Tuned-In

Little changes...

2009-09-05T01:17:00.000-07:00

So much for time off.

After much prayer, and (4) weeks actually of actually being retired from music ministry (again), I'm heeding the call have taken a new position in music ministry. It's hard to stay away.

I'm sure to get some upset emails from the St. Vinnie's folks: guys, I wasn't planning on this. It's closer to home and enables the family to go to mass together every week. I still love you all!

I'd be real easy and self-serving to come into a position where there's an existing team, and just do what worked for my previous band at St. Vincent. I'll have to overcome my enthusiasm and stick with a plan that is much less about me, and more about the community I'm called to serve.

Here's the plan: slide in - change as little as possible in the short run. Figure out what's working, become a part of the team's routine, and just do my best as a part of the team. Work with the existing folks to understand our strengths and weaknesses, building a rapport with the folks in ministry, and go from there. The best thing to find would be something that requires very little change. It's much safer to merge than to turn sharply anyway!

God bless you and those that prayed, tugged, bugged and begged. God bless all of those who have served in this role, and God bless all of you that serve in music ministry.

Updates on me

2009-09-02T09:27:00.000-07:00

It's been too long since my last post.

Here's the skinny:

July '08 - Feb '08 - Helping out at St. Louise, in Bellevue with LIFE TEEN. Subbed with St. Stephen the Martyr, St. Jude (Redmond, WA), Holy Family (Kirkland, WA) and Mary Queen of Peace (Sammamish, WA)
August '08 - Bass at Steuby NW with Angus McDonell, Sarah Hart, David Yackley, Dylan Drego and Mark Grosjean - loads of fun!
November '08 - keys at Seattle Youth Convention with St. Stephen the Martyr (Renton, WA) - again, loads of fun! Can't beat just sitting in the back with (4) keyboards and the laptop making a joyful noise!
Feb '08 - July '08 - Returned to St. Vincent de Paul (Federal Way, WA) as they searched for a new LIFE TEEN music ministry leader. They are still searching - respond to me if you'd like a hook-up.

Right now, I am discerning a new calling - an unexpected one! It's a welcome call, but it's working against this whole idea of getting Sunday afternoons back for the family.

Please pray for me and my family for guidance and wisdom.

God bless you in His ministry.

(c) 2007-2009 by Art Leonard. All rights reserved.

Getting Started in Planning for Mass

2008-07-18T21:36:00.000-07:00

Mass happens. Be ready.

I've focused for a while on stuff that can be applied to any Worship Band. This time, I'm going all-out Catholic! Whoo hoo.

Let's break the parts of mass down. If you've never noticed this before, it might be a bit of a learning experience. I happened to be blessed with parents that sent me to Catholic School for 12 years. So, if you haven't learned this stuff before, you can always read the GIRM. (Actually, every Liturgical Minster should read the GIRM.)

LITURGY of the WORD

Opening Song

Sprinkling Rite (optional)

Kyrie Elison

Gloria

Responsorial Psalm

Gospel Acclamation

Profession of Faith (can be sung... but probably not)

General Intercessions (

LITURGY of the EUCHARIST

Offertory Procession

Holy Holy

Memorial Acclamation

Great Amen

The Lord's Prayer

Lamb of God (Agnus Dei)

Communion

Hymn of Praise (optional)

Exit Procession (instrumental when done with Hymn of Praise) - OR - Closing Hymn

Recording the Band LIVE!

2008-04-23T21:41:00.001-07:00

Let me be up-front on this. You aren't going to like this article. I'm not going to give you the key to making an album you can sell from some random concert or Sunday that is going to sound awesome. This is not an article for audiophiles. In fact, it's going to tell you how to do this in a way that will alienate you from audiophiles.

If you want to record something that sounds like you recorded in a studio, record in a studio.

If you want to have something that you can listen to you band and say, "That sounded pretty good," and you're not going to care that it doesn't sound the same as it did in the room, keep reading.

First, I'm going to tell you what you're up against:

Without a significant investment, you won't capture what you hear in the room. You just don't have the mics. So much of what you listen to depends on the room.
There is no such thing as a really good live rock band sound. It's just hard to get right in the room. To take that same equipment to make a signal that sounds good anywhere is just nearly impossible.
Monitor speakers interfere with isolation.
And you won't have any real isolation.

Since the FOH (Front of House) mixer's job is to provide sound to the room, the secondary task of recording will almost always take a backseat.

That said, here's some advice I can give about recording a live band into something that will be tollerable.

You need to have a person dedicated to recording during set-up and sound check. You can't use someone in the band, and you can't use the FOH engineer - they're too busy. I've tried it.
Using just the FOH mix will not give you what you want. It will likely be overly vocal heavy, not in stereo, and mixed for the room.
Record each channel individually if you can. I used my MOTU Traveler and a Berhinger AD/DA box, though there are better options out there. This gave me 16 channels at 48khz. This takes a LOT of time to set-up. You need inserts on the main mixer that are not taken up by things like compressors and ample cabling to make it happen. Other options include newer firewire mixers like the Mackie ONYX or... almost anything else on the market. The hard thing is going to be setting your levels to something nominal since the FOH mixer will be set for something.
Other options: M-Audio and other companies make small stereo, portable recorders that can record the room and give you a good idea of your sound in the room without the need for going to the lengths I describe above.

Ideas for Sunday, April 27th, 2008

2008-04-22T00:01:00.000-07:00

"If you love me, you will keep my commandments."

This Sunday, Jesus speaks to us about the Holy Spirit, the Advocate. He speaks to loving Him through keeping His commandments.

Opening: Shout to the North

Psalm: Let All the Earth Cry Out (Angrisano)

Offertory: Alive In You (Maher)

Communion: Jesus, Wine of Peace (Haas)

Closing: Send Your Spirit Down

I wrote a song last year specifically for this weekend, next weekend, and Pentecost called "Send Your Spirit Down". (Available at http://www.myspace.com/artleonard). Check it out. Sheet music is available via email - just leave a comment.

My Cheap In-Ear Monitoring Solution

2008-04-21T12:12:00.000-07:00

You've all seen these great systems for in-ear monitors. They're fantastic and the even cooler thing is that they WORK. They reduce the overall volume and allow you to focus on making music.

Systems run at around $300 - 2000 per transmitter / receiver / headphone set depending on wireless needs (2 - 8 channels), mixing capability built into the base unit, and interference handling. I have heard mixed things about baseline units, basically that if more than two people are using them, there are issues with interference and reliability.

When I was having trouble hearing myself, I figured it was time to invest in a better way to hear myself.

But problems I've had with in-ear solutions are:

They are too expensive for most Catholic bands
Are dedicated to individuals, so when you have higher turnover in your band, it can be problematic
If you add someone to the band at the last minute and they don't have the monitors, they can't participate
A drummer isolated from the room doesn't know how loud they are in the room.
They can be a mixing nightmare as the sound-man needs to tend o individual mixes.

So, I actually come up with a solution that is inexpensive, and simple to use. It doesn't solve all of the above problems, but it does drop the cost.

I had to give up on wireless to keep the cost down. I sit at a piano. It's not a problem for me to be tethered. Same with the drums. I can even do it on guitar and have had great results.

So, what do I use?

I have a Rolls PM351 Personal Monitoring Station (~$99), Shure e2c in-ear headphones (~$99), and a headphone extension cord (~$8). This is probably the cheapest set-up I have seen yet.

The PM351 allows me to plug my mic and an instrument in as well as a monitor. My mic then has a THROUGH port to go to the sound system, as well as the instrument (which comes out as balanced, so I don't need a separate DI box!). The sound engineer then builds a mix like he normally would, and I take my monitor mix from the same mix as the singers. I can then blend my own voice and instrument with theirs, adjusting it up or down. My mixer some something interesting with phase inversion that allows me to adjust my own voice independent, even if my voice is there in the monitor mix!

The end result is for $207 + tax, I have a personal in-ear monitor system that works for my voice as well as my instrument. I have also used the Rolls PM51 which is the same as the PM351, but without the instrument input for about $59. That means you can do this for a singer for only $167 + tax.

There are tons of expensive systems out there that will run circles around the proposal I have here, like the AVIOM system.

I'm talking about a cheap solution.

I suppose it might be cheaper just to tell the drummer what I think about his volume control... ;-)

Warm-Ups!

2008-04-20T19:43:00.001-07:00

We all hate that cacophony that preludes a rehearsal or performance the warm-up. The incoherent din that precedes a all that we do - that gobbledygook of noise is actually all NECESSARY.

This morning, I got to play along with St. Jude's again on the song, "Don't Wait 'Till the Battle Is Over". It was tons of fun. I was just playing the one song at the ned of mass. The problem is I haven't been playing piano every week, and while it hasn't made me rusty per-se, it has made it so my muscles are not always ready to go on notice.

I got a 2 minute warm-up with the choir before mass. I then sat out for the rest of mass to sit with my family. When the choir came to the final song, I came up and played. It's an energetic setting made buy the Total Experience Gospel Choir in Seattle. It was awesome and it rocked (can a song" Gospel"?).

The issue I had was that over the course of this 5+ minute song, my forearms began to hurt something fierce. I've hit this more and more recently where my arms just aren't getting the exercise they used to. When we got to the end of the song, I was just in pain. I made it, but if I had had to go on to play something else, it would have been very difficult and would have affected my playing.

So, what am I getting at?

Before you start rehearsal or mass, take a few minutes to warm up. We all like the silence and want to communicate, but we as musicians need time to warm up our muscles. This is no replacement for rehearsal during the week, but it's still important to get the blood flowing to those places where we need it before we actually need it. This is not an opportunity to launch into the most daring work of the day.

Drums - practice a couple rudiments
Bass & Guitar - Work on a couple scales together
Piano / Keys - Warm up the singers
Singers - Warm up with a few scales and vocal exercises.

Each one of these deserves an article in an of itself.

Sing That Song in Your Heart

2008-04-19T17:52:00.000-07:00

This is as much for me as it is for anyone else.

My daughter has been bugging me that she needs to use the piano to "write a song". I keep telling her to sing it to herself first, and then we can work on the music.

So often I get this wrong myself! I'll pick up the guitar or piano first, let my hands fall into their typical shapes and after about 15 minutes wonder if there is any originality left in me. I get bummed and go do something else.

Recently, I picked up a demo of MasterWriter, a song writing tool. I used it for the first time the other night and after a while, started writing lyrics. It was again frustrating, but it got me thinking about themes and stuff to sing about. When I net got down to the keyboard and guitar, I had an idea in my head about what I wanted to say - and started playing things that I hadn't played before because I had new ideas!

The thing I can say is before you start to write, try figuring out what's in your heart and head... do something crazy like hum it out loud. Don't play a chord until you get an idea of where your head wants to go!

This got me thinking in new ways again. I like thinking in new ways - it gets the creative juices flowing!

Voc-robatics

2008-04-17T22:52:00.001-07:00

Voc-robatics - My abbreviation for VOCal aCROBATICS. This is the time-honored tradition embraced by gospel choirs for a soloist to ad-lib. I've used this term is a bit negatively, but done sparingly and well, it can be a good method to take your group "to the next level" of performance.

Getting your ministry "to the next level" shouldn't be your goal - not if it is in conflict with obtaining the universal cohesion of praise with your congregation. What I'm saying is, "Beware." Self indulgence hides behind the door - be careful when opening. Our first job is to get everyone in the congregation to sing with their hearts.

First of all, the melody must be solid. Someone in the group must since what the congregation is singing, and it has got to be the strongest sound in the group.

With that, there's a couple guide points to pay attention to:

CHOIR: Keep on the melody and what you want the people to sing. Make sure the melody stands out above all else.
SOLO: Add color, but do not thwart the balance of getting the people to sing. Wow... how to not distract here... I'm not sure how...

With that... um, for those that have wondered why we didn't do more of this back at St. Vinnie's - this is why. It's not the talent in the group, it's how to do the trick of balancing performance with relevance and leadership.

Virtual Instruments - I'm Gloating

2008-04-16T20:40:00.001-07:00

Easter Sunday. St. Jude's Gospel Choir. I offered to bring some fat B3 sounds to the sound for Easter. I brought:

My trusty Korg Triton Pro
My M-Audio 49-key controller
My Apple MacBook Pro with Logic Studio 8 and a MOTU Traveler.

The sound was great - at least from where I was. The Triton was up and running great, but I had weird problems with the FireWire until the second song of mass and things started...working. (Word to the wise, having the Triton was a great backup plan!) Here's the breakdown on what I did:

Anything that required drawbar control went from the M-Audio Oxygen49 through the Mac. I did this for light stuff or stuff that needed to stick out dynamically using Logic Studio 8's new Main Stage plug-in host and the EVB3 Hammond simulator. I re-assigned my controllers on the M-Audio to control the drawbars in the plug-in.

