Chris Huff explains techniques for mixing worship music.

Let’s be honest, musicians only play the music but we’re the ones who form it into something great. Their music pales in comparison to what we create. We are mixing gods!

I so hope you were offended by that. I didn’t mean it. The problem is some techs buy into that belief. The result is they work against the musicians and not alongside them. That needs to stop, today.

Musicians give us the most wonderful gift we can get – good song arrangements. Song arrangements that carries the listener through the composition, with energy, with emotion.

Great arrangements make for easy mixing but if one doesn’t recognize the power of an arrangement, then mixing becomes about creating sound, not creating “music.”

What is an arrangement?

A musical arrangement is the representation of a composition through the unique design of the song. This design, called the form, uses the areas of melody, harmony, style, and rhythm.

A composer can create several arrangements of their own composition. Other people can create new arrangements of a song. Take “Amazing Grace” as an example. The song, published in 1779, has had various arrangements including one recently made popular by Chris Tomlin.

An arrangement is more than a re-interpretation of a composition. It’s gives the song emotion and energy, sometimes in a new way. Having once been in a worship band, I did my share of studying good and bad arrangements.

A bad arrangement is like a straight road. The listener is riding in a car, going straight down the road for four minutes with nothing to see but asphalt. They get tired. They want beautiful scenery, curves in the road, even some hills.

A good arrangement is one that provides changes throughout a song that affect the movement of the song. Drums only come in during the chorus. A trumpet plays during the bridge. Backing vocal volumes change. A song starts with two lead singers but one drops to a supportive role during the chorus. An electric guitar is out front in the verse but subdued in the chorus.

Arrangements that build to a crescendo are easily recognized as arrangements with building energy and movement. Likewise, an arrangement that slowly strips the song of its instruments can do the same. There are no rules to arranging. A good arrangement is one that carries the listener through the song, not one that drags them through it.

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Barna conducted a multi-phase research program.

Many churches today are explicitly constructed not to look and feel too much like a religious place. A stark contrast to the ancient cathedrals and churches of old—the very design of which was intended to help people experience the divine.

How does this design shift impact worshipers? What about outsiders? What do church buildings say about the faith of those inside? And, when it comes to the next generation of believers—who, leaders worry, will darken the church doors less and less often—does the building itself have anything to do with their resistance or attraction to the church?

To understand the principles of design that best resonate with Millennials, Barna Group partnered with Cornerstone Knowledge Network to conduct a multi-phase research program. First, Barna recruited Millennials from a variety of religious backgrounds to tour urban cathedrals, suburban megachurches, city parks and coffee shops. Along the way Barna’s researchers asked what they did and didn’t like about each space, what they would use different spaces for and how they might change each place if given the opportunity.

After observing these Millennials, Barna better understood the scope of issues confronting churches as they work to optimize their buildings for the next generation. The Barna team then developed an online survey for a nationally representative sample of 18- to 29-year-olds. This survey combined word-driven questions with “visual” polling—asking participants to respond to sets of images—for a unique, in-depth look at what types of spaces Millennials resonate with at home, at church and at work. Additionally, the survey sought to uncover Millennials’ perceptions of Christianity beyond the four walls of the church.

Finding a Place
In this summary, readers can see some of the visual polling from the survey as well as some of the results of the word-comparison poll. These questions focus on the design and aesthetic of church buildings and worship environments. To explore the full scope of the survey—including demographic segmentation, questions on work, home and community, field-test results and insights into how Millennials feel when they visit a church—read the Making Space for Millennials monograph.

The first series showed four images of different kinds of worship spaces and asked which respondents found most appealing. Just under half of participants (44%) selected Sanctuary 2, with the remaining respondents split almost evenly among the other three images. Those who profess a faith other than Christianity (32%) were more likely than average (20%) to prefer Sanctuary 3; this image is devoid of Christian symbols.

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Tony Guerrero served as Music Director and Director of Creative Arts at Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, CA.

I spent some time considering what the main tips are that I not only recommend to people in classes I teach and articles I write, but that I also use in my own weekly ministry. I have a hard time calling these my Top 10, since at various times, other tips not mentioned here could be extremely important, but these were the ones that I tend to rely on frequently.

