“From beyond the cage” by JDT

Hey all – these are some thoughts I shared at musicians practice a week or so ago…

It is amazing to see how much the worship team has grown in the past year! These thoughts from beyond the cage stem from my time spent in worship with the congregation over the course of several months this past spring. I was glad for the opportunity to share with the musicians, and hope that you will continue to find some of what I have to say helpful to you.

We are on this journey of learning to worship God together, to play skillfully, and to serve our community of faith with consistent joyful sacrifice on a weekly basis. I really do want to highlight that I feel we have this “priestly” calling which has a dual responsibility. First we are consecrated members of our congregation whose responsibility is to give God the worship he commands. Secondly, a qualifier of those selected for this service (biblically speaking and according to our worship team tryout model! J) was that they were skillful musicians.

1 Chronicles 25:1,7 1 Moreover David and the captains of the army separated for the service some of the sons of Asaph, of Heman, and of Jeduthun, who should prophesy with harps, stringed instruments, and cymbals. And the number of the skilled men performing their service was … 7 So the number of them, with their brethren who were instructed in the songs of the LORD, all who were skillful, was two hundred and eighty-eight. (*This is one of many biblical references to the musical talent of those selected for this service, even in 1 Chronicles it says the leader of the musicians was selected because he was the most skillful.)

While the primary emphasis of being on worship team is not about performance, our ability, etc, I would argue that increasing our skill level will enable us to worship more freely and further enable us to serve our community as they worship at church on Sunday. So personally, I am challenging myself to get better at my trade (drums) so that I can continue to grow in my ability to facilitate an irresistible atmosphere that inspires worship (brownie points!). To that end, I thought it might be helpful to review some musical standards that are commonly used by judges in solo/ensemble competitions and then I’ll share some of my reflections on some things to work on as a team.

Some of these standards include the following items which I have summarized in laymen terminology:

Tempo – Defined as the ability to keep steady tempo, rhythm at various speeds and volume levels
Technique/execution – Defined as quality of rudimentary control, accuracy with notes or rhythms
Integration – This applies to bands in particular...measures how well you integrate your instrument into the group, which demonstrates your ability to listen to the other musicians and integrate your sound into the mix
Dynamics – Defined as the ability to play soft, medium, and loud; includes ability to transition gradually from soft to loud and loud to soft
Rhythm/Expression – Defined as the ability to interpret music stylistically and synchronize interpretation with the total rhythm and feel of the song and the band
Musical Quality - Total quality of the product (includes song selection; total quality of the output; did the group pull it off with ease)

Based on these standards, there are a couple of areas I think that we could grow in and it would serve to have some practice as a team going through. The first area that comes to mind is our control of dynamics. We are good at being soft and good at being loud, but the transitions to and from I have observed are at times abrupt. Also, part of this is learning how to "drive" a song when the volume level is soft/medium without necessarily playing as loud as you can...producing the same effect/intensity with a more pleasant sound to the ear that is lost if you are playing as loud as you can. The second area I feel needs the most attention is our total integration - this requires learning how to listen to each other more and learning when to pull back so a solo can be heard, learning when you need to step up to drive a song, and finding the right mix for it all, etc.

I think that our team has taken tremendous strides in song execution, tempo, and musical quality overall in the last year. I also think to go to the next level it would be helpful for each of us to talk about and/or reflect individually on these various areas of musical competence (see list above). Individual reflection on our own skill level will help us corporately be aware of the types of considerations we should be thinking about when we play together to produce a more glorious sound!

Finally, I just want to say that we are a very passionate worship team. It is awesome! I also want to say that passion is not always best communicated by an increased volume level, a faster speed, etc. Sometimes passion is found in silence, or through the type of intensity that is only communicated from the heart through sincerity (sometimes even spoken/played softly).

So my prayer for our team is that we would learn to let God “play” us, that we may be instruments in His hands where He can communicate His heart to His people, and where we can respond and resound with awe-struck worship. In the same way, I also pray that our instruments would be tools in our hands to communicate our sincere worship back to God that stems from our heart attitudes. In order to fulfill this calling, I charge us to prepare our hearts and to prepare our skills (vocal or instrumental) to be postured in such a way that we are ready to offer God our best.

You all rock and roll!