Video Blog #1: loopsinworship.com review

Recently I found a great resource that has really helped our worship team. Check it out!

SLAM - 06.28.09

Sunday Set List:
Neverending - David Crowder Band
No One Like You - David Crowder Band
From the Inside Out - Hillsong United
You Never Let Go - Matt Redman

Matt and the band brought it this morning. Over the course of VBS week, they went from being a band that struggled to play to a click to confidently locking tempo. Their playing is at a whole new level. I'm so proud of their progress. It's also helps that they are so fun to work with. Awesome job this morning!

Last epicenter service of the semester

EPICENTER BAND:

(left to right) Harrison Hinson-Keys, Matt Bryant-Drums, Jake Sumner-Vocals/Acoustic Guitar, Andrew Von Essen - Acoustic Guitar, Hannah Sumner - Vocals, Jeff Nordeman-Bass, Sam Elgin-Electric Guitar

Tonight was our final weekly epicenter service before summer starts. We will have 2 summer services June 7 and July 12th. Then, we'll kick things back up with our regular schedule beginning on August 9th. It's hard to believe that we've had 17 services since we started on January 4th. It's been an exciting journey so far and I'm excited to see where the next season will take us!

The band did an incredible job tonight. We have been working on integrating loops and clicks. Tonight was the first set that we have done entirely with clicks on every song. It really tightened us up and kept us from speeding up on several of the songs.

Set List:
Happy Day - loop
Spring of Life - loop
Salvation is Here
None But Jesus - loop
From the Inside Out
Kingdom Come - loop

The band has done amazing this semester. I'm so thankful to be working with such talented musicians and great people. They have served faithfully this semester and it has been a joy to work with them on a weekly basis. I'm glad we have a break for a few weeks but I'm really looking forward to us coming back together in the fall!

Using Loops in Worship - The Journey Part 3

It's been a few weeks since I posted about our journey using loops in worship. Since then, we've made progress but it hasn't been an easy road. Our musicians are at a very comfortable point where they can show up for practice and play the music in front of them without a lot of outside effort. I'm excited that they are at this point - it's been a long time coming to get them this proficient and I'm proud of how far they've come. One of the most challenging parts of implementing loops is that it requires people who are not used to playing with a metronome to practice at home. There have been several rehearsals over the last few weeks where we have prepared click tracks and loops, tried them out a few times and realized that the band simply was not going to be able to pull it off. It's hard to just throw out the plan when there are hours of behind the scenes work that have been spent preparing but that is exactly what we've had to do.

Band practices have been hard for the last few weeks. We'll start our trying to play along to a click/loop and it hasn't worked out well. Sometimes, 30 minutes of rehearsal go by and we're still working on one song and haven't even started on the others. This has led to some very hurried, frustrating practices with little progress being made in the implementation of loops.

Last night at rehearsal, we had a breakthrough. I decided to run our rehearsal like normal with no loops or click tracks. We had four songs we were preparing that the band had played many times before. The preparation went quickly and within 30 minutes we had all four songs at a place where they were ready to go for the night. At this point, we still had about 45 minutes of practice time left so we spent that time working with just one song that had a click and fully sequenced loop. It took a few times to get the hang of it but eventually it fell into place. For many of the band members, it was the first time they had really experienced being locked into the click. It was pretty incredible to see them play at this next level. This will be our new approach to practice for the next few months. We are aiming at August as our goal for implementing playing with a click for every song. At this point, just focusing on one song a week is a much more manageable task than trying to make the transition all at once.

A few final thoughts on implementing loops with a band:
1. Make sure everyone can hear the click - it is annoying at first to just hear it in your ear monitor but it has to be loud enough so that each person can hear it over their instrument. I'm not advocating damaging anyone's hearing - I'm just saying it probably needs to be louder than you think at first.
2. Focus on implementing one loop per service. Simple, repetitive loops are the easiest - even if you get off the downbeat, it may not matter. Eventually move to playing along with a fully sequenced loop. *Triple-check the order of your chord chart - it must be absolutely correct.*
3. We've had success using loops on opening songs. In our services, unfortunately, the opening song is usually the signal for everyone to come in, finish their conversations and grab a seat. That puts less pressure on the song if there is any problem, it won't be as noticeable as if it were in the middle of the set. The plus side is that if the band does pull it off, the loop adds a lot of energy to the opening song - which hopefully starts to solve the problem of people not being engaged during the beginning of the service.
4. If at all possible, get the loops/clicks to people ahead of time. We use Planning Center to distribute our chord charts/loops. Allowing people the time to practice at home is critical - especially for the drummer and lead vocalist. We created metronome links for each song using WebMetronome. You can set the tempo, time signature and accent beats then just copy the link to your musicians and they can practice at home.
5. Prepare your other (non-loop) songs first. This will allow "extra" time at the end to work with the click/loop without stressing everyone out since the other songs are already rehearsed.

Progress is being made. More updates to follow!