Everything else that needed to be subtle, dirty, or very predictable from my perspective was the Triton because I needed only one control - volume.

In the end, things worked out well. The only thing that would have been odd would be that the sounds of the TWO organs would not coincide really with the amp or the rotation speeds, but people listening to the choir weren't really any the wiser, I don't think.

Get the Vocals Together

2008-04-14T18:54:00.001-07:00

A couple things to remember when putting voices together. Any group of more than one vocalist must:

Agree on the rhythm
Agree on the diction
Agree on the pitch
Agree on the style
Agree on the balance

Harmonies are great. Nail all of these and then multiply by harmonies.

Random Thoughts on Drumming

2008-04-12T18:17:00.001-07:00

Nothing more controversial than drums in church. I'm going to keep this brief and just cause a riot. There are lots of things to try if you had forgotten these. It's all good.

Brushes
Hot Rods(tm)
Deadening Rings / materials
Sound booth
Carpet or heavy material BEHIND the drummer
Shield in front of the drummer
Mics for overheads / snare / Kick at least
Jazz (7a) sticks
Just play quieter
Don't play on everything. Be willing to just sit out a song.
Put the hi-hat everyone else's in the monitor so they can hear subdivisions
Leave space
Use in-ear monitors so the drum monitor isn't loud
Light cymbals
Play with a drum machine or a loop in your ear monitors (Boss Dr. Rhythm or another drum machine)
Research linear patterns for new, simple challenges
Make sure you pray
Check with other people and be open to balance issues
Make sure that prayer is not second to the emotion of drumming. It should be first.
Listen.

Checklist for Music Planning

2008-04-11T23:12:00.001-07:00

Before I like to call a mass plan done, I like to run over the following check-list:

Do the selections reinforce the readings?
Is our Psalm selection true to the reading?
Do our selections coincide with the presider's homily?
Do we have the proper instrumentation this particular week?
Can we engage the people to worship musically?
Do we have the proper licenses?
Are we repeating material too much / not enough?
Are we trying to branch out to new music, bringing people to experience Christ in new and relevant perspectives?
Does the liturgy flow properly?

Most importantly, will we be able to make it out of the parking lot without being excommunicated or stoned for our choices?

God bless you in your ministry. Wear comfy running shoes.

Foods for Singers to Avoid on Sundays

2008-04-10T20:43:00.001-07:00

Dairy
Pop
Caffeine
Heavy oils
Spicy food

Examples:

Pizza
Coffee - including soy lattes (I sob)
Anything fizzy
Sundaes
ANYTHING ELSE WITH CHEESE
Really good Chinese food
Yogurt
All you can eat Indian buffets between the hours of 11 and 2pm (no doggie bags) with the really good Chicken Tikka Masala.

Why? Respetively:

Dairy causes mucus
Fizzy stuff causes burping
Caffeine tightens the vocal chords which should be loose
Oils give ME more mucus
Spicy food brings more risk of hoarseness and throat irritation

You might also want to consider garlic and onions on that list as well if you actually like the people you worship with. (Thank you for this one, Kristi!)

Bass - Ghost Notes

2008-04-09T20:29:00.001-07:00

When I get to play bass, it's easy to play on every note of every song.

It's something else to play one or two notes per measure - not letting them ring, but choking them off and play NOTHING for the rest of the time.

I learned this trick playing out with Craig Curran of Isabelle years ago back at Victor's Coffee in Redmond. He had this great, tight sound with the drummer, Doug Finefrock, and I asked him what his secret was. He said, "I hardly play at all." He'd seriously play like one or two notes and then nothing... a couple more.. nothing. It was just tight sounding.

He's right. Listen to pop radio, or some Nashville-produced bands. I personally like Sarah Bareilles' "Love Song" (which has the incomparable Matt Chamberlain on drums, but I digress). The bass line during the verses is sparse, playing only a pickup note and a root here and there, regularly in time with the kick drum. When the song comes round to the chorus, the bass kicks in big time, thumping on every eighth note, creating a big difference between the parts of the song. Additionally on the bridge again, the bass does this masterful eighth node walk up-down in perfect contradiction to the work in the other parts of the song. And at the end of the bridge, nothing! Just space for the piano and vocal to re-establish the chorus.

It's just slick.

No gizmos, gimicks, slap techniques or 6-string bass licks.

Just simplicity that drives home a song.

Try it. Just play less notes.

Solos Should Have a Point

2008-04-08T15:52:00.000-07:00

Okay, I'm not a big soloist. I like playing, but I don't have a big need to solo on much. In worship music, it's not needed often, but when it's called for, I have some opinions on the subject.

A pet peve of mine that got solved along with the issue of the existence of 80's hair bands was the fruitless efforts of flying fingers against setting of an otherwise harmless and unsuspecting melody. To me, it quickly turns into a demonstration of skill rather than a musical movement propelling the composer's melody to heights unattainable by the lyricist.

Which brings me right to my point - if you have a solo, see if you can sing it first. If you haven't done this, slow down and take the time to really sing it to yourself. You'll find a big difference in what you can capture emotionally with your voice at a pace much slower than your fingers could muster, and it will have a greater emotional impact as a result. I like to improvise, but if I can't sing it in some way, I ask if it really belongs to the song or if it's just too much me in the worship movement showing off. That's not how I should be glorifying God.

Here are a few points I like to think before diving into a solo or writing a new instrumental part:

Keep it simple. Try something as simple just walking up the scale every half-note from the 3rd above the root!
Keep it stylistically relevant to the rest of the song
Make it carry the melody first and take it to new places second
Do not use the opportunity to just exercise my fingers
Stay focused and (if improvising) have a clear, pre-planned exist strategy to get back to the song

Seriously, Leave More Space

2008-04-06T20:52:00.001-07:00

We all want to play. We all want to praise. We all want to praise and pray.

Good.

We all want to praise and play together. That's great, but not always at once.

As musicians, being professional means leaving LOTS of space. My high school orchestra conductor at Padua Franciscan H.S. in Parma, OH, Mr. Wayne F. Miller, put it best: "Never, never, ever play a rest."

This is more easily done with thorough composed music, especially on my bass clarinet with only the random whole-note to add. When faced with chords charts and a band full of ideas and improvisational chops, our ingenuity quickly turns into noise every week on every song.

Be the big, brave one and sit out until the final refrain, or the bridge. Let the piano or the acoustic guitar do all the heavy lifting for the entire first verse. Let only the drums and bass play on the second verse of "Let the River Flow".

You'll hear the vocals better.

You'll sound more like the CD.

People will hear themselves better.

You'll be able to praise better.

You'll be able to clap your hands and lead by example!

And when you come back in, the professional difference you make by both playing and not playing will be obvious!

Tip - Go Old Sk3wl

2008-04-04T00:01:00.000-07:00

Got a Glory and Praise 1 or 2 hymnal? Ever heard of SLJ? Foley? Schutte? Haugen? Haas?

Well... a lot of these resources are still around now and are still relevant NOW. I DARE you to get one of these now "classics" out and see who sings! My guess is it'll be everyone! Mind you, 20 years ago, these were cutting edge liturgy.

Sing a New Song
Sing to the Mountains
One Bread, One Body
You Are Near
Though the Mountains May Fall
City of God
On Eagle's Wings
Abba, Father
Hosea
You Are Mine
Come to the Water
Canticle of the Sun (Son?)

After 10 years in a guitar choir and you think I'd do these more often. I love these songs as they remind me the constancy of His church.

Kudos to John Hudak in Cleveland for the years we served together. Where are you, man?

Running a Sound Check

2008-04-03T00:01:00.001-07:00

Sound men (and women) are so very, very important. They are critical to preventing distractions by providing clear sound in a prayerful environment. I've seen sound people looked down on by bands and seen bands looked down on by sound people. Stoppit. We are all children of God and capable ministers.

Here's how I've learned to run a sound check. My hugest thanks to Kenny of the Matt Maher Band for filling in the gaps! I'm going to assume 1) your band is using a typical three part system - front of house (FOH), monitor and backline, 2) your mixer (FOH) is probably being used to drive your monitoring system, 3) your drums are miked, and 4) you have a sound person running it all.

If you are blessed to have in-ear monitors and/or some type of personal monitoring system like AVIOM, God bless you, stop reading and go do something else. Otherwise, read on.

If you don't have "mains", assume your church system is your "mains". Any speaker pointed at a choir member would be a "monitor".

Start the sound check after you have prayed.

Once everyone is in place and attentive, start with the drums. Have the drummer hit the kick drum with full force going to be used for playing. Do not have any sound in the monitors or in the mains. Bring the channel used for the kick up to a nominal level well before clipping. You should strive to average around 0db or "Unity".

Once you have the kick at a nominal level, set the monitor levels. With the drummer still hitting the kick, go to each sub mix and set the level for the listener. And ask the person (or people) who are in front of that monitor to give a thumbs-up or down to increase or decrease the volume of the individual instrument.

As the sound person, be aware of the following fun facts and goals:

The sound system is for REINFORCEMENT. It's not a radio and sound that is not in the system may in fact be FINE without any additional monitoring.
The person whose monitor is being set will need to hear themselves more clearly than anything else in the room.
The overall volume of all the monitors will ad to the noise in the room. Keep it to what is strictly necessary for the person to hear and not be distracted.

Having completed the above, repeat for the snare, hi-hat, etc.

I like to set-up in the following kind of order:

Kick
Snare
Hi-Hat
Overheads
Bass
Piano
Electric Guitars
Vocals. (This one will take a while).

To repeat, do the following for each input:

Bring the signal up to unity.
Bring the signal into the individual musician's monitor first.
Bring the signal into everyone else's monitor to their liking. No signal is great, if not preferred.

Importantly, do not put anything in the main speaker system until you have set all the monitors for all involved. You need to know how loud all your monitors are before you will know what to put in the mains.

Once you've done all the monitors and the band starts playing, have them all play a song and have it stop part-way through and adjust.

Repeat just a couple times, but don't dwell on it. Bands that dwell on monitor mixes will have a hard time being satisfied, so band members will often have to deal with imperfect sound.

Once the band is happy, start focusing on the room mix - the subject of a later article.

God bless you in your ministry.

Organic Crawl

2008-04-02T00:03:00.000-07:00

So you're playing Hammond. You might have a great B3 yourself, or you might be playing an emulator or a keyboard with some decent sounds. Great. Here's a couple tips that can help your performance blend.

Make it growl. Turn UP the distortion in the amp section. You'll find it blends rather than sticks out. It doesn't have the same effect as your guitar player.
Try using just ONE drawbar, especially for softer stuff.
Turn the rotary speaker sound on for about 5 seconds, then off. Repeat to build intensity.
Vary your sound by changing octaves. You can CRAWL up from one to the next, but beware of jumping.
Try playing no more than one or two notes at a time with your right hand.
Try leaving you left hand off the keyboard to play with the Leslie (rotary speaker) sounds, drawbars and volume controls.

Lastly, don't be afraid to just listen. Being judicious with your playing can make the parts where you do play even more special to the song of praise.

Simple Tip of the Day

2008-04-01T20:42:00.001-07:00

www.spiritandsong.com has a Podcast of weekly song ideas for building a Sunday Liturgy that is relevant, vibrant, and holy. It's hosted by none other than Ken Candeo, composer.

Keep it Simple

2008-02-02T19:17:00.000-08:00

Okay - I don't like to complain, but I've been to several parishes over the last two months. The thing that strikes me as important to getting the people to sing is SIMPLICITY. This is doubly true for mass parts.

I don't remember the setting, but one particular "Glory to God" used weekly is just painfully hard to learn from the pews. Additionally, this week the difficulty in singing spilled over into the mass parts (the Holy, Memorial Acclamation, and Great Amen). The cantor had a fantastic voice, but on its own it could not compensate for the non-repetitive notes that accompanied an extraordinarily long setting. I'm a musician and (without notes) I just could not follow it. In addition, the memorial acclamation they chose was the one least fitting to the notes of the "Holy". As a result, people mumbled - no one sang, and as a result, our prayers were distracted by an inability to participate.

So, to put a positive spin on this: "Keep it Simple".

God bless you in your ministry.

(c) 2007 by Art Leonard. All rights reserved.

Songwriting

2008-01-02T07:49:00.000-08:00

So, here are some short tidbits for those composing new songs for Liturgy.

Range: Middle-C to a D one octave above. Stretchable to A two notes down to E one note higher.
Relevance: You should be able to cite a relevant Biblical passage.
Relation: is the song from us to God, from God to us, or about God? Be consistent throughout the song, i.e. You cannot change your mind to make he bridge fit.
Form: Be consistent and deliberate about your song's form. Traditional "hymns" are AAA. typical pop songs are AABA.
Liturgy: if composing for the Psalm or for one of the parts of the liturgy, you cannot break out the thesaurus or rhyming dictionary. You must use the text from the relevant translation of the Roman Missal.

