Music is an interesting thing, no?
Music played with the right kind of power and authority behind it has the ability to bring a room ALIVE.
On the other hand, music that is lacking even one element can be close to powerless…
Yesterday, a significant constituency of our worship band was absent for one reason or another.
To be honest, it felt REALLY empty…
Don’t get me wrong—the music was good, the choir sang wonderfully, and Christ was honored!
In terms of worship, you can’t ask for much more than that.
But it’s no less true—when people are missing, the music suffers. Bottom line.
By the way, there’s a miniature lesson here. NEVER believe the self-talk that you don’t bring anything to the table, they could just do it without you, the worship band doesn’t “really” need you, etc…..
You would probably be surprised at the level of difference your being there makes.
Okay but what if the shoe is on the other foot. People are out, there are no “second fiddles” around…what do you do?
Well the answer depends so very much on your context.
However, there is a basic principle to follow: Do what is necessary to create the maximum amount of rhythm possible.
Here’s just one example…
In our context, I can play any instrument in the rhythm section needed—bass, drums, and rhythm guitar.
Last night, Matt and myself were the only musicians.
Now—disclaimer—we did not do this last night, but in hindsight, my suggestion would have been for Matt to split the keyboard into keys (right hand) and bass guitar (left hand) and I would have jumped on the cajon.
Would things have been missing? Sure!
- When your keyboardist can’t use the full keyboard AS a keyboard, the music suffers a bit.
- When you’re using any sort of synthesized bass, you lose the human element and expressiveness an experienced bass player can bring to the table.
However—in our case, we would have GAINED the glue—the cajon. The one instrument with the power to keep the time and direct the course of all the others.
So, I believe there would have been a net gain had we approached it that way.
Well, there you have it. We make mistakes. We do things sub-optimally sometimes.
We never claimed to be perfect—only that we’d try to be helpful! 🙂
In much the same way, we have taken the same approach to our Worship By Numbers™ membership.
We don’t claim to be perfect. We don’t even claim to be experts!
But we do have something useful: YEARS in trenches of both professional music (performance AND studio) as well as worship music.
We have taken that experience and tried to condense it into a program that will EXPONENTIALLY level up your musicianship.
Willing to give to give it a shot? If so, we’re going to pay for your first 14 days. We’ll keep the lights on long enough for you to try it out…
If you think it would be helpful to continue, there’s a small monthly fee afterward. (Costs WAY less than going to music lessons…)
Why not give it a try? Here’s the link:
Steve Schramm