Sunday Summary – Music: May 24, 2009

Ugghhh…. Holidays are great and all, but they sure do get you off your schedule. Seems like Tuesday and Wednesday are just for playing catch-up for what you couldn’t do on Monday.

Are you with me, people??

OK, well, here’s a look at this past Sunday….

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Every once in a while one of my hair-brained, off the cuff comments actually becomes a reality. Y’know when you say something expecting a laugh, but are delighted when people actually say “Yeah – that’d be fun!” That’s what happened this past week.

As we looked at Andy’s 4-part series “Staying In Love”, we had margin to put in specials 3 of the 4 weeks. So two of them were love songs (“Faithfully” week 1, “L-O-V-E” week 2). Week 3 was consumed by celebrating the graduating High School seniors, and we wanted something special for the final week.

So I threw out the idea of a cheesy lounge/wedding singer doing some schtick and some wonderfully classic/horrible love songs – complete with the powder blue tux.

Well, that idea stuck – as long as the right person was available. And, by God’s mercy and grace, he was!!

Brandon O’Dell is an unbelievable talent – actor, comedian, writer. He writes for The Re:Think Group, acts professionally around town, and is one of our KidStuf hosts.

Imagine a taller, lankier Steve Buscemi who loves Jesus, and you’ve got Brandon…

As the concept progressed, it turned into Brandon – as wedding singer Chet Maxwell – rolling out his “audio cart” to the middle of the stage. A rolling audio rack, complete with mixer, CD player, and the coveted tape deck all the way at the bottom.

“Chet” introduces himself and the series, “They’ve asked me here today…” Then proceeds to do the verse and chorus of 4 of the greatest (cheesiest but recognizable) 80′s love songs.

The Power of Love – Huey Lewis

I Just Called to Say I Love You – Stevie Wonder

Hello – Lionel Richie

I Will Always Love You – Whitney Houston (oh, yeah – he did the big key change into the out chorus!!)

BUT!!!!!

What sent the whole thing over the top was the idea to use wretched MIDI tracks, easily found for free on the Internet. They end up sounding like a child programmed them on their Casio. Wonderful. Horrible, but wonderful….

The whole thing was a big hit!

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WORSHIP:

God is Alive

Glory to God Forever

Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone)

East Band - Steve Fee, Matt Adkins, Heath Baltzglier, Brandon Coker, Jared Hamilton

West Band – Chrystina Fincher, Steve Thomason, Jayce Fincher, Danny Grady, Doug “Slug” Mitchell, Trammell Starks

Sunday Summary – Music: April 26, 2009

You don’t need a big rock band.

You can effectively lead people in worship with much, much less.

I think the only thing you really, really cannot do without is passion and conviction.

Throw in a dash of energy and charisma, and you’re definitely on your way.

And a heap load of musical ability doesn’t hurt either!!!!

(Nor do all the fancy lights )

Take a look at what was on the East stage yesterday:

Yep. Other than Luke (one of our Audio gurus) on the far left and the camera dude on the right stairs, there are only two musicians on stage.

On East, Eddie Kirkland (leading) and Ashley Appling (playing the Cajon) tore it up, with reckless abandon. Couldn’t ask for more…

And on West, Chrystina Fincher led with Steve Thomason on acoustic / BGV. Again, much tearing up was done….

WORSHIP:

All Because of Jesus

Jesus Reigns (Todd’s new tune)

Glorious One

The only downside we noticed was that we lost the crowd in the 2nd (new) tune. We’d already done it a couple times, but it was still too new for them to really sing along in the sonic vacuum (meaning no full band).

So if you do a week like this, be sure to pick VERY FAMILIAR tunes that lend themselves really well to letting one acoustic carry the load.

Oh, and some killer lights help…

Sunday Summary – Music: April 19, 2008

Whew – kids, I am busy! There are 10 songs that string parts scored for our DRIVE Conference, and beaucoup of stuff to do in the yard before it gets too hot (or my allergies take over!).

So sorry for the posting delay….

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This past Sunday was lots of fun. Eddie had a great line:

“I thought it was going to be a strong single-base hit, maybe even a ground rule double, but it turned out to be a good stand-up triple!”

(Now if only the Braves could rally some of that action…)

Andy started a new 2-part series called “God and Country”, talking about our national conscience, and how God is viewed in America. The first message was really good – certainly worth a listen!

We opened with our good buddy James David Carter singing the Rodney Atkins tune “It’s America”.

It turned out to be a lot of fun, and we even had Jeremy Moyers move over from Rhythm Guitar to Pedal Steel for the tune. (He toured playing Pedal Steel with Lonestar for years!). And kind Matt Melton came over from West to play Rhythm on that tune.

So it was something different, something fun, and it was a great setup for the series.

With the opener, plus baptism, we only had time for 2 worship tunes, so we chose something old and something new.

The oldie was Tomlin’s “Your Grace Is Enough”, which was well received by many, but I wasn’t real crazy about. Oh well..

The newbie was the Tim Hughes tune “Everything”, which we’ve done a couple times, and is one of my new favorite tunes. I absolutely love it , and really, really love playing it.

