Introduction to professionalism in Christian worship music
One of my greatest joys is playing pop-gospel music with a group of instrumentalists and singers who regularly lead our congregation in worship. This is extremely fulfilling from a spiritual perspective, and it is a blast. Particularly significant to me is the opportunity to play with people I deeply love, appreciate, and respect. Many of us on the musical team have been working together for more than 15 years. In some ways we’ve matured together both musically and spiritually.
This activity has led me to experience deep times of worship, often in surprising ways. I spend a number of hours alone listening to the songs, playing along with them, and then listening some more. I saturate myself with this worship music each week, whether while driving, or in my home studio, or in rehearsal, or in performance. During these private and public times I sense the meaning of the songs and their call to intimacy with God through Jesus Christ. The experience often brings me to tears. Maybe being in my late 40’s makes me more sensitive!
It has gotten to the point that I consider leading a congregation in worship music to be more about my own worship mindset than anything the congregation is doing. Maybe that seems individualistic, but it has become true and freeing for me. It is as if we worship musicians were saying:
We on this team are about to spend some very special time playing and singing as an imperfect but heartfelt gift to God. It will be a very meaningful and touching time for us. We love doing this more than anything else in life. If you want to join us, please do, but we’re going to do it whether you join us or not.
At a recent lovely retreat with worship ministry musicians we discussed opportunities to excel in worship ministry. Here are some of the things we covered together.
"Professionalism" in worship ministry
I want to share some of my ideas about “professionalism” in worship ministry. This may seem strange, since most of us are not professional musicians. Maybe it may even seem wrong to discuss professionalism in the context of church music. This isn’t a business, right? Shouldn’t we just be happy with sincere good tries and leave it at that?
I’ve been playing the bass since 1970. That’s 40 of my 49 years. Through the years I’ve done some semi-professional playing in Madison, Los Angeles, Omaha, and Rochester. I had a full-tuition music scholarship at the University of Wisconsin—Madison. I’ve been a union musician. I’ve thought more than once about how it would be to play professionally rather than being a molecular biologist. I’ve decided that I love playing so much that there is great joy in not trying to make money at it.
But that doesn’t mean I’ve given up trying to aim for professionalism in all I do. A professional musician makes enough money at music to live off it. That is rare. However, any musician can display professionalism, and that is what we are talking about today.
We’re going to start by watching two YouTube video clips by and about a fantastic professional studio musician, bass guitarist Nathan East. I don’t know Nathan East’s spiritual perspective, and it doesn’t matter for this discussion. He is a super musician, and much in demand. He plays beautifully. The first clip is one of his live performances with Eric Clapton in 1999 on Clapton’s heartbreaking song “Tears in heaven.” Besides the fact that the song is about the accidental death of Clapton’s little boy, watch Nathan East, and listen to his playing. I try to imitate his style every chance I get.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AscPOozwYA8
The second clip is Nathan East talking about professionalism and what it takes to be an “A-list” studio musician in the professional music industry. Never mind that this clip is part of a series promoting Yamaha Musical Instruments (note that beautiful white bass guitar). The fact is, what Nathan East and other professionals say in this clip is powerful. His comments convict me about all the ways I fail to show professionalism. His comments also make me long to be more professional, and to inspire professionalism in my musical team members. Listen to what Nathan East says, and listen to the comments of the producers who appear in the clip. Think about what they are saying on the subject of “professionalism.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfxYjQ9ZuSU
So now that you have these ideas in mind. Let’s talk about how this might fit into our lives as amateur worship musicians.
First off, let’s realize that professionalism in worship is not a new idea, and it is not a wrong idea. In fact, though they often stumbled into wrong-hearted and misguided rebellion (like us) the ancient Jews worshiped through organized music. This music was not spontaneous, but was rehearsed and offered by highly trained professionals using voices and dedicated instruments. Remember too that much of the book of Psalms is lyric sheets from ancient worship songbooks where the music has been lost. We learn about professional worship music in several Old Testament passages. Some examples are:
1 Chronicles 9:33
Those who were musicians, heads of Levite families, stayed in the rooms of the temple and were exempt from other duties because they were responsible for the work day and night.
2 Chronicles 5:12
All the Levites who were musicians—Asaph, Heman, Jeduthun and their sons and relatives—stood on the east side of the altar, dressed in fine linen and playing cymbals, harps and lyres. They were accompanied by 120 priests sounding trumpets.