I've met a ton of budding songwriters that think rules stink and they should be able to express themselves however they see fit. We are called to rise above our individualistic impulses and worship as a community. As songwriters, we must build songs fit for communal worship, and these "rules" are there to assist in that. They are a simple quantification of what we experience across all quality liturgical music.

God bless you in your ministry.

(c) 2007 by Art Leonard. All rights reserved.

What’s up with Art?

2007-11-19T10:34:00.001-08:00

So, for those of you that don't know: I'm sort-of stepping back as music director at St. Vincent's.

WHY?!

I got married, now have two lovely children, and it's a 35-mile commute twice a week to LIFE TEEN – and I still have a full-time job. That said, I will still be involved about 1-2 times a month, as well as at retreats and stuff.

It is our long-term plan to find a full-time replacement for my services. Until then, the band will continue to support itself from within.

What will you be doing?

Several things: First of all, I'll be spending a lot more time at home with my family. Somehow, I'll still be very busy though.

I will also be helping out as a substitute at other parishes, such as St. Jude's, Holy Family, Mary Queen of Peace and Assumption up in Bellingham.

I will also continue to drive music planning and liturgy for St. Vincent's LIFE TEEN and writing more music. My wife and I are even working on our first song together!

Apparently I'll also be doing some more regional events. I just got asked to play bass at Steubenville Northwest at Gonzaga next summer, as well as some other events around Washington. More to come as events unfold!

BTW: If you're a musician looking to do more events and don't care so much what you play, there are never enough bass players or drummers!

Any other plans?

Watch this space for announcements! Let's just say:

Yes, there will be another album!
There will be an event to kick it off!

I will continue to post on this space – maybe even more extensively with the extra time.

God bless you in your ministry!

The Big Announcement

2007-10-22T14:41:00.000-07:00

So, in light of my last post (in June, no less), I will be continuing in music ministry, but I will be departing St. Vincent de Paul in Federal Way. Balancing family, a full-time job (not at St. Vincent's), and directing music ministry so far from home is (as expected) hard to do. I need to spend more time at home, and for the first time I can honestly say that I am fulfilled in my calling as a husband and father. I'll continue in music ministry, helping out for a little while in other places, hoping to build community a little closer to home.

It's been a long, hard decision, but it's a welcome change of pace. I love St. Vincent's, and it's likely I will continue to help out on little things.

For those at St. Vincent's, my (current) last day is Nov. 25th. We are looking for someone to take over for me for the weekly direction and planning for the music minsitry. You can contact me or the Youth Ministry office.

I will definitely continue to be in music minstry - it's been great to be afforded the ability and contacts that transcend parishes in the last couple years, so I'll likely be filling in and helping out here and there. I will likely continue this blog, since I like planning and helping folks get their groups in order for a vibrant, Catholic worship. I may direct again if the Spirit leads me to the right opportunity (I'd love to do this full time someday).

On to the relevant article:
That said, there are some dos and don'ts for changing hands in music direction:

As a new music director, always have someone else ready to take over in your absence. I know I've got a couple of them.

If you haven't done this, it's too late. New music directors, take note. There is no place for ego in music ministry, especially in positions of authority. Delegate tasks of importance and you will find key people like your effective organizers, cheerleaders and your spirit-filled folks.

As a departing director, once you leave, though it may be tempting to "hang out" and "help out". Don't do it.

By "sticking around" to ease the transition, you may likely be hindering the progress of the new director to establish themselves. You may wish to bring someone into your group and groom them for the position, but once they take over, it's got to be their game - no one should look to you (the departing DMM) to second guess their opinions or directions. It's hard to be professional about something we all love and care about so deeply.

Take an example of a singer who disagrees with the selections of the new director. Being a personal friend of the old director, he/she could call on the old director for their opinion. The old director should see the professional conflict here and do his/her best to just stay out of it. Your opinon as a former director will be respected and as a result may compromise the group in your absence.

As the person hiring a new music director, it's very tempting to get a "quick fix" in place. You want a situation that is as stable as possible over the long-term.

What the person in charge of hiring should do is:

Put together a job description and post it to your local Catholic new source, the ym.lifeteen.com, and (of course) the parish bulletin.

The best candidate may be led to you by the Spirit. Assume the Spirit needs you to advertise. I got my job this time because someone randomly put a posting on the LIFE TEEN website 10 years ago, and I was debating relocating to Seattle. It sealed the deal for me that the Lord wanted me here.

For the job description, include all hours and events they'll be expected to put in, all the tasks they'll be required to do (i.e. find, teach and direct musical instruments and vocals), clearly state competencies expected (Liturgy, voice, piano/guitar), and an indication of compensation. Be clear if this is a full-time or part time position.

Be patient.

Hopefully you have at least four weeks to find a replacement. It will probably take longer. I have seen the tragedy of impatience getting the better of a couple Youth Ministers who've hired the first person who came through the door that seemed "good enough". So much more willing talent is out there than we probably realize. I've missed opportunities in my own backyard because parishes fail to advertise properly, sending away the better ministers in their own parish elsewhere due to impatience.

For myself, as a person responsible for assisting in the hiring hiring at a major corporation, I'd always want to have two or three candidates to choose from.

God bless you in your ministry! With the freed up schedule, I may see you all around a little more!

(c) 2007 by Art Leonard. All rights reserved.

Wedding Plannin'

2007-06-10T13:21:00.000-07:00

This year, just to shake things up a bit, I'm getting married. I haven't done it in a while, and it's really just time. ;-) Love you, Kristi.

Seems that everyone else is trying to do the same thing, and as a result, I'm helping plan a few weddings summer. I just finished typing up a real long email to assist in the planning for a friend of mine, who also happens to be the Deacon's son. This information is the kind of stuff I bring to every meeting I have when it comes to wedding planning, and a lot of it in general mass planning. I've been writing a long post on mass planning, and since it isn't done, but my emailing IS, I figured I'd just keep the ratio of stones to birds down and just post part of my email here. They are having a Unity Candle, but not a Marian Adoration piece, so keep that in mind as (or IF) you read it.

You may find it useful. First read it, and figure out if its useful. If it's not, then don't read it. It's just that simple.

God bless you in your ministry!
---

PRELUDE(S)
Any number of pieces while people walk in. This is a good place to put things that don't generally fit into the program for Liturgy. I start playing about 15 minutes before any ceremonial actions start, so if you don't have anything in mind, I'll run a few pieces past you. These are generally instrumental and do not necessarily command the attention of your guests.

LIGHTING OF THE UNITY CANDLE
Pick something for your mothers or families to light the until candle to. The action only takes about 90 seconds, but the song can go a bit longer. This can be sung, or an instrumental that you like, possibly having some meaning for the two of you. Instrumentals work well because they can be cut short based on the promptness of actions taken by your mothers. :-) Generally, this would also be when your parents / grandparents are seated. Does your planner have a specific set of plans for this? Since this is really non-Liturgical, there is no formal format here - just experience and a little (very little) tradition. An "Ave Maria" could work here, but generally, I like to save those for Marian adoration type things. This song can command more attention than the Preludes, and starts to bring people into the rite of the ceremony, since this really is part of the ceremonial action, even if it is preparatory.

PROCESSIONAL
1 - 2 pieces for the brides maids, flower girls, etc. to talk into. The bride can have her own piece, or we can reprise the first piece with more "gusto". It's generally instrumental, though a hymn sung WELL can be just as effective. Common examples of these pieces are "Canon in 'D'" (Pachelbel), "Trumpet Voluntary" or "Trumpet Tune" (Purcell), "Jesu, Joy of Mans Desiring" (Bach), "Rondeau" and "Spring".. whose compsers escape me at the moment.

PSALM
The Lord is Kind and Merciful
Blessed are Those Who Fear the Lord
Taste and See the Goodness of the Lord
are among others that are sanctioned by the book.

GOSPEL ACCLAMATION
For Life Teen, we've done stuff I've written recently, which I wouldn't recommend for the sake of familiarity to your guests. "Love Has Come" is the Matt Maher one, again... probably not the best choice (though I'm going to use it for MINE!) More common ones include the "Celtic Alleluia" (Walker), which has a couple selections for verses for weddings.

UNITY CANDLE (and other ceremonial pieces)
Totally your call here. It can be done in silence, which instrumental, or some sentimental piece. We can do a shortened version of "The Prayer" as sung by Josh Groban and Charlotte Church, or really just about ANYTHING.

OFFERTORY
This totally depends on what you're doing for offertory. 1) are you bringing up the gifts? Father can bypass this and just get to the Liturgy of the Eucharist without the procession. 2) Do you want people to sing, or reflect? Since the Offertory Hymn is not really part of the liturgy, we have plenty of leeway. The people are not required to sing, because it is not part of the liturgical rite. It's function is to accompany the otherwise silent actions of sacrifice and procession. It can 1) reflect on the gospel 2) anticipate the celebration of the Eucharist or 3) reflect on the message of the celebration (your WEDDING!) or 4) reflect on theme of the season (we're not really in one).

Marie's doing "Your Love Is Extravagant", I'm doing "The Prayer" here.

PARTS of the MASS
These are the "Holy, Holy", "Memorial Acclamation", "Great Amen" and "Lamb of God". The "Mass of Creation" is the most widely used, but we can really use any one you're comfortable with. I can give you a demonstration of a number of settings in person (among other songs!)

I would elect to have the "Our Father" spoken or possibly chanted - but I wouldn't use another setting unless like 80% of your guests are familiar with the same setting.

COMMUNION
Something that reflects on the Eucharistic Sacrifice. We are one Body, Make Us A Eucharistic People, I am the Bread of Life... another favorite? I've been doing this so long that I know a lot more than what we do at LIFE TEEN, so, if you have a favorite that's great. The best thing I can tell you is something common that everyone knows is best if you want people to sing!

RECESSIONAL
The big one. Marie's going with "Ode to Joy" with a trumpet soloist. Big organ pieces are the norm here, though an accomplished organist I cannot pretend to be. Good use of a soloist can help bolster the piece. Trumpets work well, violins as well.

ADDITIONAL PIECES
Generally leftover songs like our PRELUDE songs, stuff that didn't fit in but is generally upbeat and instrumental - background noise to keep the people generally talking louder than they would otherwise because they just witnessed your exciting ceremony and are discussing any implications by any slip-up or faux pax during your exchange of vows. :-)

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
I have a couple of trumpet players at my disposal you could audition and possibly a violinist or cellist. Depending on the quantity of songs and quality of their musicianmanship, their fee should command at the absolute least of $50 per player to upwards of $125 or better (especially for those I only know professionally!)

Also, another thing I can advise you is to run our ideas past your parents as well, since they will want to participate and may have a better idea of the diversity of the musical spirit of your guests.

(c) 2007 by Art Leonard. All rights reserved.

Time off

2007-06-05T11:49:00.001-07:00

For those of you that missed the announcement last Sunday at St. Vincent's, I'm taking time off this summer to get… like… married and stuff. There are some tougher decisions ahead as Kristina and I start our lives together, but one of the important things to remember is for us to recharge.

This break honestly couldn't come at a more needed time. Most of us in ministry have a RealJob™, RealCommittments™ to our RealFamilies™, and while we exercise our faith through our music, it's often easy to lose sight of the perspective God has in his plan for us.

Yes – worship is important.

Yes – He is first and alone our God.

But what service do I do him and the community if I am exhausted and do not have my family in proper balance with my praise?

Those of you that do Liturgy well know that we cannot just show up on Sunday and make it happen. We need time to prepare, time to pray, and time to be community. With my current obligations, the first people to miss out on my time is my family. With my commitments as director, this means I am committed every week (with a few exceptions). I have missed many a family affair because of my commitments to Life Teen.

So, what am I getting at?

If you're a director, build up the people in your group to make it for a few weeks without you. Teach your most capable people what it is you do to make things happen. Yeah – we all like to feel important and have a situation where we're always needed, but that's a human need and is not what ministry is about. If the ministry revolves around your presence, then it isn't revolving around Jesus.
Take some time off.

I'll be taking time off myself from June 18^th – August 19^th.

God bless you in your ministry.

Not All Feedback is Bad (with a special rip-off from Mark Twain)

2007-05-21T14:36:00.001-07:00

Let me start by saying I thought the cacophony of silence on the site was deafening. I've posted a bunch but people had not really been so inclined to post comments or rebuttals. Usually when you get into this stuff you get at least a couple loose cannons in the crowd to make things interesting. The problem with the web is your audience is completely anonymous and invisible.

It's interesting that recently I've gotten more feedback in real life (from people I don't even know) than I have from the web site or even from my own band. It's cool, and a little unnerving , but mostly cool. I want to thank my readers.

