Here’s a fascinating article from Christianity Today discussing the reasons pop music forms have come to dominate most church worship and arguing for a wider range of expression.
What do you think?
PS — Here are some examples of the music the author refers to —
“Air and Simple Gifts,” a Shaker hymn, arranged by John Williams —
Same tune, but the vocal version, with Alison Krauss doing the honors.
It’s a gift to be simple, It’s a gift to be free,
It’s the gift to come down where you ought to be,
And when we find ourselves in the place just right,
Will be in the valley of love and delight.
When true simplicity is gained,
To bow and to bend, we will not be ashamed,
To turn, turn, will be our delight,
Till by turning, turning we come round right
It’s a gift to be simple, It’s a gift to be free,
It’s a gift to come down where you ought to be,
And when we find ourselves in the place just right,
Will be in the valley of love and delight.
When true simplicity is gained,
To bow and to bend, we will not be ashamed,
To turn, turn, will be our delight,
Till by turning, turning we come round right
Till by turning, turning we come round right
Evidently, the Shaker hymn was sung while dancing. Chastely. Hence, the references to turning, bowing, and bending. Think square dance.
Next is Amy Grant’s “Sing Your Praise to the Lord,” with a Bach fugue as prelude —
And then there’s “Here I Am to Worship” —
Wrapping up with a little Martin Luther’s “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God,” as arranged by Bach —
The Bach arrangement isn’t quite the same as our four-part harmony.
Interesting, isn’t it, how church music has changed over the years.
Our music tends toward Gospel / rhythm and blues style with a one or two a cappella traditional songs thrown in to the mix. We do a few modern “Christian radio” songs as well. In the past year we’ve introduced some Spanish songs (congregation sings in Spanish, words and translation projected on the screen). Our most recent effort is to introduce some country style songs. The general idea is that we try to have a mixture of styles reflecting the diversity of cultures in our church.
My conviction is that singing is a means to edify the other person. “Speak to one another” in song. So I need to sing the style that connects with the other person — not so much with me.
Much of popular music is written to be sung by one person – a solo or a “music special” as many churches call it. The songs don’t work with a large group of people attempting to sing them.
Most CoC congregations don’t “allow” solos or smaller groups to sing in an assembly, so we try to fit a potato into an egg carton.
I find that to be a shame.
Performance music or congregational singing – yes, Dwayne, that’s one of the main problems. Only few understand this, because they experience music almost exclusivlesy as performace (or radio) music – and until they join worship they hardly ever sang as a family or alone, except when singing along with the radio.
Alexander
Dwayne,
Most CofC don’t “allow” solist’s but do allow a music or worship leader to stand in front of a microphone and thereby amplify that person’s voice above everyone else so that they can be heard singing. Sounds kinda like a solo to me.
Why isn’t a soloist with a nice voice who is singing a song with words meant to edify the assembly… edifying? It would be nice if the CofC took a good look at what they are actually doing once in a while to determine if their policies make any sense.
Doug