2 Chronicles 7:6
The priests took their positions, as did the Levites with the LORD's musical instruments, which King David had made for praising the LORD and which were used when he gave thanks, saying, "His love endures forever." Opposite the Levites, the priests blew their trumpets, and all the Israelites were standing.
2 Chronicles 29:25
He stationed the Levites in the temple of the LORD with cymbals, harps and lyres in the way prescribed by David and Gad the king's seer and Nathan the prophet; this was commanded by the LORD through his prophets.
2 Chronicles 29:26
So the Levites stood ready with David's instruments, and the priests with their trumpets.
Ezra 3:10
When the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the LORD, the priests in their vestments and with trumpets, and the Levites (the sons of Asaph) with cymbals, took their places to praise the LORD, as prescribed by David king of Israel.
Psalm 68:25
In front are the singers, after them the musicians; with them are the maidens playing tambourines.
Nehemiah 11:22
The chief officer of the Levites in Jerusalem was Uzzi son of Bani, the son of Hashabiah, the son of Mattaniah, the son of Mica. Uzzi was one of Asaph's descendants, who were the singers responsible for the service of the house of God.
Nehemiah 12:8
The Levites were Jeshua, Binnui, Kadmiel, Sherebiah, Judah, and also Mattaniah, who, together with his associates, was in charge of the songs of thanksgiving.
Nehemiah 12:27
At the dedication of the wall of Jerusalem, the Levites were sought out from where they lived and were brought to Jerusalem to celebrate joyfully the dedication with songs of thanksgiving and with the music of cymbals, harps and lyres.
Interestingly, we learn essentially nothing about Christian worship music in the New Testament.
So now that we’ve thought a bit about professionalism from the perspective of a professional modern session player, and we've been reminded that the ancient Jews involved professional musicians in worship music, let’s think about the implications for us.
Before going on, I want to mention a comment that world-class Christian artist Michael Card made when we shared dinner with him before his concert at our church several years ago. He said something simple and profound:
We all bring mixed motives to our music.
He was talking about music in service of Christian life, whether as entertainment, teaching, or worship. He was honest and he was accurate. We are sinful people. Remarkably, when we give up our lives to Christ, God chooses to see only Christ in us. He sees me as pure, even as I struggle and fail in my attempts to offer meaningful gifts to him.
As Michael Card said, what brings us to make music is a complex mixture. Many of us in this business were made to be musicians and to praise God through musical creativity. We’re doing what we were made to do—what could be better? Sometimes we genuinely want to communicate with God through this medium, and lose ourselves in the process. I think those are my highest and most meaningful moments. I don’t even remember those songs when they’re done. But let's throw in some reality. We love being with our friends, we love the sounds of music, we love hearing ourselves play, we like the affirmation of others, we like the compliments of strangers. We like to feel needed or even indispensable. We like to think of ourselves as good players and singers. We enjoy performing. We are proud and arrogant (some of us more than others). Michael Card said it right: we bring mixed motives. Thankfully, God seems to graciously respond: "Let's start with that."
So here we go. I would argue that professionalism includes at least the following 12 ideas. There are a number of others, but these 12 form a core. I’ll provide my list and we can discuss them as we go along. Remember, I’m a bass guitarist. That’s both an excuse and a reality. These principles of professionalism are universal, so translate them into your own experience.
Skill
I’m sorry to start with this, but it is the most obvious. Skill doesn’t imply professionalism, but professionalism implies skill. When we seek to display professionalism in leading worship, it assumes that we are working very hard to hone our musical skills and bring excellent (and improving) musicianship to everything we do.
Quality
Here I mean dedication to getting things right and not accepting mediocrity from ourselves. I know, I know—I am offering imperfect gifts to a perfect creator. I am going to stumble. My heart is more important than my playing. All that is true, but my aspiration for both my heart and my playing is the same: quality. What we lay on the alter of our private and public worship is to be meaningful and expensive and genuine. That starts with quality. Franky Schaeffer (the son of leading 20th Century Christian theologian Francis Schaeffer) has written an entire book called Addicted to Mediocrity (1981) dedicated to the premise that Evangelical Christianity has forgotten quality and replaced it with “good intentions.” Ouch. That’s not professionalism.
Servant attitude
Isn’t it interesting how much of the Nathan East video was about attitude! Think of the quote from Lionel Richie. Do you remember it? It was something like “attitude determines altitude.” Professionalism is not about showing off or expecting accolades or looking for praise, or even playing really well. Especially in worship, professionalism is about a servant attitude, seeking to serve the other team members, and the joint musical product, as more important than one’s own playing. Making each team member feel good about their respective contribution can be a hallmark of a musical leader who displays professionalism.