Anyone that was at rehearsal yesterday knows I was not having a good day.

Thanks to just a little positive feedback, today is indeed a good day.

As directors, we need to keep this in mind at all times. A little negative feedback goes a long way to making our sensitive musicians insecure, and when we are insecure, we deliver our worst fears in abundance. However, little positive feedback goes a long way to really build someone up.

In an extreme case, I've watched seasoned professionals tell me (the sound man for the night) to turn the backup vocals down on a concert he was doing. The backup singers were having an "off-night". Within five minutes, he was back up on stage, rehearsing more, but doling out the compliments to the singers, building them up! Seems counter to our Godly search for truth and honesty, right? But as a result, their performance did improve!

When we start down the path of negativity, it reinforces peoples' fears in themselves, and it allows their insecurities to take over.

When we bolster with positive feedback, or just even reinforce confidence in people's abilities, we build people capable of doing more than they thought!

And Another Thing

I have the privilege of playing with some of the finest musicians in Catholicism. (No, I'm not saying that because of the above article!) These guys get it and humbly serve every week!

In the past, I've done my part for giving negative feedback – especially when it comes to instruments. Oddly, I have the ability to play piano, guitar, bass and drums (albeit with mediocrity and without discipline). Oddly, it did not actually help me lead – it had put me in the position of wanting to micro-manage every note, flail, pattern and arpeggio out of the band.

I also have the curse of not being able to lie. Remember the whole thing about building up and not being critical? It hasn't always been my strong suit, and I'm still working at it. What those of us who can't lie and don't know what to say do is we stutter and beat around the bush – poorly. This method of communicating is completely ineffective and not as transparent as we'd like it to be. We don't want to say anything bad though – but we have to say SOMETHING.

During rehearsal two weeks ago as we're going through rehearsal before mass, I worked with the guitarists as usual, but I thought I was being critical. When I approached the drummer (Gary – bless ya!) after mass, wondering if I was being to "director-y", he set me straight. I was doing great – and I wasn't being critical. I had changed my style with what I communicated. I had given broad suggestions, built up what parts they had come up with, reinforced their intuition, and given them ideas where they could take their work. In essence, showed them my confidence in their abilities without being critical, and given them room to grow.

Cool, eh? I just wish it didn't happen by accident!

So, Coming Back Around

Our musicians live on compliments. Yes, they truly enjoy making music for the Lord. At some point, we'll probably all be in a place where were just about ready to hang it all up and go do something else.

Until today, I was wondering that about this website!

To quote Mark Twain, "I can live for a year on a good compliment."

Musicians work much the same. A couple parting points:

Don't over-shower with compliments – it cheapens honesty
Be sincere
Build-up with suggestions rather than correct issues
As a director, make sure there's someone building you up too! (Even if it's not in the band!)

Parting Thought

How would Jesus work in a band? (hmm… or would he just get the music out of the way and just preach the Truth™?

God bless you in your ministry!

Time for a Guitar Check-Up!

2007-04-28T00:31:00.000-07:00

It's time. I have managed to put it off, but I can put it off no longer.

My guitars' intonations have run out. It's getting harder to do demos, and worse yet - sound good on Sunday.

If you don't know what I'm talking about, then you probably have one of the following problems:

Can't play your guitar in tune up and down the neck without retuning or bending strings
Action is too high or low up on the neck
Excessive fret buzz
Just bad sound

These problems will happen on every, every guitar - even new ones! Here are a couple tips that will help you maintain your guitar and make it sound great. Please note, I am not a guitar expert, but these have helped me!

Always bring a string's pitch UP from underneath while tuning. Don't tune down to a note; it will make it more likely to go flat while playing it.
Change your strings more often

Make sure to break in your strings every time. You can either play the guitar for 30 - 60 minutes after putting on new strings or tune it up a half-step for 6 - 12 hours before you need it to be in playable condition.

Fix your intonation.
If you've never done it, get your guitar "set-up" by a professional. I use http://www.mikelull.com.

Let's talk about intonation. It's the most likely cause of you hating or loving a guitar.

Intonation is the general term used to make your guitar's pitch be correct all the way up and down the neck. You can do it yourself, but it is tricky, time consuming and has several parameters. It will also make your guitar sing like a bird (assuming you have decent tone to begin with.) In the end, the goal is simple: make every note up and down the fretboard on any given string the correct pitch. The bad news is getting there isn't simple.

The components of the math are: string diameter, string to fretboard height (aka "action"), fret height, and string length. Since we can make string diameter, action, and fret height constant, the thing that usually doesn't stay constant over time is the string length(!). It is also the hardest component to correct.

The factors that cause string length to change are simple:

Time causes the bridge and or neck under string tension to warp slightly (especially acoustics)
The dimensions of your guitar change slightly under different temperatures and moistures
The mechanics of your bridge do move over time. If you have a floating bridge, you're doomed to fight this until you tape it down after every string change.

So, now that you know why, here's the short of how you fix this:

If you have an acoustic guitar - give up. Hire a professional to "cut you a new bone". They will fix your bone or put a new one in to match your strings and guitar as well as set your bridge to get the right pitch.
For an electric, I recommend the same technique. But for the brave and bored, the the process is laborious, but worth it:

Select your strings and get them on the guitar
Set the desired playing hight using the bridge mechanics if you can. Avoid fret noise when playing heavy. If you get fret noise, your action may be set too low.
Make sure your bridge is under string tension and locked down as thoroughly as possible - make sure the pitch will drift as little as possible. Tremblo systems are quite problematic.
Using a strobe tuner (seriously), adjust the mechanics at the bridge to make each string's pitch correct open and at the 12th fret. This means the pitch at the 12th fret must be exactly twice the frequency of the open pitch. You will need to adjust the string length by making it shorter or longer to compensate if it's too low or high respectively. (Yes, it's backwards of what we're used to, but the math makes sense!) You will need to do this over and over again for each string since changing the tension on your neck will make the strings perform differently.
The process should probably take an hour for the non-professional. The first time I did my bass, it took an hour, and I was still figuring out how to do it right.

When you're done, always play with the EXACT same strings you used when the guitar was intoned.

The problem is physics and the string's reaction to the dimensions they are put through. If you change the dimensions even slightly (like the width of the string versus where it gets clipped by the fret), your pitch will be off.

If you need to change the type of strings (even to a coated version of the same strings you've always loved), take the time and intone your guitar again.

The entire point of this article is GET YOUR GUITAR SET-UP. Most of the music minsters I've encountered don't know what that means. Now you do.

If you're in Seattle, you have got to go to Mike Lull. He really isn't expensive, but he is the #1 guy anywhere and a treasure to have in our backyard.

No one will thank you for it. They'll just dislike you if you don't.

This article is too long. Sorry.

God bless you in your ministry.

Art's Formula for Worship Guitar Sound #1

2007-04-28T00:16:00.000-07:00

I am going to call this WGS1 - because it's cool to use acronymns, and I want to be cool - someday.

I personally really go for the Vox™ sound made popular by The Edge of U2 for this type of song. The guitar sits right on the edge of overdrive without always clipping. You lay into it, and there it is – that extra noise!

I actually use a POD (1.0), but the fundamentals are the same no matter what you're on.

Here's how it works for me:

The Guitar - I use Gretsch Nashville 1962 reissue (FilterTron pickups, using the neck pickup only). Any hollow body or semi-hollow can get great sound. For solids, dial your guitar tone in on the warm side.
Optional Delay - . There are two ways to do this:
- In time with the music, usually an 8^th or quarter note in delay. Using a tap-delay will keep your drummer from killing you. (Read: don't force your drummer into a groove – adjust your equipment!) If you're shopping, make sure you can access the tap feature with your foot. Line6 makes a good model for this. It's green and can be seen on almost every band's pedal-board.
- You can also work on off beats. This is the way The Edge does it, and Christian artists everywhere copy it! You want the delayed sound closer to a 16^th note, but only feedback ONCE. Then when you play, play 8^th notes – you get twice as many notes! Timing is critical. You can also try triplets! Count 1-2-3 per HALF note and tap away! This is even closer to that classic sound – but harder to program on the fly.
The Amp - The idea is to get the sound close to overdriven but not quite there when playing lightly. This will let you arpegiate cleanly without overdriving. Then, you can use a BOOST or just start playing harder to get a crunchier sound! It's very versatile and very "in".
- If I had my way, my amp would be an Orange AD30 TC
- My second choice would be a real-tube Vox AC30. This is the basic amp of George Harrison of The Beatles and U2 and is the originator of the sound in question.
- Lastly, you can get a good emulation from the Line6 POD effects units.

Line6 also makes amp versions of the POD with the tones already built in, and in worship can be much more effective than having an amp that does all the work. (Loud backline amps should someday be a Cardinal Sin. J ) Keep your FOH engineer in mind when you're shopping!

If someone wants, I can post my actual POD settings here! Just leave a comment!

Arranging for Guitarists

2007-04-23T13:43:00.001-07:00

We've all seen it. Worse yet, some of us may have been in or created one:

A "GUITAR CHOIR"!

For the uninitiated, this is a bastion of the 70's where, like the Doobie Brothers, Alabama, or Lynard Skynard, everyone with six strings and an aptitude for making noise signs up for the church music group. Then, without clear priories, parts or prerogatives, they end up either strumming the same pattern (bad), or just all going their own ways and create an acoustic cacophony.

One way to avoid this is to limit the number of guitarists. As a director, sometimes it's okay to help people find other venues for service. (It's not easy, though.) My suggestion for that limit is three and a half. This does not include the bass player.

Now, some of you might think: that's still too many! Well, you are right – it can be. But with this number it's quite manageable. Here's how you can do it:

Everyone plays less. The more people, the fewer things people can do before it gets "too busy". This can be an interesting problem – especially if you have a band of strong "leaders", but to make a joyful noise as a group, not everyone can lay the foundation. (That's the bassist's and drummer's job anyway.)
Avoid the "rhythm" and "lead" paradigm. It's very 80's and that was (gasp) 20 years ago! (I'm so old.)
Be explicit about who is doing what so there is no overlap. I'll discuss this further.
Be creative and avoid just strumming open chords.

Arranging With Three Guitarists

So, let's assume you've got three reasonably gifted guitarists. Let's just break down some songs and what we can do with them:

Blessed Be Your Name (Redman)

Acoustic Guitar – strumming, leading through most of the song. If you've got a strong bass player, rely on them for driving the song. You might even lay out the first verse! (Gasp!)
Electric Guitar – Broad chords only on the refrain and the second half of the bridge. Can use reverb or delay to make the sound bigger. Use overdrive. On the second verse, I like to add emphasis
Electric Guitar – Starting with the second verse, use light arpeggios during the verse – "noodling". Can use some delay, but don't overdo it. See Art's Formula for Worship Guitar Sound #1 (herein WGS1). You might want to start this on the second verse. On the refrains, use a single note with more force to add rhythm.

Your Grace Is Enough (Maher)

Acoustic Guitar – foundation.
Electric Guitar – Lead / arpeggios on transitional bridges, WGS1 sound, but with more overdrive.
Electric Guitar – Broad chords with distortion. If you play keys too, add those little keyboard parts during the verse, or be patient! J

Holy Is The Lord (Tomlin)

We do this song in an open "G" so our congregation can sing along. (This affects our capo settings.)

Acoustic Guitar – Foundation, lead, Open chords
Acoustic Guitar – Capo 5 – play open "D" chords and arpeggiate.
Electric Guitar – Noodling lead parts, similar to recording, using WGS1.

Hmm… these examples are fun. Maybe I'll take the opportunity to do my first "audio" podcast!

God bless you in your ministry!

Sing a new Psalm

2007-04-18T18:29:00.001-07:00

The Liturgical norms for Psalm settings changed a couple years ago when the USCCB and the Vatican required Psalms to stay more stringent to the Lectionary text and should not be paraphrased. This means there are lots of Psalm settings that are no longer considered correct to use for Mass, even those that came from Catholic publishers. In addition, the Lectionary was revised in 1998.

Therefore we've all hit it – there are now plenty of Psalms in the Lectionary that don't have an adequate* setting.

If you're adventurous, diligent and able to write music to a rigid set of guidelines: go write your own setting!

Now for the tricky part - there are rules. These have changed in recent years, but keep in mind, it's all for the glory of God, so offer up some of that creative freedom and deliver His Word.

