2012 March — Tom Jacksons Expressive Worship

The Why, What, and When of Movement

The Why

Why move when you’re on the platform? I’m sort of philosophical. I want to understand the “why” before the “what” and “when.” “Why” is because your songs don’t sound the same, and so they shouldn’t look the same!

To those who are watching, if the songs look the same, and 55% of what you’re communicating is what they see, then the songs sound the same. And you start to lose them. No one wants to lose… they want to take their listeners on a journey – with a beginning, a middle, and an ending.

As singers and musicians, we know the content of our songs – what we want to accomplish. We need to communicate that to the audience.

By changing visually what we do onstage [Read more...]

Have Your Heart Right – But Do it Right Too

By Tom Jackson 3 Comments

I’ve taught at a lot of worship conferences over the years. I love the desire of worship teams to learn!

One of my favorite worship conferences to teach at (besides my own) is the Christian Musician Summit. It’s held every year in Buffalo, Sacramento, Phoenix and Seattle. What I love about it is this: there’s real training going on at every one of them. People learn practical skills to make their worship team better.

I can’t say that’s always the case at every conference where I’ve taught. In fact, a huge theme at many of the others is “having your heart right with God.” Don’t get me wrong… I want you to have your heart right with God! In fact, you probably shouldn’t be on a worship team if your heart isn’t into it for the right reasons.

But I’m concerned about worship teams who [Read more...]

A Fine Meal or Goulash

By Tom Jackson Leave a Comment

I want to give my audience what they came for – and they came to experience moments!

As musicians, we assume the audience is there to hear some good music. We have some great musical moments for them, and some cool lyrical things going on. In one song there’s this awesome bass lick, and in another song the lead guitar is stellar.

But audiences can’t discern that stuff because they’re not musicians! It’s like a big plate of goulash to them. So we need to make it more obvious – [Read more...]

The Definition of Insanity

By Tom Jackson 1 Comment

Albert Einstein said “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” He was a smart dude.

I don’t want that definition to apply to how you approach what you do on the platform. I want you to get out of the thought process of “singing songs,” and into the thought process of “creating moments.”

So does it have to be a song full of special meaning for you in order to create a moment? [Read more...]

The Freedom to Disappoint

By Amy Wolter 3 Comments

My recent blog ‘Baby Steps’ looked at the role a worship leader at a new church, and what it takes to integrate new ideas into an old mindset. My friend ‘Jay’ helped me out by sharing his experience.

Since Jay was going into a traditional church making the move to a more contemporary music style, he had to be careful about not making changes too quickly or abruptly and took time to learn the songs the team was already doing.

Obviously change isn’t easy for most people and will typically be met with opposition. His first Sunday there, he got complaints about [Read more...]

I Don’t Want to be Interesting

By Tom Jackson Leave a Comment

One of the Facebook comments I get pretty often after people see me teach a conference class is: “I saw you at ____, and you were so interesting.”

My mind always goes a million ways when I read something like that. I’m glad someone saw me, and I certainly am glad I held their interest. I even appreciate that they found me on Facebook and thought enough of my class to comment!

But I’ve realized, I don’t want to be “interesting,” entertaining, or even fun for singers, bands, and musicians! At least that’s not my #1 priority. [Read more...]