Respect for the time of others
This is a big one. Respect for time is hard to understand until you have played with professional union musicians. It was an eye-opener for me. People are paid by the clock, there are prescribed breaks, and overtime costs a lot more. People come prepared, and leaders work efficiently. Before and after a professional rehearsal there is time for humor and good fun. During the rehearsal it is business. Players are silent when they are not working on a section together. The leader has the complete attention of all involved at all times. Players take notes to speed their subsequent preparation. Players arrive totally prepared, assuming they won’t have any time to re-orient to the music. They come assuming that the first time through in rehearsal needs to be tight, and might be recorded. We should act like each member of the team is making $200 an hour. How would it change our behavior if they were?
Patience
We in worship ministry often rehearse at night, after long and difficult days at school or in our other careers. We often work weekends. We are often tired or stressed. That’s life. Professionalism means the discipline of patience. Tempers are held in check. We exemplify professionalism, expect it in our team members, and do not blow the whistle when we don’t see professionalism around us. Like good parenting, professionalism is 90% setting a good example, and 10% expecting others to imitate it. If that player needs to go through the part 5 times to get it right, we do it 6 times. If the vocalists need some time to work out their harmony parts, we sit alertly and give them the time. They’re each making $200 an hour, right?
Self control
We joke all the time that professionalism means being paid for the notes you don't play, not for the notes that you do. Professionalism is about choosing the correct notes, and placing them (or singing them) in such a way that a song is complemented. Self control is also about disciplines like finding something complimentary to say about the musical gifts of your dear friend, or even the gifts of that new younger musician just sitting in for the first time.
Flexibility
This is about making one’s playing a tool in someone else’s hand. Maybe that someone else is another player with a suggestion, or maybe it is the worship leader. Flexibility means trying new things, willingly and cheerfully offering musical options, stretching to explore new and unfamiliar musical territory. It also means switching instruments or vocal parts or transposing as if the new key means being paid double! Flexibility also means choosing to sit out when one’s voice or instrumental part is not helpful. It means I smile and agree about sitting out even when it wasn’t my idea!
Listening
Professionalism means excellent musical skills, and an essential musical skill is listening. This means being constantly aware of what the other team members are doing musically. Many of us benefit from personal monitor mixers allowing us to choose which team members dominate our musical experience during rehearsal and performance. This is fantastic. I am a bassist. I listen to the drummer and my favorite singer and that’s almost all (OK, a bit of an exaggeration, but sorry guitarists and keyboardists and background singers). I’ll admit it though—it is an all-too-common experience that I study our rehearsal recordings and realize that a team member was creating an important musical statement, and I either played over it, or improvised a part that didn’t agree with it. Bad listening.
Encouragement
The Nathan East YouTube video makes the claim that professionalism means helping others to have a good time and to feel good about their musicianship. If there is one thing I’ve learned as a scientist who writes research proposals for money, it’s that people don’t create well when they are scared. People create when they are relaxed and when they trust those around them. Professionalism means passionately investing in that kind of environment. Professionalism means setting aside pride and cliquishness and making the musical process a pleasure for all involved. I fail at that way too often.
Attention to detail
Professionalism means caring about the little things and finding ways to eliminate errors and unhappy surprises. Such musicians think ahead, plan for problems, and bring plenty of experience in providing solutions. Players like this know their gear, know their limitations, and (in the Zen sense) play (or sing) “within” themselves. This means offering well-seasoned tools and practicing the discipline of treating body and vocal cords with respect and care.
Team playing, not cliquishness
Professionalism means reaching out to new team members who are less familiar. As I mentioned, some of us have known each other for many years and we have shared some of the most sensitive and personal experiences of our lives together. Some of us are married to each other! Some of us admire each other very, very much. Many of us love spending time together. This is all good, and it is all beautiful. It is only an obstacle when the bonds of friendship and love create a clique, an obstacle to giving and meeting and serving and hearing others in ministry with us.
Preparation
Last and not least, professionalism means preparation. This has been extremely important for me. Preparation is important not just because it supports all of the other aspects of professionalism, but because it has freed me to get closer to what I think worship should be. Let me explain. What I share is about me. It may not apply to you. If it challenges your thinking, good. No apologies.