These aren’t in any order…

1. Don’t Be Late
There is simply, in my opinion, no excuse for being chronically late. Lateness happens occasionally to all of us, but chronic lateness is a sign that something is out of order in someone’s life-either pride, organization, priorities, over-commitment…something. Whatever the reason, it does not honor God to hold everyone else up on a regular basis. If you struggle with this, make it a top priority to deal with it.

2. Lead Individually 
There are no catchall rules for dealing with people. The way you deal with one singer on your team may not work for another singer. Get to know your team members individually-what makes them tick, what they love, the dynamics their families and jobs bring to the equation. Give extra time and grace to those who need it. Your expectations and methods should be flexible enough to allow many types of personalities to coexist in your ministry.

3. It’s Better to Stop a Song 
Guitar horribly out of tune? Stop. Did the drummer start playing in 3/4 instead of 4/4? Stop. Are the singers singing a different song than the band is playing? Stop. Too often, our performance mentality dictates that we’re supposed to pretend that nothing is going wrong so the audience won’t notice. They notice. Just stop and fix it. I don’t have perfect pitch, so one time when my keyboard accidentally got transposed, I didn’t realize right away. Until the singer started to sing and couldn’t reach the notes. I should have stopped and fixed it, but my inexperience told me to keep going and pretend nothing was wrong. I think that singer has just now almost recovered from his head explosion.

4. Give Creative Authority Away 
Are you the only person on your team making creative decisions? Shame on you. Start giving your team members creative input and authority. They have a responsibility to work within the parameters you set, but ultimately, they will shine when given ownership over some of the creative expression. My pastor, Rick Warren, wrote, “When you give authority with responsibility, you’ll be amazed at the creativity of your people.”

5. Don’t Let the Trends Dictate Direction 
Just because the latest and greatest worship song is a rocker doesn’t mean your congregation can no longer worship God with a favorite hymn. It is our human economy that lets us believe God cares at all about trends-He doesn’t. He’s already heard the latest fad long before it came out. And besides, fads are based on generalities that are often easily disproved. For example, modern worship, which is arguably most heavily influenced by U2’s music, tends to be marketed towards the 18-30 crowd. But U2 came out in the early 80s, which means their music is just as relevant to people in their 40s and 50s. Age, styles, tempos, volumes, instruments-it’s all up for grabs. Don’t get pigeonholed by trends. Authenticity beats hipness any day.

6. Identify Your Left-Brained and Right Team Members
Creative people tend to be bad administrators, and administrators aren’t always the best songwriters. Your methods of working (both how you work and what you expect from your team members) need to be based on these strengths and weaknesses. If you’re creative, get administrative help rather than let your team suffer under your bad organizational skills. 

7. To Feed or Be Fed 
If you are in ministry, always remember that you have a responsibility to serve others. Sunday mornings are often chaotic and full of tasks, details, conflicts, etc. We can come home drained and feeling like we never “got anything out of church.” But the times when you’re serving aren’t always the best times for you to also be served. I tend to operate under the idea that on Sunday mornings, I am there to serve others, not to be served. It is up to me to be sure that I am getting fed spiritually during the week. Too often, we confuse “service” with “serve us.”

8. Team Devotions Should Be Focused
Devotionals times, while valuable for team building, can be misused. Team devotionals should either be related to the task at hand (worship, music, fellowship) or be related to the current teaching series of the pastor. They should not be used as your personal opportunity to preach or show off your biblical wisdom. Remember, many church members hear a message on Sunday mornings, a different message or two on the radio during the week, a Bible study in their small groups, a different study in their personal time, and then your weekly devotional. How are they expected to retain all these different messages? They can’t. Make this time count.

9. Don’t Get Sidetracked 
(A) Rehearsal time is for rehearsing. When people give up their weeknight to come rehearse, it is important that you don’t monopolize their time with stories about your kids. And you should always strive to be the most prepared person in the room. There is a big difference between rehearsing and practicing. Practice at home, then rehearse what you practiced with the team. (B) Fellowship time is aboutfellowship. Using social time to discuss “work” can be annoying. Use that time to just get to know about your people. Have fun-it’s not a meeting. (C) Worship times are for worship. Once the service starts, allow that things will go wrong. At this point, you either believe it is in God’s hands or not. You stay focused on God. If you focus on the problems, so, too, will your congregation.

