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