This Is Amazing Grace
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Great Are You Lord
© 2013 Open Hands Music (SESAC) / So Essential Tunes (SESAC) / (admin at EssentialMusicPublishing.com). All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Good Good Father
© 2014 Common Hymnal Digital (BMI) Housefires Sounds (ASCAP) Tony Brown Publishing Designee (BMI) worshiptogether.com Songs (ASCAP) sixsteps Music (ASCAP) Vamos Publishing (ASCAP) Capitol CMG Paragon (BMI) (adm. at CapitolCMGPublishing.com). All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Scandal of Grace
© 2013 Hillsong Music Publishing (APRA) (adm. in the US and Canada at CapitolCMGPublishing.com) All rights reserved. Used by permission.
It’s Your Love
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Thank you so much for this video, this is exactly what I need right now! I have a question, you mentioned that we should not speak out during every transition, but just once for a shorter set. Do you mean for a 3 song set, choose to either speak out OR pray OR read Scripture only once, and not say anything during the other transition?
You’re welcome—glad you enjoyed the video! Yes, in a shorter set, I would leave one transition with nothing spoken, and the other transition you could do one or a combo of those things (read a scripture and pray, scripture and a quick thought, etc).
The responsibility of leading worship kind of fell in my lap recently when our worship leader had to go out of state for his job for an extended period of time. We were just getting the band to a new level and had added transitions, but I had never done them myself. I was nervous and just wanted to make sure I was on the same page as our pastor. He is a former worship leader himself and he’s been very helpful. I’ve been leading for a month now and am beginning to feel more comfortable, but I have found your webinars so helpful! Thank you so much!
That’s awesome Pamela! So glad you’re starting to feel more confident in these things — and it will grow the more you lead and plan out transitions!
Hi Charmaine, thank you for this really insightful video on transitions and for the reminders of how important transitions are and how much more time I ought to spend planning and thinking of the in-between songs. Appreciate it a lot!
There has been something on my mind which I’d like to hear from you about. Usually, when I lead worship, during transitions, I either pray or read scripture, but I don’t usually ‘speak’ to the congregation. I don’t do that because when I speak to the congregation, saying “Let’s worship God”, “Let’s put our hands tog”, “Let’s declare who God is” it sounds as if God is not present and so it feels a little awkward to me. God is present in our worship and God is right there with us and we can just talk directly to him. (: In that case, then I wouldn’t really need to ‘speak’ to the congregation and say, “Let’s sing, let’s reflect on this scripture” etc, but to just be so in awe of God and to direct everything I say to Him, and not to the congregation. What are your views on this? Would really love to hear some perspectives! Thank you very much.
Hey! Thanks for sharing your thoughts! Ultimately — you have to do what you feel comfortable with, and every worship leader is different when it comes to that.
Re: speaking to the congregation — I totally agree that God is very present with us, but encouraging and leading the congregation with some short phrases, from my perspective, is not “excluding” God, or intimating that He’s not present — our congregations want to worship and join in, but sometimes they don’t know what to do, so a short encouragement to them is actually very helpful to lead them!
I absolutely agree that we can and should talk directly to God as well! Speaking to God and speaking directly to the congregation serve two different purposes in the worship set.
Thanks so much for sharing your insights! (: I’ve been watching the discover your voice series and learning a lot from you about the heart behind what we do. Also started trying out/practicing some new things for a set I’m leading this week!
Awesome! Hope the worship set goes well! 🙂
Hi Charmaine! I’ve been absent from the site for a while…and wish I hadn’t been!! I have totally been missing out! This is the most amazing tutorial! I felt….honestly ministered to through this video. Not only that, but since the new year I have led 3 services and though I think I have done a decent job have had some struggles. I am the kind of person who needs it spelled out for me…and you do exaclty that! I think I am going to listen to this several times to really soak it all in, but I wanted to say thank you SO MUCH! You are a blessing ♡
Hi Susan! Nice to hear from you! You’re so welcome, I’m so glad to hear that this video has been a blessing for you! <3
First of all just let me say… I love you and what you’re doing! No one else I’ve ever found is doing exactly what you’re doing. I have the Brett Manning program and have used it and it was helpful in vocals but you taking Brett’s principles and applying them to worship leading has been such a helpful tool. Thank you for your ministry and for answering the call of God to train worship vocalists.
Here’s my question… I have been the worship pastor at my church for right at 13 years now. Normally I like to have the person leading the song do that transition before their song. I have a lot of lead vocalists who are hesitant to do this and it gets really awkward at times. Do you think that it’s okay for me to just handle all the transitions for a short time just to model to them what to do? Or is it awkward for the transition to come from someone who isn’t singing lead on that particular song?
Hey Steffanie! Thanks for the encouragement! That’s a great question. In many cases, yes, having the person who’s leading the song do the transition can be ideal. However… it’s FAR from ideal if it’s sacrificing too much strength/energy/excellence in the service. In my opinion, I think modelling for them first is the way to go, with clear expectations given to them that they will be expected to do it in upcoming months… so they should be watching closely and practicing at home! I don’t think it’s awkward at all for you to do the transitions, even if you’re not leading that song, especially since you’re the worship pastor and obviously a very “known” figure at your church having been there for many years!
