WTF is it with Americans and playing in churches

[Neil.C]

IIRC approx 50% of Americans attend churches on a regular basis compared with about 2% here.

Little wonder really that a lot of guitars etc get used in places of worship in the US.

[thebeagle]

God doesn't give a fuck if you are using symmetrical or asymmetrical clipping.

Sig-worthy

[daveyh]

Actually, some churches here do have parishioner formed rock bands to lead the community singing. These are almost always the newer trendy churches in modern buildings and with a younger clientele than the handful of pensioners in a gloomy, draughty old traditional type church.

You also find that modern churches are specifically designed for amplified music, I know of two churches with *very* good acoustics indeed, with very hefty in-situ sound systems. Can be a good source of rehearsal space too.

[erictheweary]

We've had forumites on here playing in church groups and I know a couple of people who do. Quite fancied it myself in my church going period.
Polite religious audience would make a nice change.
Just need to fix some of the ska tunes. Lip up Jesus?

[daveyh]

We've had forumites on here playing in church groups and I know a couple of people who do. Quite fancied it myself in my church going period.
Polite religious audience would make a nice change.
Just need to fix some of the ska tunes. Lip up Jesus?

I know a guy who is a minister at a URC, and is the MD for the music side of it. There's a repertoire of 'worship music' and they have their standards, and it's less than inspiring IMHO. TBH, just think of it as hymns with guitars.

[frankus]

Had an interesting conversation with the leader of one church group about the quartal harmonies he used in his orchestrations - sounded like the Carpenters - his band was the one all the other bands looked to in the church - they did rotas.

Church, done the way I like it is, no different to a lot of other venues. A lot of church-goers treat it as a social club. Ultimately, I prefer spending my Sunday mornings fighting twenty other guys in angry white pyjamas ... and I don't believe in God

[ESBlonde]

The Bible Belt of the USA has some truly huge churches. They are modern buildings designed with full audio visual capability the likes of which most of us never get to use on stage. Think lasers and moving head stage lights with full projection ability and a line array sound system run with a multi Chanel digital desk. Preachers with wireless mics and in ear monitors, paid professional audio engineers the full monty. These buildings hold thousands and I've heard of some that have to do 3 services a day just to get everyone to at least one! Often they have outreach teams with 5 or 10Kw sound systems they can set up in car parks or fields or at fairs to Preach further, it's big business over there very big.

For those with bugger all else to do have a butchers here

http://www.prosoundweb.com/church

and here for the working HOW/Church forums
http://forums.prosoundweb.com/index.php#c5

There really is little of the same over here by comparison.

[erictheweary]

I know a guy who is a minister at a URC, and is the MD for the music side of it. There's a repertoire of 'worship music' and they have their standards, and it's less than inspiring IMHO. TBH, just think of it as hymns with guitars.

there's a guy at work who plays guitar and bass in a worship group and whilst they play certain standards they have other services where they play their original material as well - which is sort of modern progressive rock. No questions about which valve amp though, they just use Zoom multi fx straight into a small PA.

I did once go to a Christian rock festival. Which was okay but quite odd in the sense that each band seemed to be a christian version of a better known band. So there would be a band that sounded a lot like Iron Maiden but singing about God followed by a band that sounded a lot like Def leppard but singing songs about God and so on.

Last witter from me - I did also used to know a guy who played in Martin Jospeh's band and they played Christian Rock festivals all over the world, just a much,much bigger market elsewhere than it is here ( around the time Martin was getting top 40 singles singing about God so even in the UK there is/was a reasonable market).

[bertie]

God doesn't give a fuck if you are using symmetrical or asymmetrical clipping.
.

but he does care about modelling

John, Chapter 2, Line 6

[monquixote]

but he does care about modelling

John, Chapter 2, Line 6

Wasn't there something about worshipping false relics?