Southern Gospel in Kelowna

Sometimes it feels right to just dial into that good ol’ gospel music. Right now we’re featuring John Lee Sanders on our Worship Café home page, rebroadcast from his appearance at Worship Café on June 27^th 2010.

John Lee was originally an American, and made the choice five years ago to head up to Canada and become one of us. According to his newsletter, it’s been a good choice: John Lee has been winning Canadian music awards, headlining festivals, and selling out performing arts centres throughout Western Canada since he’s been here. On a side note, Sanders still writes “centers” rather than “centres” – seems like the Canadian spelling of some of these key words still needs to sink in a bit further…

In December of last year John Lee spent some time in Vancouver as the special guest of the Good Noise Gospel Choir, a 75-voice group who hosted three sold-out Christmas shows at the Christ Church Cathedral.

John Lee at Christ Church Cathedral (photo: johnleesanders.com)

What I liked about John Lee’s appearance at Worship Café was his ability to connect with the people in the café, his down-home attitude, and his great bluesy gospel voice and piano playing. One of the highlights for me was his version of “His Eye Is On The Sparrow” – it just seems to work as a piano piece.

Like all of our past worship events, the complete John Lee Sanders session is in the Worship Café archives; right now you can just go to worshipcafe.net and hear his whole session right on the home page.

watch John Lee Sanders - "His Eye Is On The Sparrow" 

Serendipity

Serendipity is described as being “the occurrence of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way”. That was the case for last Sunday’s Worship Café. Our previously booked artist was not able to come (meaning, of course, that it wasn’t serendipitous for her) and at the last minute we had to arrange a substitution.

Nico Boesten filled in, supported by Michael Donley on guitar and Eric Funk on drums, and the trio did an amazing job. Nico played some original music plus cover tunes by artists such as Bruce Cockburn, Phil Wickham, Van Morrison, and even Ben Harper (yep). A couple of classic hymns rounded out the afternoon, and I know everyone in the café enjoyed the whole hour.

Why do I say Nico’s appearance was serendipitous? Well, I’m sure our previously booked guest would have been very good, and would have led us in a great time of worship. But I like Nico’s approach to worship, and I always find his playing and singing, and song selection, to be consistently refreshing – I like it when he’s booked here. Our recent attempts at rebooking him haven’t met with much success due to his busy life and other reasons, so his willingness to step in and help us out at the last minute meant that we were able to slide him in (along with Michael and Eric) and have a great Sunday afternoon of worship. A refreshing time of worship.

It feels sometimes like the world is getting faster and faster, even on Sundays. That might be just because it’s December, and that holiday gift-giving deadline is approaching swiftly. Whatever the case, the chance to interrupt the flow of the world for a bit, nab a warm drink, and sit back for a good break in a great atmosphere of worship makes Sunday afternoons at the WC seem more and more appealing.

Next Sunday is our final worship session of 2010. We’re very much looking forward to having Heather Clark and Kim Smith join us for an afternoon of Christmas songs from their own Christmas albums. And this won’t be a bunch of songs about Santa, I’m sure! I’m really looking forward to it. A great way to end the season. How serendipitous.

December at Worship Cafe

It’s that time of year again; the trees are barren (well, mainly – the early snow caught some of the lazy leaves still hanging around), the ground is white, the air is cold… and Christmas is almost here!

We just heard via facebook that Jodi King is unable to be with us this coming Sunday. She has a very ill family member, so our thoughts are with her. We’ll still have Worship Café, though, smack dab at 4PM Pacific. Who’ll be our guest? You’ll have to come out to see or tune in to find out!

December 19^th is our last Worship Café prior to the holidays. Heather Clark and Kim Smith will be bringing us a taste of the Christmas album they recorded together (Christmas Memories) plus Heather’s solo Christmas album (Christmas Eve). We thought it would be a wonderful way to embrace the real meaning of the season and give harried Christmas shoppers a way to relax over a warm cup of hot chocolate or coffee.

