Psalm 96 by Joseph Stigora

Joseph Stigora’s setting of Psalm 96 gets a bad rap. Sure, he started it off in the key of F# at the Worship God conference in 2008 only to have the band join in the key of G, prompting this hilarious and often-viewed YouTube video, but you’d never know anything else about how the song goes or how the verses sound unless you were at the conference.

And then last week I added to the abuse of Joseph’s song by writing a little post about how, when I used it at my church to start off the service, the people in the congregation who came in late and missed the instructions to not sing the verses ended up standing around confused.

It’s actually a great contemporary setting of the Psalm. The chorus is singable and catchy, the verses are great for a vocalist to sing on his/her own, and the melody/feel complements the text well. All you have to do is make sure you’re all singing/playing in the same key (because you wouldn’t want this to happen! Have you seen that video, by the way?), and your congregation knows what to do on the verses (i.e. not try to sing along).

Joseph has kindly agreed to offer the chord chart as a free download and a rough demo mp3 of the full song (in the same key the whole time!) for you to listen to. Joseph is a gifted and humble guy who’s a worship leader and pastor on staff at Covenant Fellowship Church in Glen Mills, Pennsylvania.

Chord chart

What Are Your “Go-To” Songs?

Fill in the blanks:

When I really want to get a service started off strong, we’ll sing _____.

On Easter Sunday we always start off by singing _____.

When the sermon has been on the topic of mission, I love to sing _____.

If we want to sing a song about being “in Christ”, then _____ is perfect!

If we sing _____ then I love following it up by singing _____.

_____ is my go-to song for starting off communion.

We all have our “go-to” songs. We’ve tried them and they’ve worked. Not only have they worked but they’ve worked really well. I love starting off a service with “Beautiful One” by Tim Hughes or closing a communion service with “Let Your Kingdom Come” by Bob Kauflin, or singing “O Come All Ye Faithful” as the opening hymn on Christmas Eve. It’s nice to fall back on those tried-and-true songs when I can’t think of anything better to use or don’t have the time or energy to try something different.

I’ve been realizing lately that my tendency to gravitate towards the same songs in the same slot time after time can contribute to a staleness and predictability in our services. God never ceases to be indescribably great and beautiful, but singing the same song about him being the “beautiful one” can become monotonous and seem rote. God’s greatness is unsearchable, but singing about “how great” our God is with the same song once a month for four years can get boring. I’ve likened it before to making a copy of a copy – you gradually lose crispness and vibrancy with each one.

I’m learning that in order to help people be aware that we can never sing enough about the cross, I need to help them articulate praise to the Lamb who was slain in as many combinations of words and melodies as possible. To help people come into a worship service reminded afresh of God’s greatness and kindness we can’t sing the same three songs on a rotating basis. If I want a Christmas Eve service to help shake people out of their last-minute-shopping-stress-coma, I need to think about whether “O Come All Ye Faithful” really is the best opening hymn, or if something else would be more effective.

Newness and creativity for the sake of being new and creative is idolatry. But newness and creativity for the sake of helping people see and encounter the glory of God afresh is worth the time and worth the effort, and one of our jobs as worship leaders.

Look for different and varied sources of congregational worship songs from which you can draw. Visit other churches or watch their services online. Put your most frequently sung songs “on the bench” for six months and force yourself to sing something different. Take a risk. Instead of starting off a service with a fast song, start it off slow. Read an appropriate Psalm corporately in between verses of a song. Anything to help you avoid doing the same song you always do in the same way you always do it.

What are your “go-to” songs? Try “not-going” to them for a while. It’s a good exercise in staying fresh.

There is Always Something to Learn – Pt. 2

Yesterday I shared some things I learned after spending a Saturday at Mariners Church in Irvine, California. It’s a church that is different from my church in many ways, but it is possible (and a good idea) to learn new things even from a church that is completely different from yours, and even when there might be things you’d rather not emulate. There has got to be something you can see or hear that will help you think about how stay fresh.

Here are a few more things I learned:

Don’t rehearse right up to the minute the service is about to start
Mariners builds in enough time to their rehearsal schedule to allow the band to be finished a good 30-40 minutes before the service start time. This gives the band a break and means the congregation doesn’t walk into the middle of a sound check. 

Invest in good equipment
Too many churches own lousy equipment, have poorly designed sound systems, use the wrong microphones, replace a piece of equipment only when it breaks, and replace that broken equipment with new lousy equipment. Whether your church meets in a living room, a cafeteria, a traditionally designed church building, or a 3,000 seat auditorium, make sure you buy the best equipment you can possibly afford.

Train and deploy volunteers in technical areas
While Mariners has a very large staff, larger than many churches in fact, they depend on a large number of volunteers to help in technical areas. I loved this creative way of recruiting volunteers to run cameras: it says “you could be sitting here. We will train you. Ask how at the sound desk or…” Great idea. Who wouldn’t want to wear a cool headset and run a camera? Recruiting isn’t as hard as we make it seem sometimes.

