Playing too slow for the congregation?

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Permalink Reply by Gav on March 11, 2009 at 7:40pm

i dont think its just a slow thing, sometimes we can be too fast for teh congregation. but sometimes ive deliberately slowed some songs down and lost the congregation completely, so you may have a point!

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Permalink Reply by Julia Chantrell on March 11, 2009 at 9:49pm

I think there's a natural comfortable pace for both speaking and singing into which most people's voices fall [and indeed their ears if that makes any sense]. Singing outside that range takes both training and practice. Two examples that spring to mind are;
'I am the very model of a modern major general' [Pirates of Penzance - G & S] which is a complete killer for an amateur, but which a professional singer can pick up very quickly even if they've never heard it before.
'God so loved the world' [John Stainer], which needs to be quite slow and controlled, and over which many a church choir has come to grief before they come to terms with the flow of it.

Of course, it's also a matter of breath control, which in itself takes a bit of training when it comes to things that are faster or slwoer than usual.

The reason I also said 'ears' is that, when you have a reader whose pace is much slower than the norm it's very trying to listen to - and conversely, someone who speaks quickly [even if they're enunciation is perfectly clear] tends to be quite exhausting!

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Permalink Reply by Daniel Read on March 11, 2009 at 10:18pm

I always play too fast. I compensate for lack of volume (i.e. no drummer) by increasing the speed. One of my many failings.

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Permalink Reply by Luke Ingledow on March 12, 2009 at 11:44am

To keep everyone of all ages happy, have a mixture of slow and quiet with fast and loud in most services. Sometimes even if the song is slow, changing the rythym of the song can make it seem faster, I'm speaking as a drummer here and very often have to slow down, even for the fast songs! :P. My advise is just try to change the rythym a little, don't always try to play it how it's written, make a few changes you could even change the style!

I hope this helped!

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Permalink Reply by martyn burt on March 12, 2009 at 1:52pm

I have always heard it said that the larger the band, the slower you can go. So what you might do on your own at housegroup might be faster than with a full band.

My take on all this is we don't actually vary enough and tend to do everything mid-tempo (90bpm?). How many of us have been in services when a song list such as 'let evrything that has breath' into 'blessed be your name' into 'I will offer up my life' into faithful one' into 'this is the air i breathe' sound like they are all done with a drum machine and NO CHANGE in tempo! (I've even been in groups that did that deliberately!).

Perhaps we need to listen more to the variety of speeds on recordings and try to vary. My motto has always been 'if you think it's too slow, go slower' to get the dynamic, but not everyone likes things slow. However, we need to do the fast songs fast, and the slow ones slow! If Brian Doerksen does 'from everlasting to everlasting' at about 136bpm and 'faithful one' at about 70, maybe we should try as well?

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Permalink Reply by Graham Boler on March 12, 2009 at 4:33pm

This has been an issue between our sound engineers and musicians - we find the "natural" speed of a song differs for each and therefore their perception of the congregation's reaction is different. It can be quite upsetting to be told to speed up or slow down, when you feel it is going well.

Looking into this further in the music industry, I found another contributory factor - how busy the music is. We can play music slower when we have drummer, and it feels quicker. This is because the dead space between notes is filled with percussion, so something is always happening. Remove the percussion and play at the same speed using just chords can turn a song into a dirge. Recorded music is (nearly) always full of instrumentation, so a slower pace can sound lively.
To counter this issue, I try to get busier on the acoustic or rhythm guitar and encourage singers to play percussion as well.

Finally, I think the worship teams' demeanour can influence the congregation. Someone saying "that song was too slow" might mean they were just uninspired. Bored, uninterested looking singers and musicians can transmit that lethargy into worship, and affect everyone. Equally, over-exuberance can leave some behind. While musicianship and professionalism can get us so far, our attitude in worship must be paramount.

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