All text should be taken from the Lectionary. You can find the text for a given week for Masses in the United States at http://www.usccb.org/nab.
If you absolutely must paraphrase, stay true to the true meaning of the text. You may need to cross-reference the Bible (NAB) to get the words in the proper context.
Range should be as follows with only very rare exceptions: the "A" below Middle "C" to the "D" one octave above middle "C". (See my article on the subject.)
Other than that, good songwriting principles should always be applied. (There many, many books on this subject, and I've read a few of them.)
1. Start with a good hook. It's subjective, but you want to keep the Word in the congregation's head long after Mass.
2. Keep it sing-able. If you can't hum it in your head without hearing the accompaniment, it's probably not a strong enough hook.
Be crystal clear as far as which parts the assembly should sing.
Keep it simple.

When it comes to teaching your new Psalm setting, make sure it works first. Have someone else sing it back to you. A good test of a good song is one that doesn't require you to sing it.

Also, if you have the ability, you might want to make the effort to notate at least the refrain / antiphon on staff paper or using some application like Finale or Sibelius.

God bless you in your ministry.

References

Redeptionis Sacramentum

* Remember, "adequate" is completely subjective; what works for one group might not work for yours. Also, don't forget to check with your local publishers.

He Is Risen! Now make it known.

2007-04-10T16:44:00.001-07:00

Lent is over. We’ve renewed, refreshed, and been revived!

Your music should reflect on the resurrection, moving the people to praise with fervor as in no other season!

At St. Vincent’s, we do some simple things to keep from lapsing back into “Ordinary Time Mode” (OTM):

Sprinkling rite at each mass in the Easter Season (with accompaniment)
Change the mass setting to something bright, simple and worshipful
Use the word “Alleluia” as often as is possible

Find a new song and repeat it a few times during the season:

On the Third Day (Maher) performed by Tim Hughes (reflection-type of hymn
Resurrection Day (Maher)
Let Your Love Come Down (Blakesley)
So We Will Worship (Hart/Hipp)

A couple other things to try:

Update some of the older hymns like “Jesus Christ is Risen Today”
Add a brass section for a few weeks
Make your warm-up more interactive, or just do something different
Find a new song with hand motions
Commit to find one new instrumentalist this Easter season
If you’re a writer, write something new!
If you’re a keyboardist, use a different preset, or even play a non-synthetic instrument

Me? I’m gonna praise Him just a little more this week on my old 1973 Wurlitzer 200.

Whatever you do, keep it out of the OTM!

God bless you in your ministry.

Rotten Apple®s

2007-04-05T00:34:00.001-07:00

A word to the wise: backup your hard drive early and often.

I've been blessed with several years free of hard drive failure. In fact, I can't recall the last one I've had fail without some early warning signs.

All that ended last Monday.

I have been the proud owner of a MacBook Pro Core 2 Duo since November. It rocks my little musical world. I run Logic Pro 7 and it's just killer – and it's portable! I was even mixing a recording of live show on the car ride back from Eastern Washington just to get a jump on things for a project I'm working on! Even Cubase 4 runs like it never did on my PC! Yes, even Windows® Vista™ ran great under BootCamp (with much tom foolery and hackery).

Then last Monday happened.

It always happens when you don't expect it.

If you expect it, you've got another problem – paranoia; but I digress.

I get up in the morning and open the Dashboard to check the weather – just as our Lord intended it. (Because opening Windows® is silly*.)

The whole thing locked - hard. Nothing moved. When the mouse stops moving, you know you are in trouble. Reboot? Nada. Just the click, click, clicking of a dazed and confused machine unable to get to the comforting grey on grey Apple® logo.

I took the MacBook Pro to the genius bar at Bellevue Square Mall. After much help from the guys at the counter, they figured the problem was the logic board (a.k.a. motherboard to PC users). No theoretical data loss.

Or so I thought.

I went back into pick up the machine on Thursday and to my horror the hard drive had been swapped! They went and did all they could to resuscitate the data from the damaged drive to no avail.

Here's what I lost on the drive:

Almost all of the pictures I took since Christmas Day!
The masters for Tom Curran's theme music for Sound Insight (on Sacred Heart Radio at 8 am)
Preliminary mixes for Soul Food Books' CD project
Experimental source code I was working on
My Microsoft® Money™ files
All my recent demos for the LIFE TEEN band at St. Vincent

Needless to say, I was upset – very upset. I could have taken the damaged drive and paid someone else to recover the data and replace the damaged drive in the Mac at another store. The problem would still remain – I would not have a reliable backup system for otherwise valuable data. I decided to learn a hard lesson and buy a backup drive instead.

Fortunately Tom's basic tracks are done, and I can record additional his additional needs separately. I was able to recreate the Money™ files from an older backup, and the Soul Food masters are all safe and sound.

How does this all relate to music ministry? Think of everything you have saved on your computer relating to your ministry. Here's my short list:

Live recordings of the band
All our sheet music
Demo recordings
Song sheet files
Historical band photos
A database of everything we've done since 1999
Source code for generating song sheets and overheads
Masters for my CD

So if you don't have a backup plan, get one. Do it at least ONCE A WEEK.

*Like you were going to get out of this post without a joke like that.

Space – the scary frontier

2007-03-07T11:33:00.001-08:00

As musicians, we often feel it is our job to make noise, after all who can argue when the Bible says, "May a joyful noise unto the Lord." (Ps. 100:1).

The thing is, not playing and not singing often takes much more discipline than playing all the time. As my orchestra teacher used to say, "Never, never, ever play a rest," we too must leave space at the right times.

Take the song "Sacred Silence" as recorded by Tom Booth or Jenny Pixler (available through www.spiritandsong.com). It is a lovely, sparse song that grows, ebbs, flows and resolves. At almost no point is the entire band playing at the same time. Yet, the beauty and completeness is achieved with so little.

The same is true for more upbeat songs, like "Trading My Sorrows" (Darrell Evans). The verse doesn't need a lot of things going on. You might find more people sing when there is more space for them to do so. For example, next time your team plays this song, try using just drum and bass on the verse along with the vocals. You might find the space is just what the congregation needs to find a home in the song.

The congregation, just like us as musicians, has the desire to be needed in worship. We should do our best to give them the space to feel desired. We, as musicians, should provide holes for them to fill in, like the name tags: "My Name Is:
".

As musicians, we all have egos. Just admit it. It may be checked at the door, but it is still there waiting to come out. We should all have the ears and guts to know when we don't need to play. And it does take guts. Even more so, it takes professionalism I

Over the weekend I had the honor and privilege to play a mass with Jesse Manibusan, David Yackley, Jackie Francois, Paul Nuyen, Becky Rameriez, and Rufino Zaragoza (among others). David and Rufino, both gifted, talented pianists traded off on piano, Jesse played where needed, and not all singers sang on everything - and it was awesome and beautiful. All had the professionalism and talent to demonstrate:

the worship experience is more important than for them to hear me play
I am secure enough in my skill that I don't need to fill the entire space with my notes for me to be satisfied with my contribution.

If your team isn't carrying these notions every week, you might think about some of the following questions:

Have we reinforced our team's skills with compliments or with criticism?
Have we made clear the need for space in our music? (Does your team know it's okay to not play?)
Are we personally comfortable enough to let go and not play, and yet still feel valuable to the worship experience?
Is our team's working environment competitive or collaborative when it comes to dividing arrangements?
Do we (as directors) always rely on the same people to fill the same roles, or do we also provide space for others to grow?

God bless you in your ministry.

Directing from the Piano

2007-03-06T19:27:00.000-08:00

Yeah - I am a pianist. I love leading from the guitar, but it's not always practical. Or in my case - ever practical.

Here's some tips that will help anyone trying to lead from the piano:

Try not to make yourself critical to performing a song. This is especially true of your left hand. Let the bass player do his job. He / she will thank you for it.
Position yourself so that you can clearly see the drummer, and the drumer can clearly see your hands.
Use simple hand signals with your left hand to cue the drummer.
Get a drum stool or keyboard stool that will let you sit higher than the expensive artist bench the church invested in. Sitting higher just even a few inches will make you more visible to the band and the congregation.
Be in constant visual communication with the drummer, the same way he / she is with the bassist. As long as the to of you agree, you will have a much easier time moving the song musically.
Position the piano in such a way that you are looking at your singers.

Alternatively, you can do what so many others have done: Give up, get a guitar and someone else to play keys. :-)

It's taken me a long time to get the balance between playing the piano and directing - and I'm still learning. It's much more difficult to do both from the piano as it is so easy to hide behind a behemoth instrument (we're gifted with a grand piano at St. Vincent).

Go fight your pianist intraversion with a few sparser inversions.

God bless you in your ministry.

Lock step - the drum and bass

2007-03-06T08:52:00.000-08:00

"Never uttered words more true." - Angus McDonell

This is the response I got when I said the fllowing at a conference recently where I was playing bass for Angus McDonell (who is himself a wicked bassist!):

The kick drum and the bass should be in sync at virtually all times.

Seriously.

What does that really mean?
If the kick is on the one - the bass is on the one and generally doesn't hit another "big" note until the kick does. The two parties are in lock-step with each other at all times. If this is news, then there is something else the two parties will need to start doing: communicating.

The drummer and bassist need to talk little about most songs. That means that the drumer and bassist have to be solid enough to know what the grove is and what they're going to play before they play it. You can "wing-it", but you have to agree what wing you're talking about.

One case in point: Raggae. Raggae is one of those places where you can play it "white", or you can play it "right". The key to doing it "right" is the ghost note on the one. That means no bass or drum is played. Often times I've heard demos where its just kindof got a raggae feel, but to paraphrase Jesse Manibusan, if you don't have the ghost on the one, then the groove is to raggae like Taco Bell is to Mexican food.

If you've got the kick on the one, the bass should probably be right their with it. If the bassist has a note change on the upbeat of 2 (as a lot of our modern CCM music does), he/she should communicate that to the drummer so the change can be reinforced by a well-placed kick.

(If I get some comments here, I'll post some charts to explain what I'm talking about.)

A lot of times we have willing musicians, but not the most skilled. The key thing is to be willing to learn and be of service. Often too we have musicians that are more skilled than the task calls for - and thats awesome. Again, the key is to be a willing servant.

In the case of the drum and the bass, I don't think this is any more true. These two people (often half of the band) has to provide the spine of the group and be happy doing it, knowing full well that their abilities will likely never be used to their full potential at mass. And that's okay - it's being part of the Body of Christ. If the band is the Body of Christ, the body needs its spine - or else it will fail. As musicians, if we are not skilled, we should invest to become skilled to serve effectively. If we are skilled, we should bring the mind of the teacher, and the heart to serve and communicate.

God bless you in your ministry.

Can I see your License, please?

2007-03-05T22:36:00.000-08:00

We've all done it: violoated copyright law. Most of us without knowing it.

More often than not, the key thing people aren't aware of in music ministry is how to manage copyrights and make sure that they are legal. They don't understand the differnces between a mechanical reproduction and performance rights. Here's the skinny on what I've come to understand as what we all need to know.

The FIRST thing you need to know is that I am not a lawyer, nor have I ever played one on T.V. I am not offering legal advice and this article should not be construed as such.

Here are the types of licenses / rights you need to be concerned with:

Performance rights - the right to perform a piece of music
Mechanical royalties - the right to mechanically reproduce a perforance of a piece of music
Reprint license - the right to mechanically reproduce printed music

I'll go through each of this as suscinctly as I can:

Performance Rights

In the United States, when used for a worship service, no performance royalties can be collected. However, when broadcast or played for any other situation (concerts, etc.) performance royalties of the song are due to the songwriter. This is paid by the venue (i.e. bar, coffee shop, concert hall) to the Performance Rights Organization (i.e. ASCAP, BMI, SESAC) in order to pay the songwriters and their publisher. The performer is required to turn in a songlist to the venue, and the venue is required to submit the songlist (with composers) over to their Performance Rights Organization.

In practice, this rarely happens in small clubs and venues. Same with college radio. Larger companies like ClearChannel-run radio do actually turn these over and people do actually get paid for their work.

Again, this royalty is not owed the songwriter when a song is used for worship. But publishers and songwriters have other means of getting paid for their work.

Mechanical Royalties

Mechanical royalties are due a company when a work of theirs is reproduced in any means. For example: copying a CD, or a tape.

When your singing group makes a recording of a song, they must pay the songwriter* a statutory rate of $0.08** per song produced. For small runs of privately funded CD's, a more low-cost fee may be reached, but it is your duty to contact the publisher to get permission and pay their fee.

*songwriter and their publisher, actually

** this may be out of date.

Reprint License

THIS IS THE THING that as a music minister, YOU REALLY NEED TO KNOW.

A reprint license grants you (most often) the right to make copies of the lyrics of a song to be consumed by a large number of people for public performace (like at mass). This applies to song sheets and overheads.
It does NOT grant you the right to copy sheet music. (With notes.)

The sad news that you probably don't want to hear is that there is almost no legal way to license music to make tons of copies for your 300 member choir and accompanying orchestra. The cost per sheet is roughly equal to that of what the publisher would charge you anyway - so just buy the sheet music.