10. Stay Connected to God
This sounds easier than it often is for people in ministry. I constantly struggle with getting so busy doing “God’s work” that I forget to check in with God in my own life. Daily time with God is the most valuable thing we can do, and how often do we simply see it crowded out of our schedule? If you get one thing from this list, I hope it’s this one. For me, too.

Glenn Packiam attempts to dispel stereotypes:

What are the repeated critiques you hear about modern worship?

It is so noisy.

And why is every bridge a monosyllabic chant? (eg. ‘whoa…oh oh…)

It looks too much like a concert.

The songs are so repetitive.

It’s too much about ‘me’.

I am sure there are more, but let’s just take these five. I will focus on the first three in this post, and on the last two in the next installment.

First, the critique of noise and the use of non-sensical, monosyllabic words.
I have combined the first two because both find very interesting parallels in ancient Israelite worship. Fuller Seminary’s Old Testament professor John Goldingay writes:

‘The onomatopoeic verb most commonly translated “praise”, halal…which lies behind that noun tehilla, suggests that praising means saying lalalala. The derived expression “hallelujah” is thus an [eruption] combining this verb with the short form of the name of Yhwh…’

Wait…so ancient Israelite praise was often an eruption of repetitive monosyllabic sounds? It gets better. Goldingay continues:

‘Alongside the formlessness of shouting and ululating that expresses the untamed and undomesticated fervor of praise is the form and order or music that also enhances praise as it channels and thus enhances that fervor…’

And what sort of musical accompaniment ‘enhances that fervor’? Why, a rhythmic noisiness, of course.

‘The key musical aspect to Israel’s praise is rhythm. We have little evidence of melody or harmony in Israelite music; the musical aspect to worship would likely not strike a Western person as very musical at all…

The function and nature of sound would thus resemble those of the crowd at a football game or the work of a rapper more than those of regular Christian worship.’

The parallels with ancient Israelite worship are not insignificant or incidental. I grew up in non-denominational, Pentecostal/Charismatic churches, and almost every teaching on worship I heard was rooted in the Old Testament: patterns of the Tabernacle of David and the Temple of Solomon, the stories about the Ark of the Covenant, the Hebrew words for praise, the Psalms, and on and on. This is not to say that there was no reflection given to what makes worship Christian. We understood how the three symbols/figures central to Israelite worship– temple, priest, and sacrifice– are fulfilled in Christ. And what’s more, we understood (if only dimly) that what is true of Christ is true of us: because He is the temple, the priest, and the sacrifice, we have become the temple, priests, and living sacrifices. The influence of Old Testament worship texts was not set in isolation from or in opposition to the New Testament or a Christological understanding of worship.

But it was set in opposition to personal preferences or cultural norms of ‘expressiveness’ (or lack thereof) and loudness. For instance, in many non-denominational worship settings– especially those of a Pentecostal or Charismatic persuasion– the congregation is exhorted to not stay silent but to ‘make a joyful noise’ or to ‘lift up a shout of praise’. Psalm 150 is read to encourage the use of any and all instruments–and by extension, the full range of musical creativity– to ‘let everything that has breath praise the Lord!’

While Goldingay notes that in some Calvinist traditions, music that overpowers the voice is problematic (as it was for Barth), for those steeped in ancient Israelite worship, the louder the better!

Goldingay states it strongly:

‘Its systematic insistence on noisesome worship issues the Psalter’s closing exhortation to intellectual and socially activist readers of the Psalms, reminding us that sharp thinking, heartfelt sincerity, moral integrity, joyful feelings, loving commitment, willing obedience and social involvement are not the only important things in the world…’

Where does this leave us? Perhaps it should chasten us from being too hasty in condemning a certain worship style or musical approach as being ‘unbiblical’…when what we really mean is that it doesn’t fit our culturally-conditioned mode of expression. (Would it be painting with too broad a brush to suggest that Western European approaches to music in worship favor a quieter, ‘accompaniment’ approach, while Eastern– and perhaps African– approaches to music accentuate rhythm and volume?)

