Song Mapping (Worship Training)

I think it's time to share some free tools for worship training. Sometimes our music teams get into a pattern of doing things a certain way without knowing the purposes behind it. We keep using the same methods, even when there are better ones, or when we need to freshen up our old ways of doing things. 

Scheduling regular worship training for each of our ministry teams ensures that we keep trying to improve, we stretch ourselves in creativity and hone our skills so that we can give the very best worship offering to our Father. 

Today's free resource is a chart called a Song Map. This is a tool that you can use during an annual training workshop, or even an extra-long weekday practice when learning a new song. Its purpose is to allow your team to truly listen to a recording of a song and notice minute details about instrumentation, energy, layering of voices and harmonies, etc. It will show you how the artists in the recorded version chose to build the song.

When you finish the process, you will have a spreadsheet that shows you, at a glance, what should be happening in any part of the song. 

You won't want to use this for every new song. It is time-consuming to complete, and seasoned musicians will learn to listen for these things automatically. But especially if you have a team who is still learning their instruments and learning to play together, developing their listening ears is one of the best skills you can give them. 

Immediately after using this, you should notice some more awareness among your musicians about when to play and sing, and it will also allow your leaders/arrangers more ideas about how to craft a song.

How to use a song map

1) PREPARE

Listen on your own to the song recording. As you listen, jot down the order of each section. For example, "Verse 1, Pre-Chorus 1, Chorus 1, Verse 2, Pre-Chorus 1, Chorus 1, Bridge, Bridge, Chorus 2, Tag, Ending"

Prepare the template by typing in the song name and changing the heading for each section, then copying/pasting the lyrics for each section. This enables your team members to easily follow along when it is their turn to listen. 

Print one out for each team member. Use 11x17" paper. If your printer doesn't print this big, I suggest printing them at your local print shop instead of shrinking it to 8.5x11, because else the boxes will be too small to write in. If you have too many sections, consider combining some or using multiple pages. You also do not have to use the entire song to get a good idea for how to build the song. 

2) EXPLAIN

Explain what they are going to do. Give several examples of what you are looking for. For example, "I see that the male singer doesn't come in until verse 2 and the harmony is added in the second chorus. I see that the drums start with a double floor tom on beat 2. I hear the keyboard use more reverb starting on the second chorus. The guitar cuts out during the verses. It only uses downstrums during the bridge."

Tell your team members why you are doing this. "This is to train your ears to listen more, both to the way that others play this song and to the musicians who are playing along with you. In doing this, we can learn to effectively build a song instead of always playing the same thing. Sometimes the difference from one verse to the next comes down to only one small change."

3) LISTEN & WRITE

Play the song recording at least twice. The first time, ask them just to listen and follow along as it plays. The second time, they can start writing stuff down. Give them a moment to finish writing as the song finishes.

Remind people that silence is a very important part of music and they should write in when to stay silent. If someone is not singing or playing in a certain section, that's because it was an intentional choice to leave them out, because whoever was arranging the song thought it would be better with select voices/instruments at that point. 

4) SHARE

After listening, ask each musician or group of musicians (for example, percussionists, singers, etc.) to share what they noticed in each section. 

It is better to go through the song section by section, instead of sharing only one instrument at a time. That ensures that everyone stays attentive and can even build on what each other say. 

5) LISTEN AGAIN

If you have time for a third listen, do it after sharing with the group. After the sharing, they will know exactly what to look for, and they will find more details to fill in.

6) PLAY

After completing the song map, have everyone play through the song together. 

If you are doing this at a large worship training event, and you have multiple musicians for each instrument, you can take turns playing the song together at the end, but make sure you don't weary people by going through the song too many times. Those who aren't on stage can just take notes and learn by listening. 

 

Tips

*You may also wish to use this when arranging a worship song from scratch

*Don't worry if you don't notice everything. You can take it home and listen multiple times, adding more every time you listen. But even with 1-2 listens, you will already hear things which you may be able to incorporate into your playing which will lift the level of the song performance.

*Try to do this with multiple styles of songs, so you can learn. If you don't usually play jazzy or gospel songs, for example, it can be very enlightening to listen and see the choices that the artist makes, and then try to apply some of them in your own worship. 

Here's your free resource: Song Map for Worship Training

Download Word format (.docx)  |  Download Pages format (.pages)

Purpose: To train your musicians to listen and think more deeply about their song arrangements

Audience: Worship Musicians

Feel free to modify this resource in whatever way will help you and your training purposes. 

If the song map works for your team, please drop a comment below and tell me how you used it.