Memorization
Posted by: susheel <susheel@...>
Hmmm.... In a worship service context, I guess there are 2 advantages to
memorizing songs. First of all, it's so that the player himself or herself
can better focus on worshipping God. Secondly, if the worship leader or
pastor suddenly feels God leading him to sing an unscheduled song. In fact
this is not just limited to musicians - even vocalists and worship leaders
are encouraged to commit things to memory for these reasons. And I think
many worship pastors and music directors "enforce" the memorization rule so
that these 2 benefits can be achieved.
If I may offer a perspective, I don't see memorization as being the most
important thing. Practice is more important. The Bible shows us that the
Levites played skillfully on their instruments. Skill doesn't come by
memorization. it comes through practice. So that's what I'd encourage you
to do. If you have the worship songlist ahead of time, take some time to go
through it on your instrument. If you don't get the songlist ahead of time,
then get the chord charts for some of the more frequently sung songs in your
church and go through those.
Another suggestion, is to sing while you are playing. During the worship
service or rehearsals, when the song is being played, sing along - even if
it's not into a mic. 🙂
God bless!
susheel john
his sanctuary
singapore