Let's start with an explanation. This post is sort of masquerading as a manual, but is in fact more or less a polemic. There are some severe issues I see in the field of worship songwriting. I've been doing this myself for some twenty years or so now. And it appears to me that we're going about this wrong. Songwriters, worship song writers that is, have a tendency to see themselves as something so unique in the church that they have a special list of rules that only applies to them. So the following is an attempt to correct the skewed perspective we've been living with.
1. Your songwriting is a spiritual gift, therefore, unlike songwriting in the secular world, what you produce does not belong to you. What you produce is inspired by the spirit of God for the people of God in the context of the church. It belongs firstly to the church. (Do the math. No Spirit, no church, no song.) Therefore, it's immoral to assume that residual income from copyright belongs to you or worse, to those you to whom you sign your 'rights' away. Money is a powerful corrupting influence and we have certainly seen that recently in the field of worship songwriting. Some people have "made good" as the saying goes, and so many others have jumped on the bandwagon, for their own gain. The quality of worship songs has suffered in the face of quantity. If, on the other hand we turned off the tap by recognizing that the money was never theirs to begin with, the dominance of powerful 'Christian' publishing houses who flood our churches with substandard worship songs, might be reduced. You, the worship songwriter can assist this by backing off of your vision to make serious bucks off of something that was freely given to you for others.
2. Never lose your raw edge. What you wrote when you were inspired by your own anguish, or by a theological truth, or by a corporate experience is what will last and what people will remember. Beware the commercial music mentor, who comes to tell you what really works and how to craft music to his false standard. Speaking as a fan, after Famous Worship Leader X had this kind of encounter with Recording Artist A, few indeed are the songs written after this 'discipleship' that anyone wants to sing.
3. Production values are false values. Creating perfect music is a worthy goal gone off the rails. Why will people sing your song? Because and only because God touched them once when they were singing it. Focus on that.
4. Once the rush of inspiration on any one song has run its course, work on poetic composition. Rhymes are good, consistency of rhythm is good. Consistency of expression and thought are essential. Hill Song songs are the worst offenders. A best example of this is one of their older offerings: "My Redeemer Lives" can't stay on the same subject for more than one phrase. But this is hardly a one-off. I'd say that not more than five percent of any of their songs doesn't veer off-theme at least once. Another song which could have used some help was Brian Doerksen's "Holy God." The inclusion, without any other Hebrew names of God, of the word 'Adonai' was ill-judged in my view. We just don't use the term often enough to throw it in the way it was done.
5. Publicity as a pursuit is a symptom of the involvement of money in this thing that should never have become an industry. Don't bother. Publicity photos drip with the vanity of assumed expressions, poses, etc. There's just nothing good about it. Also choosing cool names for your band, etc. What do you get out of it? Nothing.
6. Beware elitism in your sector. This includes not just writers but performers and worship leaders. There isn't a need for you to think of yourselves as artists to be pandered to, even among yourselves. Connect with other people. In one event, I wasn't sure whether to be elated or disgusted when I was finally in conversation with Famous Worship Leader Y, whom, I'd been with in various places and churches with, for years. The reason for this extremely random connection? I'd just conducted a choir at some seasonal production at a Vineyard. Magically, I was now not a nonentity. Worship leading just a function in the church. Stop being so bloody aloof. And the pursuit of excellence must be subordinated to a bunch of other concerns. Firing someone off your band because there is now someone better available sends every wrong message about your own character and the character of your church.
7. Also for the whole sector, don't let new teachers or new teachings side track you from what you do. A couple of years ago there was a nonsense circulating about how all of life was worship. Of course it's true in one sense, but not in the sense that we talk about when we say "corporate worship." Maybe we should be using the word liturgy, instead of worship. Would have been clearer. At any rate that teaching took the life out of corporate worship so effectively, we haven't really recovered.
8. Wanting to teach your songs and wanting your congregation to make the most of their together time with God can be a conflict of interest. Be aware of that. Check on how it went.
9. Music should be fairly original. There are some pretty hackneyed chord progressions going around these days. Stay away.
10. Stop pillaging the public domain for your own gain. Chris Tomlin has no business claiming copyright on his version of Amazing Grace.
11. As an alternative to copyright, being that you don't want others to falsely claim a song you wrote as their own, may I suggest Creative Commons Attribution? It's what I use.
