Playing Hymns on the Drum Set

July 17th, 2013

All too often I hear drum set players use a simple rock beat for hymns. I would challenge drummers to think a little more creatively and improvise a part that is more stylistically appropiate. Someday I plan to upload some recordings of myself improvising to these old songs but for now, here is a place to start:

  • Try playing the melody on the drums. The drum you use should not be based on pitch, but rather on where the note is in the measure. Almost like you’re letting the melody influence that rock beat you’ve already been doing.
  • Listen to the pianist and imitate. Usually, the pianist will drive these traditional songs. Get ideas from there. If there is no pianist at your church, get with one from outside your church and jam for a while.
  • Play something different for every verse and make it match the lyrics. “Up from the grave he arose with a mighty triumph o’re his foes!” There are about 50 good things to do right there. A simple rock beat is not one of them.
  • Emphasize beats 1 and 3 when in 4/4. This style comes from a classical tradition and you should not be emphasizing 2 and 4 like you normally would. However, do NOT put the snare on 1 and 3 to do this…that just sounds bad. Be creative, you’ll get it.

That’s all for now. I’ll be sharing more on this topic soon.

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Learn How to Sing Hymns in Parts – Just Two Minutes a Day

July 16th, 2013

I’ve been taking a break from composing to work on this Sing Hymns in Parts project. So since I’m making it, I may as well share a little bit on how to use it:

Practicing every day is more important than practicing for a long time. Listening to a single video and singing along with it for two minutes a day will do more for you than practicing 15 minutes once a week.

Try a part to “Amazing Grace” right now. Do it once or twice, and then try again tomorrow.


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Proclamation – New Recording

May 22nd, 2013

Here is a new recording of Proclamation that my wife (Liz) and friend (Eva) made recently. It’s a huge improvement from the old one, and we are excited about it. Enjoy!

 


Old recording.

Proclamation

I’ve learned to never force music into the box I originally intended it to be put into, but this violin and clarinet duet took that concept to a new level for me. My original plan was to write a sacred work for violin and saxophone for my friend and I to play during communion services. Typically, communion has two musical segments; one for each communion element. So, I wanted the work to be two movements with each being less than two minutes long. The first movement came together very naturally and very quickly, but then life happened and I never got around to writing the second movement. When I finally got a chance to work on it again, I realized that there was no good musical reason to add a second movement. I also realized that the only reason I was using the saxophone was because I sound my best on it. Clarinet blends with violin much more naturally (although I attribute this partly to traditional bias) and the very simple part I had written for it makes more sense with a simpler sound. I rewrote the piece for violin and clarinet thinking I would just have my wife play it instead; She and my friend have performed it several times. So, I started with a two movement work for violin and saxophone to be used for communion and ended up with a one movement work for violin and clarinet to be used for who knows what.

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Lost in the Sound of Separation – Response by Evamarie Burnham

February 2nd, 2013

We are in the car listening to Underoath’s album Lost in the Sound of Separation. Caleb knows this is not the kind of music I like to listen to, but says I should still be exposed to it. He keeps commenting on how cool the drumming is, so I try to pay special attention to the rhythm. Though I don’t understand it, I can appreciate the intricacy of the beats. I have a harder time enjoying the hard screamo sound.

We read the lyrics of one of the songs: confusion, brokenness. Caleb’s impression (he has read through the lyrics to all the songs and listened to the CD many times), is deep angst (remorse, regret) over sin and the brokenness it causes.

We near the end of the CD; the music takes on a different character. No more screaming desperation—instead, the lyricism of sadness. My heart hurts. This beauty, flowing from sadness and despair, is inextricably linked with the darkness it wars against. It is Galadriel: though she expends her power to aid the ringbearer, the fires of Mount Doom that break the power of Sauron cause her also to “fade and go into the West.” Intertwined with evil, her beauty fights against the very fabric of its own being.

Complete change: the dark beauty and intricate percussion give way to the simple repetitiveness of a ring shout.

“Good God, can you still get us home,
Good God, can you still get us home,
Good God, can you still get us home?”

The ring shout, a chant of slaves working day
        after day
                after heart-wrenching day

with no personal gain from their labor, and the hope—the possibility—of freedom like a faint pin-prick of light in an entire universe of blackness.

This ring shout, a chant of sinners working day
        after day
                after heart-wrenching day

to pay up for their sin, yet accomplishing nothing. So enslaved to sin that they wonder if even the Lord Almighty, the completely powerful God, “the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth” (Isaiah 40) is able to free them.

The climax: a juxtaposition of hopeless ritual, melodious despair, and the inhuman torment of a scream. Fighting each other, these sounds work together to show me not only the complete hopelessness of the lost without Christ, but also the utter depravity of my own little white lies.

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Our Prayer Problem – Singing Will Help Us to Pray

January 28th, 2013

Thinking back over this past week, I don’t remember spending any sort of intentional time in prayer for any significant period of time. Thirty seconds here and there for meals, bedtimes, praying over the concerns of others when they ask for it, and maybe a few other times that I’m forgetting about. Then I justify my pathetic prayer life by saying, “At least I’ve been reading my Bible.” If I took my Bible reading seriously I would come to that place where it says “Never stop praying” and start praying. The fact is that my cumulative time spent in prayer each week is less than an hour. If you’re honest, I’m guessing you’ll admit your prayer life is much the same as mine. Even the people who can honestly say they pray for more than a few minutes here and there will still say they don’t pray enough. An all-out prayer warrior will tell you that it’s not possible to pray enough.

Prayer

This morning was different for me, however. I spent about ten minutes learning the tenor part to “Holy, Holy, Holy” (click here to learn your part too). Interestingly enough, I was praying the entire time. When we sing to God, we are praying. When we sing to God in a group, we are praying in a group. When we sing our different parts in a group, we are all contributing unique content to our prayer. When we take the time to learn our part of a song that was designed to be sung in four part harmony, we can meditate on the words and let them penetrate our hearts. We pray on our own as we learn our part, then again in a group as we sing it with other believers who have also let the words of the prayer penetrate their hearts.

Song is not just an extra help to our prayer life, it is a necessary element. In fact, most of the prayers in the Bible are songs. Mary’s prayer in Luke 1 seems to have been some sort of song. Exodus 15 explicitly states that Miriam’s prayer was a song. Although the Bible doesn’t say that Moses actually sang his lengthy prayer in Deuteronomy 32, it does indicate that he was at least reciting a song. Oh, and let’s not forget the Psalms: the longest book of the Bible, which is completely dedicated to prayer through music.

All of the spiritual giants in the New Testament are seen praying through music in scripture. Matthew 26:30 very clearly states that Jesus sang with his disciples, and the phrase “they had sung” presupposes that they sang something they knew; in other words, they sang it more than once before. Acts 16:25 states that Paul and Silas were singing hymns and praying in prison. Ephesians 5:19 (NIV) says, “Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord…” Colossians 3:16, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God.” James 5:13 “Is any one of you in trouble? He should pray. Is anyone happy? Let him sing songs of praise.” As I hope you can see, prayer and song seem to go together more often than not. Our prayer deficiency is partly caused by a singing deficiency. Prayer and song are the same spiritual discipline.

If you don’t sing, it’s time to learn. If you do sing, are you singing?

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