Ableton Live Tutorial: Setting Up Live for Use with a Worship Band

Image via Wikipedia

Here's a video tutorial that explains how I set up Ableton Live for our worship bands. This setup allows a band member to easily start and stop click and loop tracks using only the numeric keys and space bar. Check it out here:

Ableton Live Tutorial: Setting Up Live For Worship Band from Jake Sumner on Vimeo.

New Stage / Lighting Setup - Pictures!

Here's a few shots from this Sunday of the stage and lighting redesign we worked on last week. I'm pretty excited about the new look!

Using Loops in Worship - The Journey Part 2

Today, I'm trying to get a little more sophisticated with our use of loops. I'm starting off today by getting some better click tracks. Most people I've talked to recommend creating click tracks in Reason using more percussive elements. We use stage monitors with our middleschool band so it will be nice to have a click track that sounds okay if it bleeds into the house mix. The built-in click from Ableton Live is piercing and sounds out-of-place if it bleeds into the house mix. Our other bands on Thursday, Sunday morning and Sunday night all use ear monitors so it won't be as bleeding into the house mix won't be an issue but I still think that people play better to a click that is more like a percussive element of the song (shaker, tambourine, etc) rather than a traditional metronome.

I'm also on the search for some pre-made loops to get us started before we jump full-speed into creating our own loops.

My first stop was at sacredloops. This site has a tremendous amount of stuff! It doesn't look like it has been updated recently but the content section of the site has loops, Live files, Reason files (unfortunately I can't open them with my Adapted version - maybe time to upgrade!). So now I have a ton of content to search through.

Next I headed over to DigitalWorship. The loops section here is really nice for a few examples. It looks like this guy went through the same process a few years ago that I'm just starting. He chronicled his adventure and there are some great insights he shares along the way. His journey starts here.

Finally, I landed at InteractiveWorshipLive. This is a pay service that is building a good selection of loops, clicks and fully-produced Live Sets that can be used to replace missing instrumentalists in your band. They have a free account you can sign up for (you do have to give a credit card no. and a crapload of personal info, though) and you get one free complete song and one free loop. I decided to give it a try. I downloaded "Salvation is Here" and the loop for "Holy is the Lord." I'll write more about when I get a chance to really check 'em out.

So, in summary, I picked up a lot of tips and samples to sort through. Tonight, I'm trying to put together basic click and and loop combinations. I'll post more about how it goes.

Using Loops in Worship - The Journey part1

Image via Wikipedia

I've been using loops in worship off and on for almost 3 years now. Technical difficulties, time and other factors have kept me from using them more but now, I am heading that direction full-on. In the past, we have used loops for 1 or 2 songs in a set but never the entire set. So, we have the technical setup - a Macbook Pro with Ableton Live 6.0 (still debating the upgrade) running out of the headphone jack into 2 channels. In Ableton Live, I set the click to come out the left channel and panned all loop channels to the right. Eventually, I may pick up an M-Audio interface so we can send out stereo loops and still have a channel dedicated to sending out the click. I also have Reason 3.0 Adapted for Digidesign (may upgrade this also) for loop creation and Logic Express/Garageband. I thought I would document the journey here.

Last night with our middleschool band, we used 3 basic loops from the Ableton Live library and and the built-in click from Ableton Live. Here's a screenshot:
http://tinyurl.com/cjw6j2

Ableton has a cool feature where you can map anything to any key just by pressing the "KEY" button in the top right. I pressed this and assigned assigned the Master Column on the right to the number keys so one of the musicans could fire the next song just by hitting "1", "2", or "3" and could stop the song by pressing the space bar.
Here's a screenshot of that:
http://tinyurl.com/c7aula

Thanks to Duane Mixon at portcitychurch.org for showing me that trick!

Another fun trick I figured out yesterday is how to change tempos in Live for the different songs. In the master column on the right, you control click on any of the numbers, select "Edit Launch Tempo" from the pop-up menu and voila! Anything you put in that row will start at the selected tempo!

the wire / SLAM 12/14/08

The band was phenomenal this morning! Not only was the music great, everyone did a great job leading worship. Today was by far, the most fun I've had playing in a while. This morning really set the bar for how we want every week at SLAM/the wire to be.

