danmeasor
From Shoreham-By-Sea Baptist Church
We have had a few conversations about how to bring a new song to our worship team meetings/practices and then into a Sunday service.
The Issue we have is when someone brings a new song along, we have a CD to listen to, a chord sheet and the dots, various people know the song from either a CD or a conference so have learned it slightly differently IE sing some bits higher some bits lower keeping a note on for longer etc, and the CD, dots and chords never seems to match up.
Which way do people learn the songs they bring?
we came to a sort of decision of learn it note for note from the Dots (piano music) and teach it to the church using that. Then once we are all familiar with it we can 'go of on one' ie sing what comes naturally in a worship time even if its strictly not exact as the dot's.
Otherwise we have lots of people trying to introduce the same song but slightly differently and some people put it as 'it clashes' and the congregation don't then know what to sing.
Yeah, it's important to teach a new song to the church in a way that all worship leaders can subscribe to. Having one worship leader say that "I don't quite sing it like that" isn't helpful for other musicians, but more importantly it's a distraction for the congregation. We use the 3-0-1 system of introducing new songs, whereby the song is done for three consecutive weeks (whoever the worship leader is), then rested for a week and then used again in week five. All worship leaders on roster subscribe to that.
In team meetings and practices, teach the song to the team in one way - that doesn't necessarily have to mean a draconian fixed arrangement for chords and structure, but certainly the melody and intervals must be the same. If you have a CD with 'your' arrangement on it, send it to the team. If not, record your practice session!
In short, your worship pastor/team leader (the one person inwith overall responsibility for the team) needs to lead and make a decision!
What is that 3-0-1 system? Why do you do it? I've never been told to play a song before. What if one of the worship leaders doesn't like the song? or feel comfortable leading it? There are some songs that are used at St Mary's I don't touch because they suit a genre that one of the other worship leaders do better etc. Also there are songs that only I use that none of the others do. What is that system for? teaching the song? Or discerning whether it is right for the church? I think you can tell quite early on if a song is working - and it doesn't necessarily take 5 weeks to teach a song. What do you do after those 5 weeks? Is it a free for all?
Sorry for the mass of questions - I'm fascinated by it.
What is that 3-0-1 system? Why do you do it? I've never been told to play a song before. What if one of the worship leaders doesn't like the song? or feel comfortable leading it? There are some songs that are used at St Mary's I don't touch because they suit a genre that one of the other worship leaders do better etc. Also there are songs that only I use that none of the others do. What is that system for? teaching the song? Or discerning whether it is right for the church? I think you can tell quite early on if a song is working - and it doesn't necessarily take 5 weeks to teach a song. What do you do after those 5 weeks? Is it a free for all?
Sorry for the mass of questions - I'm fascinated by it.
Happy to explain the 3-0-1 system again:
Week 1 - New song introduced and taught
Week 2 - New song used again
Week 3 - New song used again (that's the '3' bit)
Week 4 - The song is rested (that's the '0' part)
Week 5 - Song is used again (that's the '1' part)
This method is really useful in ensuring that new songs are taught consistently and for a decent period of time so that they are learnt quickly by the congregation and become easily assimilated into the church's repertoire. It prevents one worship leader teaching a new song, none of the others using it and the original WL coming back to it four weeks later, when they have to teach it again.
We have a 'hot' list of 12 to 15 songs which I mark up on our online leadsheets folder of around 200 songs. These are the songs that as worship leaders we feel are really hitting the mark as being anointed, allowing people to worship easily, and really speaking to the church in the current season. Not all new songs taught would go straight onto this list of songs, but most probably would, since we review the list regularly and are very careful no to teach new songs too often. We probably only introduce around 10 new songs a year.
To your questions and comments:
> "What is that 3-0-1 system? Why do you do it?"
I hope I've covered that!
> "I've never been told to play a song before. What if one of the worship leaders doesn't like the song? or feel comfortable leading it?"
Sounds like it might be good to prayerfully consider how you might respond if you were asked to do a song, Matt! Most of the time - but no means always - we have discussed together as worship leaders the introduction of new songs. Of course, not all new songs will liked by all worship leaders. Firstly I'd challenge you to ask yourself whether you've ever led worship with a song you don't like, and why that might be if you haven't. I guess we're really looking at songs which seem to be anointed in congregational worship, rather than 'favourites'. Secondly, it's all done (I hope) a lot more graciously than "YOU MUST USE THIS SONG!" but equally, there surely also ought to be a sense in which the prayerful leadership of the team is allowed to offer some direction?