Christmas Memories on iTunes 

Percussion Persuasion

Acoustic guitarists have it easy when it comes to setup; don’t you think so? I mean, they come in and all they have to do is plug in their guitar. (Actually, I suppose piccolo players probably have it easiest of all, because they can fit their whole instrument, in its case, in their pocket or purse).

Percussionists and keyboard players have it much tougher. Lotsa gear, lots of cases, and usually things have to be assembled and placed on stands and linked together. Keyboards are heavy, too.

The hollow-ness of drums aside (meaning they’re lighter than keyboards), Scott Matthies, the percussionist who played Worship Café last Sunday with Graham Ord, puts keyboard players everywhere to shame. He showed up early to load-in his gear and let it warm up (yep, it was a cold and snowy day. The stereo-type of Canada persists despite all our efforts otherwise). Scott lugged in his tabla case, his djambe bag, his drum kit (all in separate cases), plus a large black case with all his stands. He had a table for his tabla and various percussion accoutrements, a stand for his djambe, and all the normal snare, high-hat, cymbal, and tom-tom stands and brackets that every drummer uses.

When Graham and Scott were playing, Scott had a way of playing tabla with one hand, djambe with the other, and adding a kick every now and again to propel the beat forward. He’d finish with the djambe and then pick up a shaker of some kind to play with one hand while he switched his other hand over to playing toms and cymbals (sometimes with sticks, sometimes just with his hands directly). Scott was in such fine form that he even had one of the sound guys asking him about tabla lessons. It was very impressive and effective.

It was a great worship time. Graham shared a lot of stuff between songs, talking about things that were on his heart and giving background insights about songs he was playing.

Afterward, Graham said he’d really enjoyed the worship time. He said he’d felt the presence of God quite strongly, and found the whole afternoon refreshing. The response in the café seemed like everyone agreed with him.

The online audio only worked on one channel, for some reason. The replay is up on the site this week, and the audio is working fine for that – feel free to check it out if you missed the live event and want to enjoy a great guitar & percussion worship time.   Worship Cafe

Graham's not here today

Fraser Campbell was from out of town, so I had no idea how many people would be at Worship Café yesterday. The Streaming Café is closed on Sundays, so they only open the café doors when we show up to set up the gear for the worship time.

Funnily enough, we had people coming to the door even before the café was open this week. Not a lot of people, mind you, but people. One of the early comers was Jennifer Jade Kerr, who has lead worship at Worship Café twice now. She said she’d met Fraser at The Gospel Music Association’s music week in Calgary at the end of October, so when she saw that he’d be at Worship Café she decided to swing by and check it out. Turns out Jennifer had come in third place in the GMAC’s performance showcase event – congratulations, JJK! She also told me that Mark Tromsness (another WC alumnus) won that same event, so he’ll be off to Nashville next year as part of his prize.

Two other early-comers to the café thought it was Graham Ord leading yesterday; it wasn’t, though. Graham’s on next week. There were half-a-dozen people who knew Fraser from his time up in Vanderhoof, so they came to reconnect with him. These folks weren’t expecting to see Graham Ord, which is good, because Graham wasn’t there. He’ll be leading next week.

Usually there is some kind of connection between the folks who show up for Worship Café in person; they know each other and made plans to be there together, or they know the worship leader from somewhere, or things like that. Every once in a while there’s someone who comes to the café just because they’ve decided to, not because someone they know is going to be there. There were a couple of young ladies at WC yesterday in that latter category; they knew about Worship Café, and even though they didn’t know who was leading, or if any of their friends were going to be there, they decided to come out, grab a coffee, and just enjoy the atmosphere.

It is a good atmosphere for that, actually. As the weather grows colder and the days grow shorter, the café is a great place to stay warm, hang out, and just enjoy the company. That might sound like a plug, and it is. I’d much rather find myself at the Streaming Café (whether for Worship Café or just for coffee) than at either Starbucks or Second Cup. Coffee’s better, music’s better, and the bloggers leave you alone. It’s good all the way around.

