Category Archives: Blog

Permalink to Sunday Set-List: May 1, 2011 (with audio!)

Sunday Set-List: May 1, 2011 (with audio!)

by Brian|on May 2, 2011 |in Blog, Sunday Set-Lists |Leave a comment

Special treat today: live audio of a few of the songs we did. We use a Zoom H1 recorder for some audio work, so today I thought I’d just sit the recorder in front of a speaker and see what happens. It’s not something I’d release on iTunes, but it’s pretty good for reference audio, and really easy. Just hit the record button.

Songs (download charts in the Worship Tutorials section):

Everlasting God – Brenton Brown

I Will Follow – Chris Tomlin

Your Grace Is Enough – Chris Tomlin

You Are So Good To Me – Third Day version

The message during the Evergreen service was over Psalm 23. I just so happen to have written a song recently over the same Psalm, so I sang the song during a reflection type time. Here is the audio:

“Though I Walk Through The Valley”
Permalink to Sunday Set-List: Easter Sunday

Sunday Set-List: Easter Sunday

by Brian|on May 2, 2011 |in Blog, Sunday Set-Lists |Leave a comment

Songs:

  • He Reigns – Newsboys
  • Mighty To Save – Hillsong
  • Our God – Chris Tomlin, Matt Redman
  • Happy Day – Tim Hughes

It was a great morning for both Evergreen and River Oaks! More energy than we’ve felt in a long time. I could hear the congregation worshipping at about the same level as the monitors, which was awesome.

Permalink to Good Friday Set-List

Good Friday Set-List

by Brian|on April 30, 2011 |in Blog, Sunday Set-Lists |Leave a comment

For Good Friday, all 4 churches that meet at Evergreen (I lead worship for two of them) got together and did an all-night prayer vigil service. It was a really cool experience, and each church encouraged everyone in the congregation to come for one hour during the night.

We had one hour carved out for worship music (from 11p to midnight), and I led that part by myself on acoustic. I think it went really well – there were more people there than I expected, and I personally had a great time worshipping God and reflecting on the cross.

Here are the songs I played:

  • Sweetly Broken – Jeremy Riddle
  • Hosanna – Hillsong (Brooke Fraser)
  • Mighty To Save – Hillsong
  • Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone) – Tomlin
  • The Wonderful Cross – Tomlin
  • Breathe – Marie Barnett
  • Amazing Love (You Are My King) – Billy Foote
  • Jesus Paid It All – Kristian Stanfill ver.
  • Blessed Be Your Name – Matt Redman
  • You Never Let Go – Matt Redman
  • How He Loves – John Mark McMillan
  • The Heart of Worship – Matt Redman
  • Revelation Song – Jennie Lee Riddle

I sort of grouped songs by key, which allowed me to just flow from one to the next. Another thing I did was some encouraging between songs while strumming. I’m not so great at talking while I strum – it’s like my brain is keeping track of too many things at once, ha! I usually have other musicians in the band playing while I speak a scripture or an encouragement on Sunday mornings, but this time it was just me. It came off better than I thought!

Overall, it was really good night.

Permalink to Sunday Set-List: April 17, 2011

Sunday Set-List: April 17, 2011

by Brian|on April 21, 2011 |in Blog, Sunday Set-Lists |Leave a comment

Sets for both services:

to download chord charts for all these songs, click the title of the song, or visit the Worship Tutorials section for a list of all the charts I’ve got

  • Unfailing Love (Psalm 57) – original – pre service – this is one of my originals, and we’ve done it a couple times now as a pre-service song. We use the pre-service slot to introduce new songs. So far the band has played this song a couple times, and the musicians seem to really like it. I’ll schedule it for worship soon – it’ll be the first time I’ve scheduled one of my originals for corporate worship.
  • Grace Like Rain – Todd Agnew
  • I Will Follow – Chris Tomlin – this is a newer song for our congregations, and actually – this is the first time we’ve played it in the worship set. It went really well, and the band really likes it.
  • Breathe – Marie Barnett – this is always a very powerful song for us. One of my favorites to lead.
  • How He Loves - John Mark McMillan – can’t go wrong with this song – another great one.

Both services were really good. We’re starting to see new faces at each church, which is really exciting. Can’t wait to see what happens next week!