> "There are some songs that are used at St Mary's I don't touch because they suit a genre that one of the other worship leaders do better etc."
I must admit (and you are free to disagree) that I think this can be a bit of a red herring. Again, I've led worship with plenty of songs that I wouldn't necessarily choose on the basis of musical style or melody. I desperately don't want to sound pious, but whilst we do all have our own style of leading, I believe there's a strong place for a 'team' approach to the worship leading in the congregation, rather than three or four leaders with their own styles and own collection of songs.
> "Also there are songs that only I use that none of the others do."
That's fine!
> "What is that system for? teaching the song? Or discerning whether it is right for the church?"
It's for teaching the song and then using it consistently over a number of weeks. We'll already have made a decision that we feel the song would be right for use in the church.
> "I think you can tell quite early on if a song is working - and it doesn't necessarily take 5 weeks to teach a song."
As mentioned, we generally don't 'try out' songs in the church to see if they work, but hope that careful and prayerful selections of new songs mean that the ones we do introduce will generally go well. As for teaching a song in five weeks, I'd agree that the church have probably 'got it' after three, but we then want to use it again (3-0-1) to start using it as a worship song and people are not struggling to recall how it goes. Inevitably, different people are around on different weeks and so yes, even afer five weeks, it still might be new to some people.
> "What do you do after those 5 weeks? Is it a free for all?"
After five weeks, assuming we still believe the song has a lot to offer, yes, worship leaders are free to choose it or not. Although we generally pick songs from a folder of about 200 songs, our worship leaders are completely free to pick songs as they like. I just ask that we all stick to the 3-0-1 system when it's used, and that they prayerfully consider using a couple of songs from the 'hot' list explained above each week. But it's by no means a hard and fast rule.
Sorry for the long post, but you did ask!
I did ask - brilliant. Thanks. Okay cool. I understand.
I quite like that we have a diverse musical style at St Mary's the standard is the soft rock, but we have a worship leader who is has a very souly voice that directs the musical style and he will do things that I can't. Also another who prefers things a little more stripped back and not necessarily "country" but he definitely doesn't fall into the soft rock, and the female worship leaders do a different thing again - you can be team without it being the same. We're all on the same page for what we believe about worship and God and leading our church etc.
Thanks Matt.
No problem, Matt. One thought, though:
"I quite like that we have a diverse musical style at St Mary's the standard is the soft rock, but we have a worship leader who is has a very souly voice that directs the musical style and he will do things that I can't. Also another who prefers things a little more stripped back and not necessarily "country" but he definitely doesn't fall into the soft rock, and the female worship leaders do a different thing again - you can be team without it being the same. We're all on the same page for what we believe about worship and God and leading our church etc."
But does all that diversity necessarily mean you have to do entirely different songs? Musical style/genre doesn't have to equate with different songs - at least, I don't think it should. Surely there are a handful of songs that always go well and lift the congregation that you all use?
No of course not. There are many songs that both of us do - he did an amazing version of Keep the Faith the other week which was beautiful, but there are some songs which either one of us perahps wouldn't do. Or maybe he would - I simply don't have the confidence to do some of the songs he does.
But that's fine, and I don't think it precludes anything I said. I'd just encourage you to find and recognise those dozen or so songs the are *the* songs in your church right now, and make use of them regularly - for all your worship leaders. We've definitely seen an improvement in engagement in our corporate worship as we've taken a more 'team' approach to song selection. Keeping records of which songs you use is a good idea too. Worth a try?
I've just started to keep a record of songs for just this reason.
We are having a team meeting next week where we are going to leard about 3 new songs AS A TEAM so we all sing them the same way. I will be encouraging our team to spend time with these new songs in their private worship then between us will schedule when to introduce each new song to the congregation. Having discussed Matt F's 3 0 1 method with some of my leaders on team we are going to go with that method. It makes a lot of sense. As a music teacher I know how frustrating it can be having to reteach a song so this method should reduce that problem.
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interesting question dan,
for us at our place, we have 4 different bands and w leaders and just tend to play the new songs differently depending on which band is on! the congregation tend to just follow whoever is leading and sing it the way they are singing it, kind of like, 'we'll sing it band A's today and band B's way next week) also it might be slightly different but its never majorly different to be a bit distraction. sorry this isnt helpful, but thats how it works for us!
cheers,
gav.