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Adam Dolhanyk muses about the demise of a worship record label.

Recently, you might’ve have seen, or heard or read about the troubles at Mars Hill Church and with their Pastor, Mark Driscoll.

The question was put to me in regards to all of this: what do we do with the songs? What about the Mars Hill Music bands like Citizens and Saints or Kings K who’ve become popular with many worship leaders in recent years?

While I hope to address these questions, I think it kind of misses the point. Do you know where the songs you sing come from? Do you know what the implications of singing a song is? Or what the implications of promoting a worship leader are? Is Mars Hill Church the only church I need to be concerned about?

THERE’S A LOT OF TROUBLE OUT THERE

Pastor Mark is far from the only well known pastor with troubles brewing. In fact, this very morning I read about accusations that are 100 times more serious being made against Pastor Brian Huston, the founder the Hillsong Churches. There has been a certain amount of scandal around Elevation Church pastor Steven Furtick, and the more I read and hear about the theology and practice of Bethel church (from where Jesus Culture comes) I’m concerned.

So, while I am in no way comparing the charges against Brian Huston with my doctrinal disagreements with the folks at Bethel, my point is that Mars Hill is far from the only church with storm clouds overhead. Yet, I haven’t heard anyone asking “what do we do with Mighty to Save or One Thing Remains?”

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Katie Strandlund talks about how you can live through getting burned and not lose your faith.

Getting burnt out while working in a church is bad enough, but getting burned is a horrible experience.

Transition is natural in our work, but when it happens in churches the result is often relational explosions that hurt people in their wake. These situations can get downright ugly. So how do you live through getting burned and not lose your faith?

Four years ago, I was asking myself that very question. Fresh out of college, I had agreed to move a few hours away from home to help my longtime pastor start a new church.

Two years into the experience, I was burned out and knew my time in that particular ministry had come to an end. It was my choice to leave, but the transition process was out of my control. It left me feeling used, pushed out, unappreciated and hurt.

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Kenny Lamm says we are breeding a culture of spectators in our churches.

Worship leaders around the world are sadly changing their church’s worship (often unintentionally) into a spectator event, and people are not singing any more.

Before discussing our present situation, let’s look back into history. Prior to the Reformation, worship was largely done for the people. The music was performed by professional musicians and sung in an unfamiliar language (Latin). The Reformation gave worship back to the people, including congregational singing which employed simple, attainable tunes with solid, scriptural lyrics in the language of the people. Worship once again became participatory.

The evolution of the printed hymnal brought with it an explosion of congregational singing and the church’s love for singing increased.

With the advent of new video technologies, churches began to project the lyrics of their songs on a screen, and the number of songs at a churches disposal increased exponentially.

At first, this advance in technology led to more robust congregational singing, but soon, a shift in worship leadership began to move the congregation back to pre-Reformation pew potatoes (spectators).

What has occurred could be summed up as the re-professionalization of church music and the loss of a key goal of worship leading – enabling the people to sing their praises to God. Simply put, we are breeding a culture of spectators in our churches, changing what should be a participative worship environment to a concert event. Worship is moving to its pre-Reformation mess.

1. They don’t know the songs. With the release of new songs weekly and the increased birthing of locally-written songs, worship leaders are providing a steady diet of the latest, greatest worship songs. Indeed, we should be singing new songs, but too high a rate of new song inclusion in worship can kill our participation rate and turn the congregation into spectators. I see this all the time. I advocate doing no more than one new song in a worship service, and then repeating the song on and off for several weeks until it becomes known by the congregation. People worship best with songs they know, so we need to teach and reinforce the new expressions of worship. (more)
2. We are singing songs not suitable for congregational singing. There are lots of great, new worship songs today, but in the vast pool of new songs, many are not suitable for congregational singing by virtue of their rhythms (too difficult for the average singer) or too wide of a range (consider the average singer—not the vocal superstar on stage).

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