22.06.09
Musicality
If I haven’t mentioned it before: we are involved in a church that is being started in East Ryde. To set up, and in preparation for our launch in September, a group of us have been working through the different aspects of church. What the Bible says about it. What we can do differently. How we can think outside the square. How we can cater to those who don’t feel like they fit in to church culture.
It’s been great to bounce different ideas around and watch as our baby church comes together.
Music has been an interesting subject. Most people have an opinion on church music… There are people who sing, who sing badly, who don’t sing at all, who like old hymns, who like new music, who don’t care as long as it’s theologically correct. Discussions on the subject can last for weeks.
I was thinking about it last night and kind of started to understand what exactly I want from church music.
When I was a teenager, I loved my Hillsong cassettes. My family can testify to my woeful singing (due to headphones) while listening to my walkman in the car. That music was helpful in expressing that particularly emotional stage of my life. The one thing I didn’t enjoy about them however, was that they often imposed the emotion. The long drawn out end to a song with lots of ‘woahooos’ etc was particularly annoying.
Then I moved to Sydney and was introduced to ‘Sydney Anglican music’. The theologically correct, but not necessarily emotion evoking (Rock of Ages and the like excepted). Some of it even seemed ‘clunky’ and out of date. The CD’s were good… but they all seemed have the same style and sound and get boring after a while. there were songs that could have been explored a little more creatively and weren’t. Perhaps they were afraid anything more would make the music unsingable by a congregation?
I think the ideal church music – for me – would be melodious, thought provoking, with a emotive and reflective mood (without the imposing factor). It should also stand up as biblically correct, but not pharisaically* so.
It excites me that we are trying to do something different with church music.. it excites me that we are trying to do something different with church! I really really hope we get somewhere good with music… that would be so cool. 
Check out our website !
* Is that a word? If not, it should be.
