It frustrates me to no end when we hand out published rhythm charts to contemporary choir anthems that are seven pages long with nothing but slashed treble clef and very few items in the bass clef other than the chord changes. This has become a soapbox issue of mine–though I realize most people, other than rhythm players, could really care less!

Many of those published charts are so full of wasted space. And I’ve never met a rhythm player who asks for multiple pages!

Lead sheets have many limitations as well. They’re fine for running a vocal rehearsal (as long as they include vocal parts), but rarely do they have information for the rhythm players, other than the chord changes.

My ideal notion of a rhythm chart contains information for every player in the rhythm section, some suggested cue notes or voicings when necessary for pianists/b-3 players (but only a couple measures here and there) a written out kick pattern for a couple measures (written where there is a change), a clear formal layout so that beginnings and endings of sections are easy to find, at the most, three pages, and usually some instruction about who should play at each point, dynamic markings, etc, etc.

Achieving the perfect balance between being concise and too cluttered is hard…I usually error on providing a too much information. Mostly this is for the sake of rehearsal–when the players have what they need to know in front of them, they can work things out on their own and it reminds me of all thing things I thought were important in the tune to give to them in a busy rehearsal setting.

Regarding charts as a limiting factor, I find paradoxically that giving players a chart is actually very freeing. I like to teach everyone a song from a “standard,” and then over time, be happy to depart from it as confidence with the song grows.

I always score the vocal parts to the rhythm chart. This is another time saving/rehearsal-saving habit that lets me easily direct folks to the same place at the same time. “Measure 43, second time.”

Finally, having a chart that codifies the music let’s us move on from trying to remember things like what chord comes next, or what feel we’re trying to give, or “oh yeah, we’re gonna hold that for two measures this time…,” what instrument should be playing how, and lets us move on to larger musical issues. With a chart to anchor us with these necessities, we can as a group start to focus on things like our time, listening to each other in an interactive way, building an emotional dynamic that lets us be more effective in worship. It pushes our musicians even more toward excellence, which to me lies beyond the words-with-chord-names-written-above-them charts.

I do this work in Finale, but a quality rhythm chart can be created analog as well. Remember staff paper? Thought we left that behind in college! Well, it is easy to scribble all the rhythmic hits and bass/kick feels on a single sheet of staff paper as well.

Let’s encourage our musicians to not be simply satisfied with what they can get away with musically, let’s continue to push them (and us) and challenge them to a high standard!

I love this discussion. Makes me feel like a church music geek.

So you can shift from a classical training to basically playing like a jazz musician, but it takes time and a willingness to move out of your comfort zone and make mistakes. But it is worth it as it gives you a great deal more flexibility both in your playing and in who you can play with.

James

I’m very excited about this step, and I can’t wait to release our first batch that will feature chord charts for all our top songs.

“The blend of styles in your church and the musicians themselves will dictate a great deal of this.”

Amen. There are a multitude of variations to a theme when it comes to what kind of music our musicians play from. I’ve found that different musicians prefer or require different kinds of music. That means I or someone else may have to do more work than I originally intended.

But you can also stretch your musicians. I’ve had note-reading solo instrumentalists grow in playing spontaneously over time. Even keyboardists can learn to read letters instead of notes! (But be patient.) The important thing is to produce music that encourages and expresses faith-filled, truth-driven, Spirit-empowered worship. That’s our goal, whether we’re reading from two staffs or none.

You said, “it can be helpful to pianists to understand that, when we’re part of a team, we don’t have to carry all the parts, which is what we’re often used to.”

That definitely seems to be the issue. Piano players seem to be afraid of playing to little and often have a very hard time playing little.

Unfortunately, all a lot of churches have is a piano player that acts as the whole band. But they can learn to let the vocals take the melody and not worry about playing the melody. That way, tricky rhythms won’t clash if the singers are singing slightly differently than the piano is playing.

WRT Sheet music and chords. My (limited) experience has been that classically trained musicians prefer, and I assume need in some cases, sheet music. Pop, rock etc musicians are, in general, happy with chords. For the most part this has to do with the instrument, i.e. it can take a long time to work out the parts if you have things like cello, violin, trumpet, trombone etc and you are trying to work from chord sheets. It is actually a very big shift to go from one to the other and the style of music in the church is going to govern it a bit as well.
Thank you all so much for you comments and insights each week.
Ian