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East Band – Mike Gleason, James David Carter, Rachael Gillis, Danny Grady, Jeremy Moyers, Joe Thibodeau, Pat Malone, Me

West Band – Chrystina Fincher, Ryan Stuart, Matt Melton, Ben Snider, Brad Gage, Wayne Viar, Keith Thomas

Sunday Summary – Music: March 29, 2008

First, a big shout out to our Long Island guests! (You know who you are… )

Sunday was a fun day. Sometimes the mood on stage and off is just a little brighter and perkier than others – this was one of those days.

No real reason why, other than the fact that everyone was glad that 5 straight days of rain was over.

That, and the fact that we did some fun tunes…

Sunday was our “Strategic Service” day – the day we honor our existing volunteers, and push for new ones.

So we opened with a highlight video – a montage of photos from every area that volunteers serve, underscored by each side’s live band doing Jack Johnson’s “Better Together“.

It’s a happy little tune, just like most of Jack’s repertoire. Danny Dukes sang it on East and Eddie Kirkland did it on West.

And I got to use a vibraphone patch, so that alone made my day… .

Worship was, at least for me, more fun than usual. I played on East with Chrystina Fincher leading. If you don’t know Chrys, she’s a firecracker rock-chick. I mean, this is the mother of 3 that sang Led Zeppelin’s “Rock and Roll” at DRIVE and Catalyst conferences!

So a win for Chrys is a set of “up” tunes that have a lot of energy and really allow her to show off her dynamic personalty and lead a crowd in worship.

Plus, Eddie was leading on the West, and he can sing the phone book, so no worries!

We started with Chris Tomlin’s “Let God Arise“. Now if you don’t dig this tune for worship, chances are you’ve not heard the right person lead it.

Tomlin’s recorded version lacks something, and you don’t realize what that is until you hear someone with a stronger, more aggressive voice sing it. It’s a great tune, but a smooth, tender voice like Tomlin’s doesn’t do the song justice. But when you put someone on it that has some grit, the song takes on a whole new persona!

Next was Marvelous Light, a fave by Charlie Hall, but one that is nearing it’s last days and will soon be put out to pasture. So enjoy it while it’s still around!

We concluded worship with a new song by Todd Fields that he co-wrote with Eddie called “Jesus Reigns“. It’s got a great mid-tempo groove ad is a blast to play. The verse is a little wordy and with some odd syncopation, but it certainly learnable over time. The chorus, however, is fantastic – a great hook that’s super easy to pick up and repeats a bunch.

We’ll be singing this one for a while! It’ll be on Todd’s new project due in May.

There you go!

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East Band – Chrystina Fincher, Danny Dukes, Ryan Stuart, Steve Thomason, Ben Snider, Ashley Appling, Richard Meeder, Me

West Band – Eddie Kirkland, Danny Grady, Brad Avery, Jennifer Young, Mike Bielenberg, Pat Malone, Wayne Viar

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Sunday Summary – Music: Feb 8, 2009

This past Sunday was great, at least for me…

It was a Married Life Live weekend in the West Auditorium, meaning I got to hang out Friday, Saturday and Sunday and play great music with great friends, who happen to be incredible musicians…

Talk about a treat!

Are we exhausted? Sure.

Worth it? You betcha!

And we had a great time on Sunday morning, as well. It was relatively straight forward, musically speaking, with a little twist at the end.

For worship we brought back a new song introduced a few weeks ago – “Let God Arise”. This is a newer Tomlin tune that might be old hat for some of you, but we just introduced it this year. I actually like it – it’s kinda fun, and real easy to grab hold of. But don’t be afraid to make it rock!!

After that we transitioned into Blessed Be Your Name, the Matt Redman tune. We wanted something older that was real familiar and also supported our current “Balanced” sermon series. We don’t normally program worship to go with a sermon, but in this instance it worked.

We also pepped it up a bit last year, doing it at 120 bpm with a pretty driving loop, almost verging on a dance or techno vibe. That helped it go seamlessly from the high energy of the first song.

We ended the set with a new song, “Everything” by Tim Hughes. I won’t lie, this might be my new fave… And no, not just because it’s piano-driven

I spent a couple hours last week programming the strings on it, so got deeply imbeded into my brain. So that might have had something to do with it…

But the chords are simple yet tasty, and the melody of the verse and chorus is super easy, which always makes for a good tune for the crowd to pick up on quick.

The only downfall, I’d say, are the 1 million different verbs in the verses. That’s a lot of lyric to remember! Weeping, crying, laughing, waking, walking, gnashing, screaming, running, falling, slapping, whimpering, typing, watching, driving, voting, procrastinating….

We then brought it back in a shortened form as the closer, but only doing 1 verse and the out choruses, and in a more mellow tone – taking out the loop and tambourine, and having the band keep a more meditative, contemplative groove.

We’ll definitely be bringing that one back!

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East Band – Kristian Stanfill, Alex Nifong, Danny Grady, Joe Thibodeau, Chris Arias, Brad Gage, Rosie Pinkerman

West Band – Mike Gleason, Steve Thomason, Daryl Lecroy, Pat Malone, Ashley Appling, Chrystina Fincher, and me!

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Here’s East at the 12:45 service:

What’s YOUR favorite new song?