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Ask the Expert – Is there a digital solution for worship bands to the problem of chord charts and sheet music?

By Guest Blogger | May 21, 2013

We had an email from Dave at Cheam Baptist:

“We have been wondering how best to provide sheet music for our musicians and are looking for an alternative to using numerous different songs of fellowship books. One option is to gradually build up a library of individual sheet music for each song then create an individual folder for each musician per service.

However in this increasingly paperless age this seems rather antiquated. So I would be very grateful if you could pass round an e-mail to your musos network asking if people have any tips on the best digital methods of displaying music for a worship band. I am assuming that I-PADs are too small?

Are largish TV screens an option? ie a couple positioned stragetically so everyone can see them. Page turning controlled by singers?”

Rather than tackle this ourselves, we asked Brenda Cameron, developer of Power Music to answer. We’ve used her wonderful technological soluntion ourselves and can highly recommend it:

A digital solution for worship bands to the problem of chord charts and sheet music

A solution implies a problem which needs solved, so what is a massive problem facing worship bands today?

We are in a digital age. Everything has gone digital – when did you last write a letter instead of sending an email to a friend or colleague? Mobile phones can now give you books, email, photos, music – all in your pocket. Your church probably has a song projection system for multi-media display. All these are benefits which save precious time and help to impart information in an interesting way, helping the congregation to focus better as a whole.

Meanwhile, while more and more congregations are benefitting from all things digital – what about the musicians? You plug in and switch on your instrument, have a sound check, but who sorts out the music? Usually one person takes on the job by default – finding the song sheets or hymn books, perhaps making photocopies or digging into the binder which holds all the copies. Perhaps you have the PDF files and print them out as you need them. What was that song filed under again? ‘Here I am to worship’ or ‘Light of the world’? Time is rushing by – has everyone got a copy of all songs in the set list? In the correct key? The worship leader has changed the order at the last minute. He/she wants to combine several songs together so that the flow is better. As worship teams spend time working on eliminating distractions so that they can focus on the job of leading the congregation in true worship, surely it makes sense for them to leave paper behind and go digital, too?

One answer which provides a solution is the software Power Music. Read More »

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Posted in Tech stuff, Worship leading | 7 Comments

40% off our Play By Ear DVDs

By Marie@Musicademy | May 20, 2013

40% off flash sale.
Learn to play by ear, without sheet music or chord charts

We are offering our Play By Ear DVD set at a huge 40% off until the end of May.

The course teaches you how to play by ear as well as gain a deeper understanding of what you can do with chords. Great for transposing, transcribing, improvising, arranging and even finding new chords for song writing.

The comprehensive course is designed for guitar, keyboard, bass and orchestral players and will guide you through the process of working out what chord comes next in any song by ear. It will even teach you how to substitute chords to change the mood or feel of a song. Perfect for working out chord charts from CDs, song writers, band directors or anyone wanting a thorough understanding of chord theory.

Plus each section includes plenty of in-depth demos, play alongs and there are 20 tests to maximise your learning.

Musicademy Director, Andy Chamberlain says:
“This is the most comprehensive video series we’ve ever made. It has the potential to transform the musicality of your entire worship team“.

What’s included? Buy with our Money Back Guarantee

Click through to the Musicademy website for a detailed description of what’s included. And remember, your purchase is covered by our 100% customer satisfaction guarantee. If you don’t like the DVDs you can return them for a full refund.

View the trailer

Buy now

Head on over to Musicademy to buy at the time limited sale price and with free shipping (US & UK – low cost flat rate to elsewhere in the world).

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Posted in Bass, Guitar, Keyboards, Orchestral instruments | Leave a comment

Why we need to freshen up our worship. And why loops can help.

By Guest Blogger | May 17, 2013

Creativity in Worship (Why I use loops)

A few years ago I moved to a new house situated along the flight path into Manchester airport, one of the busiest airports in Northern England. The first few weeks consisted mainly of broken sleep and sudden shock as yet another noisy plane would cut through the air above our little house. However, in a surprisingly short amount of time I adjusted to the familiar sound of the aircrafts and soon I didn’t even hear them.

Our next house was in a town centre adjacent to a shopping centre and a multi story car park which was also the evening residence for a tribe of noisy seagulls. At 6am every morning the metal shutters of the centre were pulled open, the alarms reset and the seagulls would launch into full chorus. Again, within a few months this noise was simply filtered out.

Scientists explain this process of filtering as Habituation. They refer to a specific structure in the brain stem called the pons, which as well as our hearing deals with our sleep, respiration, swallowing, bladder control, equilibrium, taste, eye movement, facial expressions, facial sensation, and posture. This process of habituation is even the main form of treatment for hearing issues such as Tinnitus.

Habituation is defined as the brains ability to filter or ignore familiar, repetitive or even boring noises!

Now as a worship leader I find this all a bit scary! Read More »

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Posted in Tech stuff, Worship leading | Leave a comment

What 8 things should you consider when selecting and then serving worship vocalists?

By Kenny Lamm | May 16, 2013

Part 7 in our Transitioning to contemporary worship series.

As East City Church transitions its worship service to a unified style of worship (see links below to previous articles in this series), they will need to identify people to serve on the vocal team in worship. ECC already has vocalists that sing in their contemporary service, but in the effort to transition the traditional service to a unified style of worship, it would be best to add additional vocalists that the traditional service would recognize as “their own.” This is a continuation of the effort to prevent an “us” and “them” mentality in worship.

8 considerations for sourcing and serving vocalists:

  1. Can they sing? Do they have a pleasant tone and can sing in tune?
  2. Do they have good stage presence? You aren’t looking for a performer but some degree of confidence will really help.
  3. Will they help evoke worship, not stifle it through their body language or singing
  4. Can they sing in a contemporary style? Traditional, classically-trained singers will not help your transition to a more modern approach. Watch out for exessive use of vibrato. A more “clipped” style is more appropriate. Musicademy’s vocal training DVDs are a great help here.
  5. Keep the group small. just a lead and an alto or tenor is fine. I would use no more than three or four singers. Remember that vocalists can be used on a rotational basis and the more experience they get the better they will become.
  6. Provide vocal coaching on more contemporary styles of singing for those that need assistance.
  7. A natural place to start the search would be in the existing choir at ECC, but it is important to search the congregation for potential singers as well.
  8. Consider the potential singer’s walk with the Lord and the example they set; do not underestimate how important this factor is in selecting worship leadership.

What are some additional guidelines you would use in selecting vocalists?

Next time, I will look at the need for ECC to cast vision for the new role of the choir. Read More »

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Posted in Vocals | Leave a comment

Louie Giglio mashup of stars and whales singing God’s praise

By Marie@Musicademy | May 15, 2013

The preamble here is definitely worth a listen in order to provide some context but if you just want to skip to the mashup go to around 9 minutes in.

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Posted in Worship | Leave a comment
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