Questions re: New Music October 30, 2007
Posted by Phillip in Church, Music, Worship.trackback
I have a few questions for you all regarding new music in worship.
How often do you add new songs to the rotation?
How much advance time do you give the band before doing new material?
How many rehearsals do you spend on a new song before using it in a service?
Discuss.
we try to do a new song every week or two. we will then repeat the new song every week for 2-3 weeks (maybe do week 1, 2 and 4)
we hand out cds every quater for the team to listen to and then usually practice one and a half weeks before do it on a sunday.
hope that helps!
Great questions. I’m struggled with the “How often” question alot!!!
As much as I love rules and strategies, I’ve found it all depends on the songs. I introduce “new” arrangements of hymns and don’t particularly count those as “new songs.” A song like Charlie Hall’s “All We Need” that the congregation catches on to real quickly doesn’t need as much of a buffer between another one compared to one like “Hosanna” or “Lead Me To The Cross” from United.
Advance time again depends on the song. What I’ve done now that the team is LOVING is planning 90% of the music a month at a time. Hopefully, that includes the new song we’ll do, if not, they now have the bulk of it besides that one tune. My golden rule is 2 weeks though.
Again, golden rule is 2 weeks.
Short answer — it depends ;^)
New songs enter in to the lineup about once or twice per month. We post the chart and mp3 on a team “new songs” webpage for reference and ask folks to get familiar with the new material a couple of weeks in advance, if possible.
As for practice, we’ll do multiple run throughs the week we are planning to launch the new song…often depends on the complexity of the arrangement.
On a related note, it’s also interesting to monitor the longevity of a new song after it’s introduced. Some of course “stick” and God uses that song to connect with people, others sometimes fall a bit more flat and don’t get much replay in future lineups. Songs like Tomlin’s Live in Austin “Forever” become standards, while others get played once (often with lots of work!) and then don’t get played again.
Thanks for the input, everyone. It sounds like there’s no consensus on how often to do new stuff and how much time to put into rehearsal. However, I think we can all agree that at least a couple of rehearsals and time to let the songs gel would be advantageous.
jofro – I think those songs that get played once are called “special music” in traditional churches.
I have a tendency to get stuck in a rut playing the same songs over and over again, so I’ve been working really hard these last few months with our student ministry band to learn new stuff. We try to learn a new song at every practice or every other practice. Then we practice it until we get it nailed, which can range from 1 week to 2 months.
Case in point, we were able to play “Everything Glorious” after 2 practices. We’ve been working on “Song of Hope” for 2 months!
my experience is very similar to jofro. one or two new songs per month. we do only one rehearsal on new songs. we just spend as much time as we need on that rehearsal night. between thursday night rehearsal and sunday morning soundcheck, we will have played through a new song at least 5 or 6 times before the service.
a few more considerations….
we have a different band (rotations) going each week, so a song will be new each week for some of our players for up to a month!
one important thing i’ve found is how to run the balance between burning a new song out too quickly while still making sure that it’s used frequently enough early on for it to catch with the crowd.
currently, i teach a new song one week, then repeat it for two more consecutive weeks. then it gets at least one week off, maybe two. then i evaluate it closely the week that i bring it back after a break to start to see if it’s one that will stick around or if it’s already run it’s course.
good stuff all……
One maybe two new songs per Sunday, depending on who is leading worship. Ryan’s style is very Vineyard, Tim, who leads from keys is kinda CCM and HeatherBrown who leads from guitar is Passion/Six Steps kind of leader. Tim and Ryan often pull the same songs, Heather’s songs are sometimes ones she has written for the church. If we introduce a brand new song, then more than likely we will see it for two more weeks, maybe just the chorus or instrumental.
We practice on Tuesdays for 90 minutes and Sunday for about an hour. Usually we can handle a new song introduced on a Tuesday. We don’t do the burn the mp3 for everybody but we will take a few minutes and listen to the song a couple times.