Have fun
All of the rehearsals, production meetings, and run-throughs that I watched were, most importantly, efficiently run and fruitful. But they were also full of laughter and good-natured ribbing. No one took themselves too seriously. This seemed to make the long rehearsal schedule seem less tedious, break tension, and help foster humility. When Tim Timmons introduced me at rehearsal and said we “met online”, he received a fitting amount of roasting and mocking.

Getting a good electric guitar sound is possible
One of the highlights of my time at Mariners was meeting Russell Crain, their electric guitarist. I’ve always really appreciated Russell’s skill, creativity, visible engagement in worship, and musical taste. I also love the sound he gets out of his guitar. His overdrive is full and smooth, his reverbs/delays/echos are subtle and just-right, and his lead work cuts through the mix without being piercing. Russell is a humble guy and was kind enough to show me how he gets his sound. I’d like to do a post later on detailing his equipment and set up, but for now I’ll just say that he uses a Line-6 M13 stompbox modeler, volume pedal, and then one another pedal I can’t remember. This is fed into a Marshall amp that is backstage in a sound-absorption enclosure. They mic this amp in some creative ways that I’ll share later. The lesson I learned was that it is possible to get a good electric guitar if you have a skillful and humble player, the right pedals, the right amp, and the right mics.

Here is a video I took of Mariners beginning their 3:15pm Saturday run-through.

So as you can see, like I said before, this is a different kind of church than the one in which I serve. But there is always something to learn – if you take the time to look.   

There is Always Something to Learn – Pt. 1

This past Saturday I spent the afternoon/evening at Mariners Church in Irvine, California, watching how they “do things”. They’re about a ten-minute drive from my in-law’s house in Newport Beach, where Catherine and I are on “vacation” with Megan and her adoring grandparents.

Mariners Church is quite different from my church in many ways. It’s non-denominational and non-liturgical, while mine is Anglican and liturgical. Its average weekend attendance is over six times ours. All of the musicians are paid, while ours are volunteers. They have a state-of-the-art “worship center”, while we have a civil war-era Historic Church for our traditional services and a 900 seat “main Sanctuary” for our more informal services. They have a sprawling campus, complete with bar-b-q grills, a lake, bookstore, café, and tons of parking. They have a five-person camera crew at each service and project images of the worship leader, band, and speaker during the entire service. There are many more differences.

But while my church does differ from Mariners Church in some of our approaches to ministry, our facility, theological emphases, size, and cultural setting, we still share a love for Jesus, an evangelical and orthodox understanding of scripture, and a mission to preach the Gospel. And while my worship team looks and operates differently in many ways from Mariners’, there is always something to learn. I learned a lot on Saturday by sitting in on their sound check, rehearsal, production meeting, and evening service. They made me feel at home, gave me an in-ear monitor pack to listen in, and let me look “behind the scenes”. It was a blast. Here are a few things I learned:

Monitors, monitors, monitors
Mariners Church has a separate sound board to run separate in-ear monitor mixes for each band member, and an engineer whose only job is to run their mixes. Not every church can afford this (!), but most churches and worship teams would be well-served to devote more money and energy to making sure they have good monitor equipment and competent people running it. I have a renewed dream of having in-ear monitors for the entire worship team at my church, and having a separate person taking care of these mixes to free our sound engineer to worry about the main mix exclusively. This will take money, time, and patience.

“Rehearsal” shouldn’t be a bad word
Here’s Mariners’ typical rehearsal/service schedule:

Wednesday
– Evening rehearsal (musicians and monitor engineer) to get a feel for how they want to play the songs. This rehearsal is recorded and posted online for the band after rehearsal is finished.

Saturday
– 1:30pm: Band members arrive, tune, and plug in. Sound team is ready and equipment is in place.
– 1:45: Band plays together (ad lib) for five or ten minutes while monitor mixes are set. Note that they are playing continuously during this time, speaking to the monitor mix engineer through individual mics that are fed only into the headphone mix.
– 2:00: Rehearsal begins. Band plays through each song, stopping occasionally to correct chords, tempo, repeats, etc. Lyric operator runs lyrics concurrently to see if there are any errors and to get a feel for how to project them best. Camera and lighting operators are also in place.
– 2:45: Band takes 15 minute break. Worship leader takes part in a production meeting at this time which is attended by the directors of the different components of the service (video, lighting, audio, etc.) the “producer”, and others involved in the execution of the service. They talk through the service, what is happening and why, and what needs to happen before the service begins.
– 3:00: Everyone involved in any aspect of the service gathers to pray together.
– 3:15: First full rehearsal of the entire service (minus sermon and announcements).
– 3:40: 5 minute break.
– 3:45: Second full rehearsal of the entire service (minus sermon and announcements).
– 4:20: Break.
– 4:30: Scrolling announcements begin on the screens.
– 4:45: Church events slideshow projected on the screens.
– 4:57: Band plays musical prelude.
– 5:00: Service begins.
– 6:15: Service ends.
– 6:25: All the players from the earlier production meeting gather again to debrief. What worked? What didn’t?