Award winning worship

There used to be an ‘awards season” when it seemed like all the awards shows were on TV one after another, week after week. It’s not like that so much any more, as the different types of awards (Juno, Grammy, Emmy, Academy, Tony, Gemini and so on) all seem to be equally split between fall or spring, both early and late in the year.

We’re conscious of awards at Worship Café this month, but it’s not about us qualifying for any. It’s rather that it’s the season for us where the guests we’ve had recently (and coming up shortly) have been nominated for different awards.

We had the pleasure of hosting Mark Tromsness this past Sunday, one half of the band Colors and Tone. Their self-titled debut album is nominated in the category “Rock Album of the Year” at the Canadian Gospel Music Association’s Covenant Awards, which will be held later this month in Calgary.

On October 17^th we will be hosting Daniel Bremnes, a worship leader from Salmon Arm, BC, whose new album is also up for a Covenant Award this year; “Your Strength” is a nominee in the category of Modern Worship Album of the Year.

The last Sunday in September we had Jon Buller as our worship leader. Buller is from Vernon, and his latest album, “Light Up The Sky”, is also nominated in the Modern Worship Album of the Year category at this year’s Covenant Awards. Buller is also a finalist in the Christian/Gospel Recording of the Year category at this year’s Western Canadian Music Awards, which run from October 21 to 24 in Kelowna.

Does being nominated for an award mean the worship is really, really good? Well, I think that comes down to us as individuals, more than anything else. Am I zoned in? Am I focused on God and on worshiping Him with my whole heart? If I am, then that will play a much larger role in whether or not the worship time will be really good – and I have to remember, too, that I’m not the audience, as a worshipper: God’s the audience!

I’ll save any further pontificating for a future blog. Just wanted to mention that this is award-nominated worship leader season at Worship Café – hope to see you online!

Instrumental Worship?

Jon Buller was at Worship Café this past Sunday, and for one number his band (Dan Oldfield and Aaron French) played an instrumental version of "I Exalt Thee". I found myself thinking about worship in relation to instrumental music.

We know, of course, that worship is more than music. Yet as believers we choose music as one of the primary means of worshiping, at least in groups (i.e. "corporately"). There's something about the gift of music that transcends the 'cerebral only' (our brains, our thinking processes alone without emotion) and draws us more as "whole people" into a place where we can worship more fully and completely.

So, is that worship based on the lyrics of the music, or the music part of the music? Can instrumental music be worship music?

In Sunday's case the song was "I Exalt Thee", a well-known worship standard. Even though the two musicians played with skill and grace and imbued the identifiable song with extra substance and flair, the melody was still clearly recognizable. It was relatively easy to still sing the words (inside one's head, anyway) along with the instruments. Therefore even though the number was instrumental, it was still possible to worship God with the lyrics ("For Thou, O Lord, art high, above all the earth... Thou art exalted far above all gods..." and so on).

But what about when there are no lyrics to the music? What about when the instrumental music is purely instrumental, written and intentionally sans lyrics? Can it be called worship music? How about if it's purchased at a Christian Book Store, or if it's released on a 'Christian' label? Does that make it worship music?

Or, on the other hand, what if the instrumental music is written by a Christian and released on CD through a record label that's just a standard label, maybe known for jazz or even new age music; does that render the Christian composer's work as being not Christian, and therefore not suitable for worship?

Let's stretch those questions a little further: can 'secular' instrumental music be used in a worship context? If you showed up at church next Sunday and the sound guy was playing Pat Metheny for the pre-service music; would that be non-worshipful?

It's an interesting philosophical trail to wander down. Tell me what you think - I'd love to hear what you have to say on the topic.

In the meantime, you can check out this instrumental worship track from the September 25 worship set at Worship Café.

French & Oldfield's take on "I Exalt Thee"