In order for your favorite artist to get paid so they can buy food (and I know quite a few good artists that have trouble affording FOOD), you must turn in your songlist quarterly. The funds that you surrendered at the beginning of the year will be distributed to the songwriter and publisher based on their percentage of the total amount of songs paid for in the year.

Penalties

You're going to love this. Copyright infringement is a simple calculation: lost revenue x 3. That's right - TRIPPLE DAMAGES. And the law doesn't care if you're doing the Lord's work.

This is a vast, vast, vast over simplification of licensing and is by no means complete or definitive. It is however BRIEF.

God bless you in your ministry.

Compose your Composure

2007-03-04T01:44:00.000-08:00

It's been a little while - okay a LONG while since I've written. For those new to reading: many of the opinions in this column are my own. While I'd love for this to be a definitive guide, its' really just my own opinions and observations on musical liturgy.

I've got a renewed sense of purpose right now, and I've also got some new subjects to write about. So I'll just get to it.

What is your composure saying about you?

At some point or another, it happens to all of us: our body language speaks louder than the hymns of praise we extol from the ambo. We are not always aware of the hidden - and not so hidden messages - that our body language sends to others, especially when we are in the role of ministry.

I have a case in point: I am at a Catholic conference this weekend and a m having a great time. Last night I attended mass, which is good because - well... it's mass. But the one thing I remember isn't so good. I remember the psalmist flipping her hair incessantly. I'm a little ashamed to say I let it bug me quite as much as it did, but it did.

The real question is, "Why did it"? It was a number of things that are both personal to me, and general to most people. Firstly, the Psalmist was a young and up and coming Catholic artist. Every flip of the hair appeared more and more arrogant and dismissive of the assembly than the next, as if to say, "I have surpassed the need to be a part of you." I know that's not at all how she meant to convey the Psalms though. Secondly, her delivery came across to me as if the Word of God was a means to convey her own personality and talent. The Psalm setting was very stylish and vocally energetic, and did her voice well, but her presentation distracted from the fact that it IS the Word and requires a deliberate approach to its recitation that negates the need for personal style. I would have been willing to let the stylizations go, but that with the hair flips put me over the edge - I was distracted.

And that's the point - we must be free of distraction from the Word of God. Everything from our clothes to our hair, to our musical prowess, to our ability to distract ourselves with page-turns, last-second directions or mike stand adjustments builds at best a distracted environment and at worst and air of irreverence for our Lord's message. We send out constant signals about our own personal level of reverence for the Word and for the Eucharist. These signals are subtle but set the tone and example for the congregation to follow - especially when that example is not up to the task at hand.

Our own reverence is key - and it is present in our body language - not just in the words we sing. As our music is deliberate to the purpose of the liturgy, so too our movements should be deliberate, key as a part of the function in which we serve. Liturgical music does not serve us. It even refuses to do so by definition. Music that serves our own purposes is not Liturgical - it is secular by nature and therefore does not serve the liturgy. Our job is to do our best to not corrupt that purpose with our own bad habits.

While all of this is most relevant when the band can be seen by the congregation, it is also important when the band is behind the congregation - in a loft for example.
Try the following:

Take two minutes before mass to make sure everyone's music is in order: one page turn is all that is required to get to each successive song.

Take another minute (or five if needed) for the entire band to walk through the entire mass before engaging the congregation to worship to answer any remaining questions.

Right before mass starts, set the tone of reverence by an example of silence.

Throughout mass observe the following:
All eyes in the band should be on the Word when it is read
All eyes should be on the Eucharist during the Communion Rite
There should be no more than the absolute minimal retuning during mass
Singers should not converse with each other at any time between songs
Communications with the director should be made non-verbally - hand signals should more often than not be sufficient to handle most crises.

I predict your example will set the tone for a more reverent, and therefore more vibrant and relevant liturgy. What good is it when we distract from the liturgy? It serves no one - least of all those we serve.Other things to watch out for:

Singers: don't touch the microphone at mass - especially for emphasis. This is not a concert.
Guitarists: make sure if you must tune, you can do so at near silence.
Singers: know your music well enough to sing it without the page.
Singers: Participate in mass essentially leading the congregation in every word - not just the sung ones.
Singers: Dress appropriately.

Directors: I don't get the wild, over enthusiastic hand motions of some directors. Enthusiasm is good, but some of you need to switch to decaf (in my opinion).

If you've ever seen Val Lamar Jensen, that's not what I'm talking about. She's got the right idea with her temperance.

God bless you in your ministry.

Vintage Keyboards

2007-01-03T18:29:00.000-08:00

I love some of the equipment I've collected over the years. I have also acquired a fair amount of junk as well. No place is the line more blurry than in the "vintage" gear. But that old Hammond M-100 may only fetch $200 on Craigslist.org, but it may be worth $1000 to you with some work and a good Leslie speaker. If you don't know what I'm talking about, read on.

Vintage – an important but meaningless word

"Vintage", a word that comes from wine-making, is simply a word that describes the year something was made. For example, the vintage of a 1999 Chateau St. Michelle Merlot is 1999. Simple, right? But for musicians, a piece of "vintage" gear is one of enough historical significance so as to warrant its continued relevance and value today.

"Vintage" keyboards (and instruments for that matter) are that category of instruments that pre-date Rainbow Brite™, often fail to shine aesthetically, but can (if taken care of properly) knock the socks off most anything else made in the last 20 years. They come with "character" rather than scratches, and sound, rather than shine.

Not all old instruments are considered "vintage". For example, a 1981 Samick acoustic, is not, and probably never will be considered a "vintage" instrument. The key here is desirability. However, I got the privilege of playing Matt Maher's 1945 Gibson acoustic guitar – which sounds great even now! As is the case with good acoustic instruments, it will often sound better after 10 or 20 years than it does new!

Here are a couple examples of "vintage" instruments, if you can find them:

Pre-WWII Martin guitars (good luck finding one)
Stradivarius violins
1965 Fender Stratocaster
1960 Gretsch Nashville or Tennessean
1971 Fender Jazz bass
Hammond B3 Electric Organ
Fender Rhodes 73 Electric Piano

What makes these instruments special?!

Most importantly, none of them are manufactured anymore. Even if they are in "re-issue", meaning similar look and electronics, they were not made at that time
Often, they represent a particular sound associated with that part of history, or were made popular and became desirable
Sounded great

A couple of reasons for these instruments being important is that they produce a sound you can't produce any other way.

For example, Stradivarius violins are so highly sought after because the builder was a master and has died, the woods used no longer exist because the climate in the 1800's when they were built was especially wet, and they sound fantastic. You simply cannot build a better violin today for some of those reasons! (I especially love the climate reason.)

Vintage Keys

Vintage keyboards are a little different breed from other instruments when it comes to vintage and value. "Vintage" keyboards still tend to be electric in nature, and therefore not always a better pick for use in worship.

The key drawbacks to owning a real vintage keyboard: tuning, hums, buzzes, fuses, weight, and cost of repair. But, the key reasons to own vintage gear: character, authenticity, expressiveness, grittiness, and… well it's just cool.

I guess the big thing I love about vintage keys is authenticity and expressiveness. For example, I own a Wurlitzer 200. Its preamp is noisy. Its keys often need tuning. The action needs work. It's as heavy as my 88-key digital piano. None of this would be a problem if I had bought a Clavia Nord Electro and used their model. But, the sound of the reeds being struck be hammers is so honest, you can't replace it. The fact that things are slightly out of tune – it's not all bad!

I like to think of this as the difference between polished singers and singer/songwriters. You may disagree with me, but I often find more sincerity in the unpolished honesty of a songwriter like Ben Folds or Elliot Smith than I find in the overproduced sounds of Justin Timberlake or David Coverdale.

Here are a couple models to watch out for on Craig's list or eBay and save up for. You may need to have a friend with a pickup for some of these!

Hammond B/C3
Wurlitzer 200(A)
Farfisa
Fender Rhodes 73
Yamaha CP80
Rhodes Suitcase EP

What makes these instruments interesting to list to is that they use real, physical means of producing sound. For example:

Hammond – spins a wheel ("tone wheel") at a high rate past an electric pickup to cause the pickup to modulate (vibrate like a microphone).

Wurlitzer – uses a hammer like a piano to strike a "reed" to make it vibrate, and is picked up via a pickup like an electric guitar.

Rhodes – Uses a non-articulated hammer to strike a "tine", like a xylophone to make a sound, which is then picked up like a guitar would.

CP80 – works just like a piano but with an electric pickup (again, like a guitar) on the soundboard.

The problems here with producing physical sound, especially for worship, is that they often have issues:

They often go out of tune
These instruments are often electrically noisy
Can be unpredictable (try finding a fuse for these during a sermon or homily!)
Are heavy to lug around
Are often quite fragile and sensitive to climate changes

The sad part is that many of these issues cannot be worked around without good maintenance, and even then can cause you pain on Sunday! So, now we've come to the very crux of the matter: "Vintage" does not mean "good", especially when it comes to keys. But there are alternatives available.

Alternatives

Your typical keyboard will have settings for Hammonds, Wurlys, Clavs, and the like. Most of these are "PCM" based (sampled recordings of actual instruments). While this sounds good, it's not the same as the real thing – nor will it sound good typically on its own.

Each of the real versions of these instruments (Hammond, EPs) use actual physical means of making sound – yes, even though the instruments are electric! A single recording of these instruments (as most digital keyboards have) is never enough to represent the range of sounds producible by the original, and its inferiority honestly is apparent.

But, there are instruments out there that model the physical nature of the sound, and even give you control over the creation of that sound to come up with some of the best available emulations out there – without the price or unpredictability.

First are the hardware based instruments like the Clavia Electro, Korg CX3 and Roland XK-8. These instruments offer a lot of options that will suit your needs well. For example, all offer a major feature of real organs called "drawbars" that let you configure the sound of the organ on the fly! (We'll talk about playing with this in a future article.) You can also configure your rotary speaker emulation to work just the way you want it, recreating those great sounds you hear today.

Roland VK-8

Also available, for those tied to the latest computer technology, are plug-ins and the like that can be run on a portable laptop computer that will create those great sounds in a controlled fashion, like Apple Logic's EVB3 and Native Instruments' B4. Both of these have great organ emulations. You can model the age of the instrument, it's noise, tuning, speakers, and even how much noise would be made hitting the keys! The disadvantage is that you have to rely on your laptop, so have a GOOD, clean low latency output. You'll still need to bring a keyboard to control the computer.

However it's still not the same as playing the real thing. So, if in my opinion, if you ever get a chance to play the real thing and can't have it all the time, DON'T. You'll wish you could, and you'll always be comparing the emulation to the real thing. ;-)

Models to check out: Clavia Electro, Korg CX3, Roland VK-8, Hammond XB-3, Apple Logic's EVB3 and EP88, Native Instruments B4 II.

My personal take

My favorite keyboard to play live by far is my old Wurlitzer 200. It has a single output jack that I plug into a DI box (because after carrying this thing around, the last thing I want to do is carry around another amp.) It's old, it clunks, it buzzes, it only makes one sound, goes out of tune, and is heavy. I take the laptop with me occasionally and play Hammond sounds though Logic. I also sometimes play the emulation in my Roland RD-700sx (which also emulates tone wheels).

I use a variety of tools to create the sound, and when it comes down to it, I try to do what's going to work best for the music. If the buzz is a distraction, I stay away from the Wurly. If I need to lead, I'm on the piano or guitar.

Do what's right for the ministry, and be ready for the answer to not be any ONE thing.

Life on Speed

2006-11-16T21:39:00.000-08:00

I need to slow down.

There's a lot going on in all of our lives. Performing music and praising God is fun and rewarding, challenging and consuming all at the same time.

Most of us involved in ministry have families, loved ones, lawns, jobs, bills, and weeds. The oil in my poor car hasn't been changed in nearly 9,000 miles. I just haven't had the time. That said, I drive 35 miles each way twice a week (yes, 140 miles a week) solely for LIFE TEEN masses and rehearsals.

Often, I have to remind myself to slow down. Life will be okay... mass will go on, and for crying out loud, pick another song rather than staying up until 3am to write a new setting or transcribe one that OCP can't be bothered to put online.

Our Holy Father, Benedict XVI recently reminded us that being busy all the time can lead to spiritual hardness of heart. I know I've felt it. It's in those times that I have trouble experiencing Jesus' love in the everyday. I haven't given enough time to let him into my day, let alone those moments of ferocious panic trying to put liturgical music together because I haven't given enough time to sleep, let alone pray.

As teens, we're reminded to leave six inches for the Holy Spirit. Sometimes, this is said jokingly, but I think if you turn this around to our busy lives, it can be equally important - leave six minutes for the Holy Spirit. Leave an hour. Leave something for God to breathe into your life. How much better decisions, better living will we experience if we are spiritually and emotionally grounded in every day, not just the few hours of our week after mass.

