Rainsticks and Sax Solos

Before you even start reading, I feel obliged to point out the Code Red level of sarcasm that follows; however, as with all sarcasm, there are some kernels of truth interspersed in the following rant.

 
I grew up on late 80’s and 90’s church “worship” music. I remember thinking how cool it was that we didn’t have hymn books (even though now I would kill for one). Looking back, it is amazing to me how in such a short span of time, the “contemporary” church managed to flush 2,000 years of church history and biblical context down the toilet. Anyway, I remember those years fondly, and here are a few things that I really miss:

The obligatory flute or sax solo – There are a lot of church flute and saxophone players out of work today, collecting “worship” team unemployment checks. I really do miss those soft flute intros, and funky white boy sax solos, that just took the songs to a whole new power pop level. I think it was every worship pastor’s holy dream to get Kenny G saved. Can you imagine how powerfully the spirit would have moved? Unfathomable.

 

Streamers and banners (Church flag corp) – At its peak, churches were removing rows of chairs just to make room for this tornado of twirling silk. They should have been surrounded in caution tape because they were dangerous. Those wooden dowels were like holy swords waiting to impale you, or gouge your eyes out in accordance with scripture. I don’t know about you guys, but give me a banner team and a hard core sax solo, and that’s heaven on earth. I never could get a beat on the guys who joined the banner wavers though. That always gave me cause for concern.

 

Projectors and transparencies – Who can forget the giant glowing box sometimes strategically placed smack in the middle of the stage for the backup singers to operate. I honestly miss the feel, and even smell, of those transparencies; shuffling through the accordion folder to find the songs and get them all lined up. Was there ever a professional way of handling these? I certainly am familiar with the bad way, the blank transparency with dry-erase handwritten words and the operator who seems to always make the slide appear upside down no matter how many times you try to explain mirrors to them.

 

Percussion – Rainsticks, triangles, cowbell, congas, what isn’t appropriate for a worship song? Even the rocks will cry out, and Lord knows we tried to see what beating a rock with different sized sticks would sound like. The big churches share in culpability for this pandemic, but the smaller churches took it to a new level. I mean really, who isn’t qualified to play percussion? As long as you have a heartbeat, can fog up a mirror, and 2 hands that can beat things with, you should be on stage…right?

Constant 3 part harmonies – Picture with me if you will, vocal arrangements as a mixing board with sliders for each singer. Usually you’d think of these sliders moving up and down as the song progresses through the arrangement, layering nicely in parts, muted in others. Well back in the day this picture was more of a giant switch. Vocals are either all on or all off. Hey those words on the transparency aren’t for looking at, if you got a mic and there are words up, sang those things sister! Oh and you know your part, it’s the same harmony you do on every song, it’s easier that way. We also took the liberty of color coding the windscreens so you knew which mic is yours.

I can’t be the only one who misses some of this stuff. What are some of the things you guys miss?

 

Shelby out!