that I couldn't stay focused. (Maybe I'm just not as skilled as I need to be. I'm okay with that idea.)
I feel you on the organ thing, Johnny, but I'm willing to be that your organist doesn't open until that last stanza: space, baby.
My posts aren't showing up on feeds because Blogger is scared of me. I'm quickly become the Christian, straight, thinner Perez Hilton. (Except I hate on CHRISTIAN celebrity...)
You really had me thinking today...
Next question in regard to playing/singing a more complicated part, one which demands the musician's attention (such that his mind is not on the content but on the execution):
Has he ceased worshiping?
I'm not inclined to say he's necessarily worshiping any less than a guy who's feelin' it. Maybe, maybe not.
I don't believe the "heart issue" is about the emotions, per se, so much as it about the motivation. If one's heart is to earnestly serve the Lord by executing his duties in leading the Church, it doesn't matter if he's emotionally engaged at a particular point in time.
For example, if I'm a priest handing out the elements of Communion to a person at the rail, and my attention is on getting the bread into their hands or the cup to their lips, I'm worshiping as much as when I was preaching, provided my heart is right in coming to do my liturgical duties.
Whattaya think?
That's a good point...
Okay, let's take the "leadership" perspective out.
But it's possible to overplay, though. It's possible to distract our people. I hear what you're saying about excellence, John. And my view is that most excellent players know when to shut up.
I also feel you on the "musical maturity" aspect, but I believe that my responsibility at my church is to lead my people through a set of songs, prayers, etc. that prepare them for the preaching of God's Word. That's hard enough without me also trying to develop their their musical maturity.
I would assume that's an issue that's probably unique to every single church in America. I would hope that those in worship leadership would be passionate about pursuing God's call and direction for their particular flock. It's something I'm trying really hard to figure out, and right now, musical maturity doesn't rank that high for us.
Paul...I know blogging is a weird thing wherein tone is hard to decipher, and your question about hymns is perplexing me. What's going through your head on the space issue?
It seemed that your post was very one sided; the problems you mentioned effect contemporary forms of music, but was space an issue with traditional hymns?
I'm more thinking out loud than anything else. There seems to have always been some division between music for enjoyment and music for worship; you listened to Mozart for enjoyment but you sang along with Charles Wesley. Space is inherent in hymns because the emphasis is on corporate worship through singing, not the indvidual expression of praise through voice or instrumentation. I guess what I'm saying is there is a time and place for expression through music (instrumentation) but maybe Sunday morning isn't the place for it.
To contrast the amplification of adoration through instrumentation (sorry for all the -ations...) - how powerful was it for me to hear the believers in Belize singing traditional hymns to their own tunes (as they had never heard the original arrangements) completely unaided by organ, piano, or even a skilled vocalist. Art is subjective.
Okay...wow, Paul.
Let me this first and foremost: I think you're saying great stuff about hymns. I would also add that I think the lack of "sections" (meaning 4-5 stanzas that are pretty much the same) helps the song to stay pretty uncluttered. I'll be honest - I still come across hymns that are hard to sing (too many words, maybe a herd melody,) but it does feel that hymns seems a little more "spacious" from the get-go.
Secondly, I'd like to remind everybody of how I started the post: "I'm gonna' be selfish here. I'm going to speak personally - telling you my opinion and the factors that have created it."
It's a blog. A blog of a dude who leads CONTEMPORARY WORSHIP, and I ain't digging the your-blog-is-one-sided comment, Paul. Of course, it's one sided.
That first comment felt a little aggressive to me, and the "one sided" leads me to believe I was right in my interpretation of where you were coming from.
Sorry I didn't start out talking about hymns (although I think we've hit on them pretty well, somehow.)
If I've misread you, Paul, my bad. But I feel like you're peeved in some way. Am I way off here?
Maybe I should have used a smiley face? I ain't got no beef with you!
I didn't forget where you were coming from - but your posted seemed one sided so I posed a question "what about hymns" to add another dimension and spur on discussion. My thought was, if contemporary worship music and hymns are parallel - in that their purpose is to allow for corporate worship - then it would be logical ask "What would Wesley do" when problems arise in contemporary worship. (And "what would Tomlin do?" if you're problem was in traditional worship).
So if hymns tend to have more space, was it intentional or just a by-product of an emphasis on the lyric?
Another of Johnny's monkey wrenches:
Some parts of hymns (particularly those from the Reformation era) are really hard to sing. Try the tenor part to "A Mighty Fortress." The hymn is "spacious" in it's meter or note-density, but it is harmonically pretty complicated. It's very difficult for me to read and sing while being all "worshipy" in my mind. But I think God is pleased with it.
"It's meter?" Man, I need to preview my posts.
Darn, this is fun, isn't it? Why aren't more of our friends giving their 2 cents? Think they're scared of how smart we are?
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