A short clip here from a live Musicademy keyboards training seminar where Tim Martin reflects on situations where keyboards are most suited to leading giving some tips on playing hymns demonstrably.
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Author Archives: Tim
Using String Sounds on Keyboards
This is some “rough and ready” footage of a live Musicademy seminar with keyboard tutor Tim Martin. Here he dispenses advice on using string sounds on keyboards.
Ask The Expert - What to say when leading worship
Flo Benton from Alaska emailed with an emergency request as she was leading worship for the first time. I thought it would make a good Blog post so our advice is here as well as Flo’s responses. Read More
How to move a church from traditional to contemporary worship styles
We were sent the following “Ask The Expert” question - and its one which comes up often in different shapes or forms so read on if you are interested in ideas for moving a congregation from traditional to contemporary worship music.
Introduction to worship keyboard – part 3 - Understanding how to form and use melodic fills
After forming chords and using rhythm well the next step is to add colour using melodic fills. As the title suggest these fill in where there is a gap rather than going on all the time. Look for opportunities in songs where there is no singing or when there are sustained notes to play a fill. There are three main ways of finding good notes to play for fills. Read More
Introduction to worship keyboard - Part 2
Understanding contemporary rhythms
Once you can use different chords and inversions properly it’s time to tackle the Achilles heel of most keyboard players—rhythm. While guitarists naturally add rhythm to a piece of music it’s much harder work for a keyboardist. It’s often easy to play very ‘straight’ rhythms (like crotchets on each beat of the bar) which can be effective but are not enough in contemporary music. The kind of music we listen too and sing in church is quite syncopated. This means that the notes we play and sing often come in between the beats of the bar. Although most people quite naturally sing this way it can often be hard to play syncopated rhythms.
There is one rhythm which dominates much contemporary worship music. If we are to be effective keyboard players we must get to grips with it and use it well. Read More
Introduction to Worship Keyboard Playing - Part 1
This is the start of a new mini series for people that have played keyboard using the traditional music score but want to move into more contemporary chords-based playing.
In this first part we will look at which chords can be expected to show up in a given key (this information will be useful for guitarists as well), how to construct those chords and how to play them in different positions (known as voicings or inversions). Read More