God is there with us always. Let us take the time to acknowledge his presence, allowing us to let Him rule our lives. If we keep Him a priority, perhaps we'll come to terms with "busy" not being equated with "productive", "important", or even "good".

God bless you in your ministry.

Watch that tone of voice

2006-11-02T22:44:00.000-08:00

Sometimes, it's the simplest things that get you. I hope this is old hat to most (both) of you, but if you're like me, and learned about vocal coaching for small groups by osmosis, experience, experimentation, trial and error, read on.

Having attended conferences, concerts and the like, I am always amazed at the great vocal sounds some other groups are able to get, and often horrified at the sound others get. Knowing our group was filled with talented vocalists, I was pretty confident the quality of our musicians wasn't an issue. The problem was in the architecture of how I had built our sound, and though great in theory, it didn't work as I had expected.

Small groups tend to lend themselves to tighter, more experienced musicians that can all lead given the opportunity. I believe in a smaller group, there is no safety in numbers. Every singer needs to be solid and be able to deliver on their own without the support of the group. What surprised me a little (as a budding vocal director) is that the individual doesn't need to deliver like this to be effective when in the group.

Over the years, we've worked on several exercises to get our blending to improve. What I've found over the last couple years are the following simple pieces of advice that, when put into practice, can make all the difference in turning a talented bunch of singers into a tight-sounding, gifted ensemble, truly capable of moving beyond filling the role of the cantor and really leading liturgical music.

Structure: one lead, others follow
All non-lead vocals need to back off when not explicitly leading in a cantor-like role
Non-lead vocals should refrain from using more than the bare minimum of vibrato
Non-lead vocals should use a soft tone of voice regardless of range expertise

I work with a small group of singers – usually 3 – 6 singers on any given week. Preferably it's half male and half female. I came out of an amateur background in music, doing theater in high school, various choirs since 8th grade, and the occasional vocal lesson.

Learning in high school, college, choirs, etc, I was taught that the way to give a good performance was to project. (That's prō-'jekt, not prä-'jekt). While this is true for almost any singing or presenting situation, this is not the case in the small choir in the role of a backup singer. As a soloist, this is a no-brainer. In order to be heard, you must project. There is no value in mumbling the Word of God. In a larger choir, the same is true, depending on the tonal quality desired – a larger choir operates without much of the aid of amplification to achieve its performance, therefore sing as you are best able!

But, in the smaller ensemble with the aid of electronic amplification, projecting is not typically going to be the right answer. I saw a great demonstration of contemporary worship music done badly with a female vocalist leading by singing into the microphone and a male tenor adding harmony. The woman led using her melody with soul, but not a lot of volume – but she sang directly into the mike, and was very effective in her duty. The male tenor on the other hand added his harmony far off the microphone, blasting all those around with his very good, but very loud and unbalanced microphone. Even with the sound system, the result was poor at best. The vocal performance was unbalanced, and ineffective – we were all distracted by the tenor. He protested that his sound engineer usually turns his mike down.

However, what I've found (and what others will tell you) is we cannot rely on the sound engineer to fix your sound. The job of the sound system is to re-enforce the sound, not deliver it en mass! While the volume may be corrected, the tone cannot be corrected by the sound engineer, and that makes all the difference.

So, what vocal tones work well? The items I listed at the beginning of this article were what I've found to work. The goal is to get a full sound with good clarity that encourages others to sing. Every person projecting, using vibrato leads more to a chaotic sound, which can be especially difficult if you've got a team of great musicians! As a director, it's often been hard for me to take the lead, because I see my role as a mentor and facilitator rather than a soloist. However, there are a lot of times that we just need good direction, and building that from the lead vocal spot is the best way to achieve that goal.

So, here's the quick breakdown of what I've found to work:

One lead – one person gets to project on any song. If there isn't a sole individual projecting, then no one should be – just use good, solid diction to make the consonants heard well.
Keep the volume down if you're not leading. No one should ever feel like they need to "steal the show". That's not the point of worship. We're all a critical part of a team of worshipers.
Keep the vibrato down. You just want a fuller sound. The more vibrato, the more chaos will ensue. Vibrato helps the voice to stand out in such a small group, which should be reserved for a soloist / cantor, but even then, still with a healthy dose of judicious moderation.
Everyone else uses hushed tones, even when adding harmonies or counter melodies. The point is just to add to the sound.

I use a couple terms to illustrate the parts as I've described:

Lead – the one person leading the group. There should be a lead for major hymns. I don't assign a lead for the parts of the mass (primarily the songs that accompany the Liturgy of the Eucharist). Backing vocals are still used when we have a lead.
Solo – one person sings the part completely on their own. No backing vocals. I only use this on occasion.
Backing vocals – everyone else who isn't on the lead part.
It took me too long to figure this out – and though I like learning by experience, this is one of those places I wish someone would have smacked me.

God bless you in your ministry.

Updating the "Standards"

2006-10-22T15:46:00.000-07:00

I've been lax with my posting, and apologize. Just a few postings into it and I'm getting busy. Here's this week's tidbit, for those of you that haven't tried these tricks.

Most congregations like to sing what they know. Very few embrace new songs as quickly as we (as music ministers) would like. This can be especially true if you're coming into a parish that has never had a "modern" music ministry with a "Worship Band". Even well established bands may find that the most well sung hymns are ones that the congregation has known for years. You can tap that energy we lovingly direct to our Father by using some easy techniques to update the sound of the hymns, making them relevant to the hearts of the young and young at heart.

Use 6/8 and 12/4 time
Don't' change lyrics or rhythm
Keep it simple

If you haven't used these time signatures before, they hold a great treasure for unlocking the potential of "modernizing" some old standards. I've heard great renditions of songs like "O Come, All Ye Faithful", "Come, Holy Ghost", and "Alleluia, Sing to Jesus" all thanks to these time signatures! You can swing an acoustic guitar easily in these signatures, bust out a killer groove, or do something else creative with the song.

Take something simple like, "O Come, O Come, Emmanuel". To update this song, I wrote an arrangement around a 12/4 time signature. (If you're having trouble hearing it your head, think the groove to "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" by Tears for Fears.) Since the original song is written almost entirely in quarter notes, the triplet subdivisions do not interfere with the melody. I then put a Bruce Hornsby-esque jazzy piano to the arrangement, along with some innovative bass playing from our bassist Rhoscoe, and we built what has to be one of our most complimented Advent songs. We made sure to keep the arrangement subtle, but made sure to re-enforce the mood of the song.

With this in mind, I do want to stress a couple things when updating songs. No matter how clever you are, the original (or well known) lyrics and rhythm must be left alone. Completely alone. Part of the advantage of using an older hymn is about familiarity, connecting to our eternal God, and leveraging people's knowledge of the hymn so they can direct their praise to Him, rather than a songsheet. If we change the lyrics, the rhythm, or the pitch of the notes, we lose a lot. The congregation still has to re-learn the hymn, you'll lose people's connection with the past, and it will cause a train-wreck of lyrical mush - hardly unifying. Instead, make sure to just keep the melody intact - you can freely changing the chords and voicing around the melody and make things fresh without abandoning the familiar.

Leave the mood of the song intact. If you can take such feelings like "anticipation", "joy", "remorse" or "patience" further in your arrangements, do so. Don't feel the need though to change the mood or setting. It'd be quite funny to hear Sum 41 do "Hail Mary (Gentle Woman)", but then it would only be a caricature, and not capture our focus.

When using an older hymn, you will almost invariably want to keep it simple. There was a time in the Church that the very idea of polyphony was branded as heresy. Your arrangement should not be complex, and the focus should still remain on the praise to God in the song itself. If you're updating a hymn, changing anything about the song will be enough, and it need not show itself in full force to be "new".

I once had a high school student demand that we "up the ante" in the group by doing some more ambitious arrangements like the setting of "Joyful, Joyful" as done in "Sister Act". While well intended, this type of arrangement is not really what we should be after - even in the movie, that arrangement served as a vehicle for the attention of the arranger. We must always are remember that we serve the community to provide it a means by which to praise our God. We cannot offer praise on their behalf. All present must be active participants in this Holy Eucharistic feast.

Stage Pianos / Performance Synthesizers

2006-09-18T01:18:00.000-07:00

For the record, I started my first keyboarding article with the notion of solving the musical equivalent of world hunger in one shot – from to choosing a keyboard to choosing sounds to technique to phasing issues… so what you're getting here is roughly less than a tenth of what I had outlined. I just couldn't short change the depth of information here when this blog is supposed to be about getting into the details of music ministry. I just can't put out another Cliff's Notes® version of these things – those are already out there. Oh the joys of being a new, amateur, make-believe journalist (more commonly just called a "blogger").

I am a pianist by trade, and guitarist and whatever else by necessity, so I feel very at home when it comes to keyboards, piano and the like. There are lots of great things you can do with piano and keyboards, but I'll just take the time to scratch the surface of keyboards, playing and sound issues you've probably encountered. I've met some experienced keyboardists that weren't quite sure how to deal with some of these issues, and I hope these are a help to you.

Types of keyboards

There are a few genres of keyboards out there. Your local bookseller's periodical racks have entire magazines dedicated to help you figure out how best to part with your hard-earned money on their advertiser's products. I realize there are tons more models and hybrids of all sorts of keyboards available, including rack mount synths and software synths. No matter what you do, you need some way to interact and generate sound using some type of keyboard playing device. Here's how I'd break down the basic types of physical, hardware based keyboards on the market today:

Performance synths / Digital Pianos (Yamaha S-series, Roland RD series)
Music workstations (Roland Fantom series, Korg Triton series, Yamaha Motif series)
Analog synthesizers / emulators (ex. Nord Lead series, Korg RADIAS, Roland SH-201, microKorg)
Vintage Synths (Yamaha DX7, Roland D-50, Korg M-1, Sequential Circuits Prophet-5, MiniMoog, ARP 2600)
Vintage Keyboards (Hammond B3, Wurlitzer 200A, Mellotron Mark IV, Fender Rhodes 73)
Vingate keyboard emulators (Nord Electro series, Korg CX-3, Roland VK-8)
Controllers (Yamaha KX series, Roland A-series, M-Audio Axiom / Oxygen)

Portable keyboards (Yamaha PSR series – virtually anything with speakers)
Every one of these above types of keyboards has a purpose in mind from its inception, and certain keyboards are going to be more apt toward worship than others, but virtually all can be used in some way, if done correctly. Each one of these types of synths warrants an entire article unto themselves. This time around, we'll delve into digital stage pianos and performance synths.
Piano-based keyboard overview

For the worship team looking for the best, most flexible, useful keyboards for the worship team, these keyboards are the total opposite end of the spectrum from the specific use sounds of the analog modeling synthesizer. These keyboards typically lack workstation features like sequencers, sampling, and sound programmability, and concentrate of great instrument playability.

Piano emulation

These keyboards tend to excel primarily at their piano sounds. What makes these keyboards better sounding than others with their piano sounds is primarily how much of the machine's memory and digital signal processing (DSP) power is dedicated to recreating an accurate, expressive representation of a piano.

First of all, the piano must be multi-sampled. Multi-sampled instrument have recordings of their sounds taken from more than one pitch from the original instrument. In addition, they can have samples taken from more than one volume of the instrument being recorded. Today's best piano multi-samples have a minimum of three velocity (volume) levels recorded for every key on the piano. That's a minimum of 264 samples just for the piano sound! Traditionally, all the best piano samples had come from the industry standard Yamaha C7 grand piano. In the past two years or so, this has changed dramatically with manufacturers looking into less standard, but no less important and powerful grand pianos – specifically, the Steinway concert grand pianos. When I first heard the Roland RD-700SX, I was so moved by the dramatic sound of the Steinway samples over the Yamaha C7 I'd been hearing for years and years, I very soon afterward bought the RD-700SX.

The second, recent innovation around piano recreation is the DSP modeling of the piano's soundboard. The soundboard is the big, cast iron piece that suspends the strings inside the piano, and allows the string to resonate. The modeling for the soundboard includes control of the damper noise, sympathetic string resonance (when you hit an "E", the "E" strings above it also make a sound if the dampers are lifted, in addition to other strings, like the "B" and "A" strings to a lesser extent). It will also add an air of… well… AIR to the sound of the piano, using reverberation models not unlike those that model a small room – which is what the inside of a piano essentially is.

Third, is the keyboard action. With these keyboards, you will (in a way) get what you pay for. When playing keyboards of this type in the store, you will notice a distinct difference in the mechanical action of each of these keyboards as you go from the moderately priced models to the higher end models. The question is always, "what's going to work for you?" not necessarily, "what can you afford?" There is no doubt, the hammer action of the higher end boards is superb. It was another major factor in the purchase of my Roland RD-700SX over her less-expensive sister, the RD-300SX. The 300 is much lighter, but doesn't have the great hammer action, and so I sacrifice my back on occasion for a great feel! (Thank goodness I bought a case with wheels!)