As a classically-trained orchestra musician, I grew up focused on the technical act of interpreting printed orchestra music on the page. No improvisation. No memorization. No transposition. Detail-oriented technical playing is everything in this setting. That is about reading music, notes, symbols, Italian. I brought this “chart-centric” culture with me to pop music, jazz and worship. Put a chart in front of me and watch me play. This mind-set is technical, but it hindered my ability to actually experience worship as an intimate and emotional reality. My mind and heart were engaged technically, not passionately.
Bob Kauflin (involved for 30 years with the a capella Christian music group Glad) describes how members of a congregation can become stuck in this technical mindset. He calls it SDD (screen dependency disorder) or HDD (hymnal dependency disorder). As a musician, I had CDD (chart dependency disorder). I was too busy technically interpreting marks on a page to think about why the acoustic compression waves were propagating from my instrument, and whether the acoustic compression waves were expressing my love for him for whom they were created.
One of my most cherished musical partners once gently challenged me, just in passing, to get my head out of the music. “You don’t need those charts anyway” she said.
Say what?
Her passing comment changed my life. Not just my musical life, my whole life. I realized that a very large fraction of the praise and worship music we share has simple structure. I can easily internalize the chord patterns and feel them rather than read them. For me this changed everything. I deliberately now learn my worship music by listening, not by reading. Sure, when I play chamber music I’m a technician of written detail. Yes, if I were hired to record with two takes, bring the chart. When I want to make the worship genuine for myself, even as I lead others, I now choose to prepare so the music is fully internalized.
Preparation and memorization should not be about pride. They should be about getting beyond the technical to a place where my contribution is at the level that my mind is on Christ, and my emotions are engaged in communication to and about him. I look forward to this experience in both rehearsal and performance. In fact, I tear up in rehearsal, and find myself transported on Tuesday nights as often as on weekends—if I have taken time for adequate preparation.
For our worship preparation we receive a lovingly-prepared packet of charts and a demo CD in advance of rehearsal. I start work immediately listening to that disc every time I am in my car, and every spare hour at home in my studio. I digitally input the music into an inexpensive transposition tool:
http://www.ronimusic.com/
(yes...there is a PC version too)
that allows me to play along with the recording and work out my part and memorize the structure in the appropriate transposition over several days of intense playing prior to rehearsal. Yes, you heard me correctly, I said “several days of intense playing prior to rehearsal.” For me, that is preparation. When I arrive at rehearsal, professionalism means that I expect everyone has done the same. There should be nobody saying “I didn’t have time to study the CD” or “can you play the CD once so I can remember this next song?” We all should have been living each of these songs for the days leading up to rehearsal.
I was intrigued to discover that this freedom I have experienced through worship music preparation has a parallel in the writings of C.S. Lewis, the wonderful Christian apologist. Lewis wrote in Letters to Malcolm, Chiefly on Prayer:
Novelty, simply as such, can have only an entertainment value….church goers don't go to be entertained. They go to use the service, or if you prefer, to enact it.
Every service is a structure of acts and words through which we receive a sacrament, or repent, or supplicate, or adore. And it enables us to do these things best...when, through familiarity, we don't have to think about it. As long as you notice, and have to count, the steps, you are not yet dancing but only learning to dance. A good shoe is a shoe you don't notice. Good reading becomes possible when you need not consciously think about eyes, or light, or print, or spelling. The perfect church service would be one we were almost unaware of; our attention would have been on God.
Interesting. For me, memorization and familiarity and preparation are aspects of professionalism that get me beyond thinking about the dance steps. They get me to dancing. More important, they allow me to think about and actually enjoy my partner in the dance during worship.
So I cannot emphasize enough the freedom and significance that have come with my attention to the discipline of musical preparation and memorization. It has changed everything. Yes, this commitment requires a lot of time each week. It is a meaningful investment that has had a profound and very personal spiritual impact for me. It may not be for everyone. This commitment to preparation may take different forms for different singers and instrumentalists. At the bottom, however, professionalism can probably be summarized best by that single word: preparation.
Summary
So there we have them: 12 principles that capture aspects of professionalism in Christian worship music. Are there more concepts that might be added? Sure—things like passion, intentionality, humor, modesty, sacrifice, consistency, accountability, mentorship, etc. etc. They start to sound like discipleship terms, don’t they?
I think these 12 provide a good start. Let’s continue to discuss them together. Let’s continue to challenge ourselves to practice these principles and display them. Let’s agree to expect them in each other and remind each other when we stumble. Please remind me.
Oh, and did I mention, I love serving him with you. It is my favorite thing. It is a privilege.