Permalink to Basics of Recording: Software

Basics of Recording: Software

by Brian|on April 16, 2011 |in Blog, Recording |Leave a comment

See all the posts in the Basics of Recording Series here.

The software you use when recording is important, but not as important as you might think. Lots of people seem to think that if they could only get their hands on Pro Tools, they’ll be able to create mixes that sound like what the big studios make – because Pro Tools is what the major studios use.

I’m sure that Pro Tools is great, but it’s not going to give you major label magic on your recordings.

In my opinion, there are two essential things that you need to make sure about when it comes to software.

read more »

Permalink to YouTube Comments, and Christians Singing Secular Songs

YouTube Comments, and Christians Singing Secular Songs

by Brian|on April 16, 2011 |in Blog, Faith |2 Comments

If you’ve ever uploaded anything to YouTube that happened to get more than a couple views, you know that people love to express their dislike in the comments. My most viewed video is a cover of “Slow Dancing in a Burning Room” by John Mayer, and wow – I’ve heard about 300 times over how pitchy my vocals are.

Allow me to illustrate a recent conversation on one of my videos. The video is an original song of mine called “I Have A Plan For You”, and the words come from Jeremiah 29.

Before we go – a bit of a disclaimer. I don’t think it’s good for people to drag negativity and bickering out in public, and most of these types of conversations that happen in blogs/twitter/youtube/etc should happen in private. Having said that – this person made it a point to publicly say these things, so here we go…

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Permalink to New Site Design Coming

New Site Design Coming

by Brian|on April 11, 2011 |in Blog |Leave a comment

Brand new site re-design coming soon here!

I’m excited about it. What do you think?

Permalink to Come Find Rest – 2011 Songwriting Challenge

Come Find Rest – 2011 Songwriting Challenge

by Brian|on April 8, 2011 |in 2011 Songwriting Challenge, Blog, My Music |Leave a comment

My 2011 Songwriting Challenge song for March is a very simple verse and chorus based on Matthew 11:28.

Listen to the other songs I’ve written in 2011 here.

Lyrics:

Come find rest
All you weary, find rest
All you hungry, find bread
And all you thirsty, drink water that never ceases

Praise the Father, the Lord of heaven
Praise the Father, the Lord of heaven
For in You we find rest
In you we find rest

Permalink to Gear

Gear

by Brian|on April 8, 2011 |in Blog, Gear |Leave a comment

This page serves as a current inventory of all my stuff. Hit the links for a more in-depth look including reviews, photos, and how I use the gear I use.

Guitars

  • Martin D35 – with K&K Pure Western Mini pickups installed – Review and photos
  • Takamine FD-360sc – Review and photos
  • Custom built blue Telecaster
  • Custom built pink Telecaster

Previously owned:

  • Samick Acoustic Guitar
  • Paul Reed Smith SE Soapbar II
  • Fender  72 Thinline Telecaster RI
  • Fender Jimmie Vaughan Stratocaster
  • Epiphone Les Paul Standard
  • Ibanez Bass

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Permalink to Are Their Eyes Shining?

Are Their Eyes Shining?

by Brian|on April 6, 2011 |in Blog, Worship |2 Comments

I just finished watching this TED talk by Benjamin Zander about passion and music. He made two powerful statements that I believe are directly correlated to worship.

1. Everybody loves classical music, they just don’t know it yet.

Let me rephrase – “Everybody loves worship, they just don’t know it yet.

2. If their eyes are shining, you know you’re doing it.

He then goes on to say this…

“If the eyes are not shining, you get to ask a question. And this is the question: Who am I being that my player’s eyes are not shining?”

What does this have to do with worship?

Two things:

  1. Everybody loves worship. Literally, we were made to worship God. We just don’t all know it yet.
  2. It’s our job as worship leaders to bring people into worship.

I think as worship leaders, we’ve all looked out into a congregation before and seen people who appear to be bored, or at least not into what’s going on. Maybe they’re truly worshipping, but maybe they’ve had a bad day/week/year/life, and they just don’t feel like engaging As Benjamin says, “their eyes aren’t shining”. So, I’m asking the question

Who am I being that their eyes aren’t shining?

Are my eyes shining? Am I worshipping? Are the members of my band or team worshipping?

I believe that to lead, we have to first do.

I’ve embedded the video below -it’s about 20 minutes, and it will inspire you.

read more »

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