Lastly, you'll want to pay attention to these finer points, which are often included on non-stage piano keyboards (but not all). For example: are the top strings affected by the damper pedal? (On all real pianos, they are not affected.) Also, in the last 7 years or so, manufacturers have paid attention to so-called "half-damping". This is when the damper pedal is neither all the way up nor down. This can include things like muting the strings, but un-damping them again before they have stopped resonating, allowing them to be sustained again. Or it can include partial damping of the strings with the pedal partially depressed as the string sustains.

More than just a piano
Beyond the piano sounds, many models include many goodies that make purchasing them unique, and would require careful consideration before purchase. First of all, there is the inclusion of over, useful sounds. Many stage pianos of old (and some current) only include a few sounds, mostly simple organ sounds, electric piano sounds and string-like sounds. In general, this may be all you need. Others may include more exotic organ generation engines (like the Roland RD-700SX or the Clavia Stage88). The Stage88 doesn't contain hundreds of sounds like the RD-700SX or S-90ES, but it does have fantastic Hammond, Wurlitzer, and Rhodes emulations, including full digital drawbars and great amp simulation! The RD-700SX has great capabilities as a multi-device MIDI controller, while the Yamaha S90ES, unlike the other two, is a fully programmable PCM-based synthesizer, able to save your patch settings, and program altogether new sounds.

What's right for you?

The first three models I have listed at the end of this article all have three things in common: great piano multi-samples (coming from Steinway and Yamaha grand pianos), soundboard DSP, and half damping. The other critical things I would listen to when choosing a keyboard that works for you: consider what other sounds you really need, what kind of control you really need, how does the keyboard feel to you, and how does the midrange of the piano sound to you? This last point, like the others, is totally a judgment call. The piano's range right around middle "C", the most used, useful and critical part of the piano's sound, is also one of the most difficult to reproduce in a keyboard instrument. Only your personal taste can determine what's right for you and your ears' perception of expressiveness.

One more thing in this area, and this is very important for worship musicians: How does the piano and the other sounds sound when mixed MONO?! Every time you plug into a system for playing live, if you aren't doing it already, you should in virtually ALL cases, be playing in mono, not stereo. This is because of the nature of stereo – it uses out of phase sounds in the listeners ears to recreate the sound of the real instrument by having the sounds be different in each ear. In a live situation, the position of the listener is for all but one or two people, never in the optimal position for a stereo sound. In fact, it is virtually always never optimal (or even good) for stereo. The music stores I frequent always have stereo speakers set-up near the keyboard for sale, or have headphones. A keyboard may sound great in the store in stereo, but get it plugged into the front-of-house, and you might as well be playing a Casio SK-1. (Please, just nod and say you know what that is.) This is because the listener is not positioned between the speakers, is hearing reflections off walls… any number of things happens live that will make your great-sounding, expensive stereo keyboard sound stale and cheap. You must have your keyboard set-up to output a mono sound, like that from a single speaker amp, or the mix of the entire band, and the sound of your keyboard will suffer from problems such as comb filtering and phase cancellation, otherwise known to the more novice reader – lousy sound.

I know I've touted the Roland RD-700SX. Mine has personally been used live by the likes of recording artists Kenny White and Matt Maher when they've visited the Seattle area. However, if I were to make this purchase again now, I'd give the Stage88 and the S90ES a serious listen to, since they weren't available when I bought my RD-700SX.

If you're looking for a lower-cost, bare-bones solution that can still sound good in a sound system, you may also want to look at the M-Audio line of stage pianos. Their piano sounds are reportedly good. I can't say that I've actually tried them out myself.
Models to check out: Roland RD-700SX, Yamaha S90ES, Clavia Stage88, M-Audio ProKeys 88, Roland VX-88 (discontinued)

May God bless you in His endeavors to minister to his people through you.

Resources for the resourceful

2006-09-11T19:29:00.000-07:00

I'm just going to list a few of the great resources I've used over the years that have helped me in my music ministry. As this blog grows, I'll be citing many of these references.

Next week, we'll discuss keyboards in music ministry – an area close to my heart.

Publications

LIFE TEEN Liturgy and Music Planning Guide (Available by subscription from http://www.lifeteen.com/)
Worship Musician Magazine (Bruce Adolph Publishing)
Christian Musician Magazine (Bruce Adolph Publishing)
The Liturgy Documents Vol. 1 – includes the GIRM, and "Music for Modern Worship". You can get some of these online:
- Music in Catholic Worship – a MUST READ for every Catholic music minister
- General Instruction of the Roman Missal – A MUST read for every music leader / director
Handbook for Creative Church Musicians - Harold Owen (G.I.A.)
The Complete Idiot's Guide to Songwriting – Joel Hirschorn
The Catholic Lectionary
- Week- by-week NAB readings available at http://www.usccb.org/)
Grape Vine (Indenendent)
The Catechism of the Catholic Church
Integrity's Songwriting DVD – other than being short, incomplete, impractical and vague, it's a good starting point for budding Christian songwriters.

Web Sites:

http://Worshiptogether.com – Get sheet music, instructions, and inspiration
http://Spiritandsong.com – OCP's contemporary Catholic music site
http://Ocp.org – Oregon Catholic Press, Catholic hymnal and book publisher of Tom Booth and Matt Maher among others
http://Giamusic.com – Catholic music publisher or David Haas and Marty Haugen, among others
http://Wlp.jspaluch.com – Catholic Music publisher of Ed Bolduc and David Yackley, among others
http://Liturgy.com – OCP's online Liturgy planning service
http://printandpraise.com – OCP's assembly edition printing service
http://ccli.com – Christian Copyright Licensing, Inc. – Chief place to get reprint licenses for many favorite

Conferences / Organizations

National Pastoral Musicians – Annual regional / national conferences for Catholic musicians
LIFE TEEN Priests and Musicians conferences
LIFE TEEN – LIFE on the ROAD conferences
Christian Musicians Summit – National Christian musician and songwriter conference held in Seattle area

Non-Christian based sources worth reading:

Performing Songwriter – Monthly magazine
Sound On Sound – Great magazine for the advanced musician and amateur recording engineer
Confessions of a Record Producer – Moses Avalon

Copyright © 2006 by Arthur C. Leonard, 10936 157th Ct. NE, Redmond, WA 98052. All rights reserved. No portion of this article may be reproduced without the expressed written permission of the author or his assignees.

Planning a sing-able liturgy – vocal range

2006-09-05T18:33:00.000-07:00

Since this is my first article, I'm going to give a little background here. When dealing with planning liturgies, you should plan music around several things:

Christ focused

Relevant to the action of the liturgical rite

Relevant to the teaching / readings of the day

Full, active, and conscious participation

This article will pertain specifically to the last point: full, active and conscious participation. A lot of the parameters going into making a decision about how to approach this will depend greatly on the collective state of the assembly you serve. Therefore the tips below may serve as a guide, but only you and your liturgical ministry can determine their relevance to your liturgy.

Let's consider a song I think is one of the more common offenders when it comes to conventional congregational vocal range: "Did You Feel the Mountains Tremble" by Martin Smith. I've heard LIFE TEEN and worship bands do this song, and they tend to perform it well, and the people do enjoy the song. When I ask those who were there if they could sing with it, they almost universally respond, "Not really, but I like to listen." If you look at the song as written, the range of the song easily exceeds the range of the congregation, soaring all the way to an "F#" an octave above middle "C"! Martin Smith has a lovely tenor voice that can really soar beautifully with this song, but this becomes hard, if not impossible to follow for the less vocally trained.
Unfortunately this misses the point of a full, active and conscious participatory liturgy. It is not enough for the music ministers to act on behalf of the community, but rather the congregation must participate, as mandated by the Catechism –

Mother Church earnestly desires that all the faithful should be led to that full, conscious, and active participation in liturgical celebrations which is demanded by the very nature of the liturgy, and to which the Christian people, "a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a redeemed people," have a right and an obligation by reason of their Baptism.1

We, as music ministers, must choose songs that enable all to participate in their role in the mass, not just observers, but holy participants in union with the Holy Spirit. Our job is to support the assembly, not supplant it with just superior musicianship.

Vocal Range of the Assembly

I will assume here that the reader is dealing with a Catholic congregation. Some congregations can get behind songs with a wide mantissa (vocal range from low to high notes), but in general Catholic assemblies have a more narrow range that our Protestant brethren in Christ. I follow a few simple guidelines when selecting music or adjusting the key of a particular song, enabling all, not just your congregational tenors and sopranos to sing!

In practice, I've found my congregation's range is limited to what you see above – a "B" below middle "C", to a "D" one octave above middle "C". You'll notice, this is a very narrow range. Most every singer has a range of at least an octave and a half, with some, more gifted singers sporting over three octaves. I can sometimes get away with an "Eb" or a low "A", but if those notes are sustained at least one person will let me know they had difficulty after mass.

In Protestant congregations, it is not uncommon to find a wider range – "A" below middle "C" to an "E" an octave above, with some select songs as high as an "F".

This totally reminds me of my role in "Brigadoon" back in high school. I played the part of "Charlie Dalrymple", the local boy about to get married. The song "I'll Go Home with Bonnie Jean", has one note that was a "G" an octave above middle "C". (If you've heard the song, you know the note on the key lyric, "I'll… "). After having sung baritone for three years, I had to exercise my newly discovered tenor voice to hit that note. As it turned out, I was really a tenor 1 in hiding, and after some work, this was no longer a problem.

Your congregation does not have the same luxury of vocal lessons, practice and patience. We as music ministers need to engage them here and now, and to do that, we can't exclude them and their perceptively lazy voices through our selection of music.

This means picking songs that fit the range of the congregation (sometimes at the exclusion of other, otherwise good songs), adjusting the keys of songs we love to sing, and making sure we lead where the congregation actually sings.

It goes without saying that when leading an assembly, it is best to lead in the range they are expected to sing in. This means your altos and lower tenors will get more exercise leading in church since they tend to represent the average assembly singer's range. A soprano leading the congregation may be sometimes more difficult. I'll cover things like this in future articles, but include as little vibrato as you tastefully can. It encourages participation rather than passive listening.

Conclusion

There is a lot that can be said about leading the assembly, and if you'll allow my long-winded explanations to continue, I'll write more on this in the future. The basic idea is lead them where you want them to go, and where they can be lead. We should not be passive in our worship, just as no other of our brethren present, acting in unity with the Body of Christ, should remain silent in worship.

Thank you for reading, and God bless you.

References
1 Catholic Catechism, 1141

Tips for Mondern Music Ministry

2006-08-30T10:55:00.000-07:00

So, I don’t claim to be an expert or have it all together when it comes to putting together a LIFE TEEN music group. I do however have years of experience doing this and love doing it. A lot of people have come to me with questions over the years, and while many are covered in the LIFE TEEN planning guides, conferences and many, many other resources, not everyone reads them, can afford to attend, or realize they have options and opportunities. I’d like to take this space and dedicate it to advice and discussion of putting together a quality music ministry at your church, hoping to spare you some of the pains that I and others have gone through.
Some growing pains are GOOD – you have to go through them to appreciate what you have.
Others are best not to go through for so many reasons.
I'll be inviting some of my fellow musicians to guest-blog on here as well, doling out advice obvious and sublime.
Here are some of the topics I’d like to cover in upcoming in-depth posts: (in absolutely no order… this is a blog after all!)
· Liturgy and LIFE TEEN
· Sound Reinforcement
· Playing techniques
· Technology in liturgy
· New songs to listen to
· Songwriting – oh the places we’ll go
· What makes a song GOOD for liturgy
· In-depth planning
· Group dynamics – oh yeah, there are people here too!
· Building your new team
· What makes a music minister different from a musician
· Mechanics for good arrangements
· Resources, resources, resources!
· Directing from guitar
· Directing from keyboard
· Mass etiquette / attire
· Being present to Jesus in each other
· Being present to Jesus in the liturgy
· Knowing your place in ministry
· Copyrights 101 (no, you still can’t copy the sheet music)
· Event production, planning
· Vocal techniques
· Drumming
· Bass
· Piano
· Guitars, guitars, guitars
· Leave space! 6 measures for the Holy Spirit
· Monitoring
· The art of a sound check
· Mixing for the room
· Wireless systems
· Keyboards – what not to buy
· Guitar sound ideas
· Dialing in your compressors
· Planning around the congregation
· The business of music – why you generally don’t want to quit your day job, even if it is for ministry
· Moved in the moment - Being open to the Spirit & being prepared for it