Musical Musings IV

Now we have reached part IV, and it is time for us to consider the 'inputs' to Sung Worship Done Well. In the earlier posts, we considered what it is, how we might judge if it is happening, and what sorts of compositions might be appropriate to help it happen. But sung worship needs more than a good song book, and the band needs more than a comprehensive back catalogue under their collective belts. How should they play the stuff, and what should we seek from each musician who steps forward to play ?

1. The bedrock input is obvious; accuracy - each individual participant must play or sing the music correctly, accurately, consistently.  We will explore this idea in another post, but for the moment, accuracy means no more and no less than at pitch, in time, in order, consistently and repeatedly.  Anything less is either cacophony, or Modern Jazz, and only one of those is fit to employ in worship.

2. The second input is more subjective, but it is linked to hard truths.  Each musician or singer must individually play expressively, giving due consideration to the truth(s) being conveyed and the mood of the piece as it carries those truths. Different truths, concepts, events and principles seem to require different handling as they are expressed, it applies to speech, and it applies when they are played and sung.  Western Music has its own well developed conventions for expressing lyrical content, and unsurprisingly, these apply to Sung Worship too.  But ignore them, and the content is contradicted (or undermined) by the musical expression.  Volume, intonation, harmonies, and rhythm, as well as the genre and speed all contribute to the mood, they 'speak', and what they 'say' must match the truth expressed.  A song of triumph delivered like a funeral march destroys the very statement the piece is making, just as a song about the resurrection played in the style of 'here we go round the mulberry bush' trivialises the truth it celebrates. 

3. Thirdly, when taken as a whole, each piece must be delivered appropriately.  This similar to 'expressively', but here we have in view the movement of the piece from start to finish, carried by the arrangement of instrument(s) and voice(s) as it is played.   Many Christian songs and hymns have a progression in the lyrics, a story is told, biblical events are re-played, a grand passage is given poetic form, and so on.  Hence the delivery of the piece should give due weight to the progress and emphases of the lyrics.  Of course, progression is not the same as crescendo, although some think is it, and neither is repetition synonymous with emphasis, although some think it is as well.  Western Music has many ways of saying the same thing, and no one size fits all.  But perhaps more common in Sung Worship is under-emphasis, where no real consideration is given to the content, and every verse is delivered identically to every other verse regardless of what they say. 

A good question to ask of the lyrics is, 'where is the emotional heart of this song ?'  Answer that question, and we are half-way to the arrangement.  Ask a second question, 'how will we arrive there ?', and the arrangement options should start to appear.

4.  Last, but not least, the stuff has to be played together, each individual playing with each other as a group.   This is challenging territory for some. In the English speaking world and in non-liturgical churches, its probably fair to say that sung worship is usually led by a band or group working as a band or group. Unless the musicians are down to one (or two), Sung Worship is led that way, and is not the performance of fully scored piece with a congregation singing along. Hence, each player's contribution to the whole is not pre-ordained, but is elastic, fluid, and variable, depending on what the others play, and how the music leader and group agree to arrange the piece.  To play together each player has to 'hear' the rhythm(s), the shape of the piece, and the interplay of the others around him, and play his component into and with that mix. In effect, when a song is 'in flight', each player has to be 10% conductor, 80% musician, 10% sound engineer, 100% alert.

Accurate, expressive, appropriate, together. Those are the inputs needed for Christian musicians to have any hope of assisting their brothers and sisters in Sung Worship Done Well.  But who can play like that ?  The short answer, is quite a few folks, probably more than we expect, but less than we'd like.  And they are the subject of our next post, Musical Musings part V.