Lineup:
Brady F. - Drums
Jake S. - Bass
Scottie F. - Electric Guitar
Jon N. - Keys
Kelsey A. - Vocals, Acoustic
Trevor M. - Vocals, Acoustic

Setlist:
I Will Go - Starfield (new song!)
Sing Sing Sing - Chris Tomlin
Consuming Fire - Tim Hughes
To Speak Your Name - Jami Smith
From the Inside Out - Hillsong United

I'm so proud of the band for learning "I Will Go" this week! For a new song, they did an incredible job and this will be one song that we will continue to use as we head into 30 Hour Famine and Mission Trips in the spring.

the wire / SLAM 12/07/08

Band Lineup:
Eric I. - Drums
Jon N. - Bass
Trevor H. - Keys
Sam E. - Electric Guitar
Brady F. - Acoustic/BGV's
Matt P. - Acoustic/Lead Vocals
Jenny P. and Hannah P. - Lead Vocals

Set List:
"Neverending" - DCB
"Happy Day" - Fee
"How He Loves" - Kim Walker
"Hosanna" - Hillsong United
"From the Inside Out" - Hillsong United

This morning was quite an adventure! As we make the transition to a completely student-led worship team, there are a few setbacks along the way. The Wire had a few rough moments but it was like there was a totally different band playing at SLAM! Everyone really pulled it together and it is amazing to see this process unfolding.

We added a new song today - "Neverending" by David Crowder Band. It turned out really well - Matt P. did a great job learning it this week along with the rest of the band. Trevor H.'s electronic key sounds were awesome. Brady F. moved from behind the drums to play acoustic guitar and sing for the first time today. Sam E.'s electric guitar parts on "Hosanna" took the song to a whole new level! Jenny P. really got everyone participating in "Happy Day". Hannah P. brought the house down with "Hosanna". Eric I. nailed the drum beats for all the songs today and made some great smooth transitions. Jonathan N. did a great job jumping in on bass and gave a great spoken intro to "Hosanna".

the wire / SLAM 11/9/08

I'm not gonna lie - today was a little rough. We did a few familiar songs but tried to change them up a little bit. Practice went a little long but we were able to cover everything.

Setlist:
Prince of Peace (You Are Holy)
Here is Our King - David Crowder Band
How He Loves - Jenny solo on acoustic/vocals (SLAM only)
How Great is Our God
Mighty to Save - Hillsong

Band lineup:
Drums - Eric I.
Bass - Jonathan N.
Keys - Trevor H.
Electric Guitar - Sam E.
Acoustic/Vocals - Jake S. and Jenny P.

I really liked the beginning of this set! "Prince of Peace" and "Here is Our King" were both in the same key and tempo so we just flowed right from one to the other. Trevor H. had a really cool electronic keyboard that announced this transition. We also changed up "Prince of Peace" by dropping back to just drums and bass for one chorus (Eric and Jonathan sounded awesome during this part!) and then building it up. In "Here is Our King" we did the first bridge down instead of really big, built up to another chorus and big bridge and then ended with an almost completely a capella. These songs flowed really well together both musically and with ideas communicated. This set was my favorite part of both services. It was a lot of fun to change things up a bit!

During SLAM - our high school service - Jenny did a solo acoustic version of "How He Loves" as people came down front and placed their offerings in a basket set on the front of the stage. This part of the service was meant to be more a performance section but I was surprised by how many people jumped right in and sang along. Jenny did a great job as usual. We don't have "special music" very often so it was cool to mix things up a little bit and give people permission to just sit and take in the lyrical content of this song. We'll have to do this sort of thing again sometime soon!

Also, in SLAM we played "How Great is Our God" before the talk. We haven't done this song in a while and it was fun to bring it back out again.

In both services, the talk went long so the post-talk set was the hardest as we were re-arranging the song on the fly. At the Wire we planed to end with 2 songs but we had "How Great is Our God." We ended both services with "Mighty to Save." Sam E. did an awesome job on the guitar parts for this song. He nailed the the intro solo and made up some really tasty parts for the instrumental sections. Everyone did a good job following but we still need to work on playing spontaneously.

Overall, it was a good day - people participated well in both services. There is room for improvement but I'm excited that our musicians are playing at this level!

ALTAER - 11/6/08

Tonight's setlist:
Solution - Hillsong United
True Love - Phil Wickham
None But Jesus - Brooke Fraser
Find a World - Jami Smith

Band Members:
Drums - Brady F.
Bass - Jonathan N.
Keys - Trevor H.
Electric Guitar - Sam E.
Acoustic Guitar / Vocals - Jake S.
Vocals - Hannah S.

Tonight's theme was missions - we're getting ready for the big parent's meeting next week. We started off upbeat with Sam's electric work on "Solution" joined by Brady's drumming. We paused for a minute as I introduced "True Love" - a new song for us. The idea of this song is simple - just a retelling of the gospel - but the imagery is great! I love the chorus of this song:
"The earth was shaking in the dark, All creation felt the Father's broken heart,
Tear's were filling heaven's eyes, the day that true love died, the day that true love died.
When blood and water hit the ground, walls we couldn't move came crashing down,
We were free and made alive, the day that true love died, the day that true love died."

Even though it was a new song, people seemed to catch on and participate. From here we made a seamless transition into "None But Jesus" thanks to Trevor's keyboard part. This song is still fairly new for us but people were ready to sing at this point and there was an intense moment of worship during this song. We made another keyboard transition into the familiar "Find a World" and people really sang out on this one.

The band played really tight. God's presence was evident. People responded. Altogether, it was a great night.