Church Band - A New Blend

Have you ever took a look at your worship team members and said to yourself, "Only God could assemble such an interesting and diverse group of musicians!"

A few weeks ago, I was setting up my guitar rig on a Sunday morning. As I was positioning my amp to hit me right in the left ear, I realized that it was also going to blast several female singers. Now usually in a band, I wouldn't care who got blasted, but I felt bad. So bad that I felt the need to apologize, in advance, for the ear ringing that I was about to give them.

Church band dynamics are always interesting. It's blue jeans and Sunday dresses. Pink Flying V guitars and a tambourine. Double kick drum kits and a grandma pianist. It's U2 meets choral ensemble!

Tell us about your unique worship team dynamics.

Comments

[Dan]

A former worship team I led:
- a drummer who played in the style of 1970s rock (think Lynard Skynard)
- electric guitarist who favored 1980s arena rock/hair bands (think Def Leppard)
- acoustic guitarist who had mastered the style of John Michael Talbot (and John Denver)
- Lead female singer who favored Sandi Patti
- bassist who came of age playing jazz fusion
- little old lady organist
- and I played piano a la Bruce Hornsby

And somehow, it was one of the best teams of which I've ever been a part.

[marina]

Sorry, I just hit return instead of tab on the previous "blank" comment.

The worship team I have now has an all-hired pro rhythm section and all volunteer singers. We've got a couple of really strong singers and the rest are choir singers holding mics turned down a little bit. Our church is relatively small, 150 average attendance. There's not a huge talent pool avail just sitting in the seats dying to join the team. I work 20 hrs per week, mostly from home. The hired band is a luxury and a necessity at this point. I can focus our midweek rehearsal strictly on vocals. It's taken over 2 years to finally get a good mix of voices going on. They are finally listening and developing technique and actually understanding the concept of not singing every note on every song and of not singing 3 part harmony on every single song. We're just starting our first book study together as a team - Crazy Love by Francis Chan. We've had 2 team "retreats" so far this year (1 day, 100% participation). 2 weeks ago, we actually had a transcendent, aha moment during our worship time. It was amazing. I wanted to turn to the team and jump up and down and yell, "did you feel that?" "did you hear the difference?" "did you sense God's pleasure and presence?"

[Matt]

We're in the middle of a transition here. I started here about 5 months ago and we are moving from a more 'vocal group' driven feel to a full band.

It's taking time...but yes...U2 meets choral ensemble.

[Ed]

I was the real instigator of pretty radical change at our church. The worship team was a piano player (70ish), a keyboard (organ) player (60+), a drummer (now 50+ and the drummer in my band-we go back to the eighties-long story), and the worship leader (50+). The basis of their music was a southernish gospel kinda pentacostal jump and shout kind of with very little of the jumping going on. The bulk of the church came from UPC pentacostalism.

I came on board as a bass player who is also a writer (haven't tried any of my songs yet) and who can do a little acoustic guitar. Thanks to the cut capo I have a repetoire of over 200 songs that I can play (Tomlin, Baloche, etc.). I started at one time a month leading worship playing the modern stuff. DEER IN THE HEADLIGHTS and a genuine disdain for MY music. There was a point where I almost chucked it all. The one night whil leading I blew a string during the third song. My song quickly went to my case and fetched a replacement, I strung it and tuned it up. In the meantime, the pastor came up and gave his two cents worth and stated that he really loved the song and kept singing it while the other played it. I quickly joined in and the mountain was ascended. Ever since that night the nights I lead have gotten free-er and better. It has nothing to do with me, it's a God thing. The other leader began to take chances too. She started picking songs that were pretty upbeat (rocky) which put a stamp of approval on what I had been trying to do for months in some folks minds, I guess. We often rock the house now. We still have our old school pentacostal moments melded with a sourthern gospel fling, but for the most part, our musical worship is very strong and rocky.