Sunday
– 8:00am: Full rehearsal of the entire service (minus sermon and announcements).
– 8:30: Break.
– 8:30: Scrolling announcements begin on the screens.
– 8:45: Church events slideshow projected on the screens.
– 8:57: Band plays musical prelude.
– 9:00: Service begins.
– 10:15: Service ends.
– 10:30: Scrolling announcements begin on the screens.
– 10:45: Church events slideshow projected on the screens.
– 10:57: Band plays musical prelude.
– 11:00: Service begins.
– 12:15pm: Service ends.

Most worship teams/tech teams can’t (and shouldn’t) take on a rehearsal schedule exactly like this. Mariners Church does it because they have 9,000 people attending on a weekend, paid musicians, and have gone for a more highly-produced service. Don’t think I’m saying that every church should do three full run-throughs before its first service! If you’re not careful you can over-rehearse and burn out your volunteers.

But there are also problems with under-rehearsing, and I suspect most worship teams/tech teams (my church’s included) might be guilty of it quite often, if not every weekend. If your rehearsals are efficient and effective, most people won’t mind giving up their time to be there. You’ll be better equipped, your worship team/tech team will be better prepared, and your congregation will be led with better skill. Mariners Church rehearses often and well. That combination is key.

Keep arrangements fresh
I’m guilty of using the same chord charts for years and years. Once I have a chart for a song, I’ll use that one every time we sing it. One thing that Mariners does really well is keep their arrangements fresh. They’ll change a chord progression, try a different feel, slow it down, speed it up, use a different electric guitar or synth sound, drum pattern, etc. They’re always looking for ways to keep their songs from feeling stale, and that’s something most worship teams (again, mine included) could improve on.

Don’t take input personally. Musicians should seek to serve the song
At one point during rehearsal, Tim Timmons (the worship leader – a great guy) asked the drummer to change the feel on the chorus of one of the songs. The drummer said “OK.” It was that easy. Throughout their rehearsal, ideas and suggestions were offered freely and no one was defensive or took it personally. That’s how a healthy body works.

Have the lyrics operator at rehearsal
I am now convinced that this is crucial. The role of the lyric operator is so critically important to the skillful leading of a service, that to expect it just to “work” with no rehearsal, and with the person showing up ten minutes before the service starts is dangerously negligent. During the first run-through at Mariners, Tim realized the video for “God of Wonders” that projected the lyrics was about one beat behind, meaning the lyrics were “following, not leading”. They adjusted things so that once the service started, the lyrics were put up about 2 seconds before they were supposed to be sung. I’ll be talking with our technical director and discussing how we can get our lyric operators to attend rehearsals as soon as possible.

Walk, talk, and pray through the service with your team
Tim took time to walk through the service with the musicians and volunteers to explain why he had chosen certain songs for specific points, what would be happening at particular moments, what he was going to say in between a song, etc. Then they prayed over the service, including many of the specific moments Tim had said to look out for. This not only helped the team feel connected and on the same page, but it also helped Tim think through and articulate what he was going to say, why he was going to say it, and what his goal was. Great idea.

I’ll share some more things I learned tomorrow.

Not Getting Off to a Confusing Start

This past Sunday I thought it would be a good idea to begin the service a bit differently, by singing Joseph Stigora’s version of Psalm 96. I first heard this version at the 2008 Worship God conference (the time when they started it off in two keys) and really liked it. The chorus (“sing to the Lord a new song, sing to the Lord all the earth, sing to the Lord, bless his name, tell of his salvation from day to day”) is congregational, with the verses sung by the worship leader. It’s unusual for us to start off a service with an unfamiliar song, especially a song where the congregation doesn’t sing on the verses, but it seemed appropriate this past Sunday and I was looking forward to it.

Looking back, however, I realize that I forgot one important detail: since a good number of people come in late, or come in once they hear the music start, about half of the congregation wouldn’t hear my instructions to only sing the chorus and to listen to the verses.

So what ended up happening was that anyone who came in after I gave those instructions (a few hundred people) was really confused.

How come no one is singing the verses? Is Jamie expecting us to know these verses? These verses are not very easy. Have we ever sung this song before? What am I supposed to do on the verses – just stand here or something? The words are on the screen – but no one around me is singing them. This is weird.

It didn’t quite work out the way I thought it would work out. A good portion of the congregation seemed genuinely confused and not sure of what to do – which is a strange way to start off a service. I got a very kind email on Monday morning from a friend in the congregation (who walked in after I told the congregation to only sing the chorus) and let me know how hard the verses were to sing – and how no one around him was even trying!

So… lesson learned: it’s confusing for people when they walk into an already-begun service and are out of the loop that they’re not supposed to sing the verses to a song. Maybe it would be a better idea to wait until further into the service.

I’ll keep trying new, different, and fresh things. Some will work, some will not. It’s good for the congregation and it’s good for me. There’s nothing to be afraid of!