Worship Team Training

For those not aware, a lot of Protestant churches chucked choirs in favor of bands called “worship teams,” consisting of a few vocalists, guitar players, bass players, piano player and drum man—and a sound system. The performers vary somewhat, of course, and there are generally several teams that rotate every few weeks.

At the church we used to go to one of the teams had a leader who'd had extensive musical training, including a class on conducting. He was good—his only flaw being a tendency to sing some passages very loud. I had to keep a finger on the fader for his mike. Luckily his conducting habits signaled what he was about to do, so I could make the adjustment seem natural. He made “body conducting” seem so natural that I came to take it for granted—everybody on his team got their cues just as though there'd been somebody with a baton out front.

Working with a different team at a new church leaves me missing that caliber of training. The lead singers tend not to move around much, so the bass player has to swing around and give the drummer his cues (sort of like marching band practices with conductors at each end of the field?). Recently we had a lead singer who (though she sings far better than I!) tends to drop the final consonants of syllables. That kind of muddiness in direction isn't disastrous if the congregation knows the songs well, but they introduced a new one that week.

The folks are dedicated, practice hard, and worry about details that I cannot distinguish. Rendition A sounded a lot like rendition B—maybe a hair faster, maybe not. Is is reasonable to suggest additional work? Probably. Is it chutzpah to have the suggestion come from somebody who can't tell C-sharp from J-flat?

I have my own ideas how bands are used, but they let me work there anyway...working within the system, so to speak.