I’d say give it a time frame (2-3 months?). Transitions are incredibly important, so do your best to communicate the importance of it being a smooth flow… that it be theologically sound and not just unnecessary “fluff” (it’s crazy what some people say between songs!), the importance of preparation in advance, etc. At your rehearsals, and/or after the worship service, give them the “what” and “why” of what you’re doing/did in the transition… if you chose a scripture verse, why that one? If you chose to speak out an encouragement/exhortation, why did you choose the words you did? If you chose to sing something, why that? If a transition doesn’t go well, tell them why! For people who are new at leading transitions, it can be so overwhelming and mysterious of what to choose… when… why, etc…. but if we break it down for them, it can make the learning process a lot smoother!
Charmaine, our church is without musicians so I use worship tracks during our service. It is challenging to make transitions, at times because I’m also controlling the flow of the track, stopping and starting as I do transitions using scriptures and sometimes free flowing words trying to make connections to songs and people’s hearts. Any suggestions for me? Thanks!
Sounds like you are doing a fantastic job — the fact that you are doing all of this at the same time is admirable! Have you tried using pads at all between songs? If you’re running tracks, basically, you could aim to have a pad sound take over at the end of one song, and continue as you are praying/reading scripture, etc… then transition into the next song. There are lots of Youtube tutorials and sites devoted to pads— here’s one that you may find helpful: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffGAiFN_y0Y
Also… do you play keyboard at all? If you foresee perhaps being in this position for awhile, it would be good to learn some basic chording, if you don’t know how to already. Even if it becomes something that you only use in a song transition, or perhaps eventually in a very simple song, that can provide a much easier flow, especially to connect songs!
Hi Charmaine! Just watching this, I LOVE your teaching! I’m new at leading…I’ve lead songs for years, but I’ve only led the whole set a handful of times…but I know God has called me to this! I’m leading worship this Friday for a graduation (LCU), & I have 3 songs…could you tell me if the theme/flow is good? Alabaster Jar in E, King of my Heart in A, & Spirit of The Living God in D…I was planning on going back into the “Worthy, Worthy” part softly after ending Alabaster Jar, then ad libbing something like, “God, You are so Worthy…You are so Good…You are my King, You are my King”, then going into King of my Heart…then after that maybe just praying & inviting Holy Spirit to have His way, & move in our midst before starting the last song. (Problem is, my Dad is the keyboard player…I’m still learning…& we may/May not have a drummer…my Dad loves to “bang” on the keys, so it’s hard for me to ask him to play it “my way”….I appreciate ANY advice/insight/observations! 🙂
Hey! Glad this was helpful for you! I’m not familiar with Alabaster Jar, so I can’t speak much to theme flow, but I do have some suggestions for song key flow. As I talk about in the video with the circle of fifths, the way song transitions flow best is to move one key to the right on the chart. Second best is to move two keys to the right on the chart.
Since the chart moves D – A – E, and you’re moving E – A – D, the transitions won’t necessarily be “bad”, but they could probably be much smoother if you were able to change things up a bit! You’ll have to decide if it will affect your theme flow too much, or if your voice wouldn’t be able to handle a different key, but here are a couple ideas:
Change some of the keys:
D Alabaster Jar
A King of My Heart
E Spirit of the Living God (or do this one in D, because at least you’ll have one “better” transition in the set!)
Change song flow:
D Spirit of the Living God
A King of My Heart
E Alabaster Jar
Or… change both!
A King of My Heart
D Alabaster Jar
D Spirit of the Living God
Another suggestion for the future (best not to get into big discussions with musicians so close to the service dates) but I would suggest having a conversation with your dad about how you would like him to play keys. Show him real examples (from youtube, etc), and tell him WHY you want it played differently. Spoken in kindness and love, this is often an important and necessary conversation to have with musicians!
Hope this helps! 🙂
Yes it does, thank you so much!! 🙂
You’re welcome!
Awesome video! God is so faithful! I’ve been struggling with how to transition between the fast to slow songs for this Sunday’s service. I decided to watch this video, even though I didn’t think I had 42 free minutes, and I’m so glad I listened to the tugging in my heart. And to put the icing on the cake, those songs are on my setlist!!! Thank you Charmaine. God continue to bless you and your ministry!
Awesome! So glad it was a blessing to you and practical for what you needed!! God bless! 🙂
Thank You so much I learned from this session, May God Bless us all.
You’re very welcome!
Thank You so much, Miss Chamaine I learned a lot this chapter. We pray that God leading our heart while we worshiping and praising His song.
You’re welcome! And amen! Following His leading!!
This may be a bit off topic but I was told recently to practice in front of a mirror and that it would help a lot..can I get your thoughts on this please? 😉
Absolutely! Practicing in front of a mirror is an amazing thing to do because it helps us to be aware of what we look like to other people… posture, facial expression, etc. Another good idea is to have someone take a video clip of you when you’re singing in front of people (on stage at church, etc.) because that helps you be aware of any nervous habits you might have!
Brilliant
🙂