Sunday Setlist [3.01.09] & Friday Setlist [2.27.09]
FRIDAY SETLIST:
We opened up for the Fireproof Your Marriage weekend conference with Michael & Amy Smalley here in Valdosta. Four churches came together and hosted this event. I really enjoyed leading worship in a different venue with totally different people. In fact, because of the multi-church factor, I decided to put together a setlist that was made up of more older and recognizable tunes for the most part. We also, scaled back to a small acoustic set with 2 vocals instead of our normal rockin’ set.
- Your Love is Beautiful (Hillsong): Key Cm. Even as an acoustic arrangement this song rocks. In fact, I played the “house” piano there (keep in mind it’s a huge church with only a piano and/or pipe organ).
- Friend of God (Houghton): Key D (capo 2 played in C with some nice major sevenths and minor add nines thrown in for color). I’m not really fond of this song. It’s just gotten kind of stale for me…but we definitely included it because of it’s repetitive nature and easy to sing along factor.
- Blessed Be Your Name (Redman): Key G. Don’t think this one will ever get old for me. I love it. Awesome as an acoustic arrangement.
- You Are So Good To Me (Pasley/Chaffer): Key G. An oldie but a goodie. Third Day has a pseudo new arrangement of this that we hear on the radio over and over so it was a good one to include.
- How Great is Our God/How Great Thou Art (Tomlin): Key G. Had to include this one. I can’t believe this song is almost half a decade old. It still rocks. And technically, this is the FIRST time I’ve ever led it. Weird I know. Anyways, when we hit the How Great Thou Art ending, everyone jumped to their feet and I actually thought we had a full SATB choir in the house. SWEET! I wish I had thought to incorporate another hymn or 2! It was beautiful.
SUNDAY SETLIST:
We used some of the same music. Kind of killing 2 birds with 1 stone mentality for our Sunday morning gathering, so that we could rehearse on the same night.
- Friend of God (Houghton): Key D.
- Blessed Be Your Name (Redman): Key G.
- God of this City (Tomlin Hello Love Arr.): Key A. We love this song, but typically don’t get to use it a lot since we do mainly upbeat music for our Sunday morning gatherings.
I love doing the oldies!
Question: How did you come to the decision of Cm on Your Love Is Beautiful?
@Mark: Honestly, it’s easier for the keyboard players. The guitarists are mainly playing barre chords anyways. It isn’t too far off the original (C#m) and the vocal range is right on for our leads.
Ah, I see! As a guitarist I was thinking “why not just change it to Bm, since that would be easier to play and dovetail nicely into the next song”. But it totally makes sense since you lead from keys!
@Mark: Also, since our typical worship setlist only contains 3 songs and we craft our services thematically, usually key and “flow” from song to song isn’t a top priority.
So you’ll see us go from E to Cm to D or A to G then back to A with no regards to “flow” – it takes a bit to explain, but in a nutshell, our music time is more about creating an upbeat energetic welcoming atmosphere, then creating a flowing, intimate “worship” atmosphere.
A really good line-up! Tomlin’s and Redman’s songs should be around a long time.
@Paul: thanks for the comment. I agree, great stuff coming from those guys.
I love it when worship leaders get it. It’s not about playing the songs that you love or get ministered to by….it’s about playing songs that the most people in your congregation can worship too.
Love seeing your set list evolve with your crowd. True sign of worship/ministry maturity.
@Jon: Thanks! It was definitely a great experience. The whole weekend was an enriching experience!
Great week Russ…and yeah, what Jon said about. If I was doing music that worked for me, it would be a whole lot different to what works for our people. And it’s them I have the job to lead into worship – I know how to get there myself.
Glad the whole weekend was great for you guys!
I love an acoustic set! Great set!
@David: Thanks man! I especially enjoyed your song this week (The Matrix)!
@Steff: It is always one of my favorite avenues to take when leading worship, though I don’t travel it as much as I’d like to here where I’m at. Because of that it’s really special when we do get to tone it down a bit.