First Community Songwriting Day

Spring 2010 Songwriting Day

May 14, 2010 at Kernersville Community Church

Our day started off with a meet and greet where everyone got to know each other, then we went into a vision sharing moment.  The vision behind the community songwriting days is to connect local congregations fostering an environment of writing worship music that comes from the heart of God through the local churches.  Our prayer is that these events lead into deeper connections between local congregations where other visions are planted to bring denominations together in a collaborative effort.  The first seed was planted on this first day of songwriting.  We pray that God will breathe on it, and give life to the vision he inspired.

Passages: Romans 5:1-5 and Psalm 43

When we walked into the building, a bible was already opened up on the foyer table.  My eyes were drawn to Romans 5:1-5.  Here, Paul encourages the church to rejoice in their sufferings because their sufferings will lead to perseverance, which will lead to character, which will lead to hope.  The hope that develops never disappoints because that hope comes from God alone.  So, the group connected with the hope theme, and began looking at other verses about hope.  Psalm 43 resonated with the group.  We then discussed how King David was very raw in his expressions to God.  David expressed his deepest struggle and still praised God despite his deepest struggles.

Musically, the idea was proposed to make the verses in a minor key to express the raw struggles we all face, and make the chorus major to express the hope we have.  One person suggested a chord progression that had that raw feel we were looking for.  Then another guitar player continued into a major chord progression for the chorus, which fit quite nicely.

As the musicians played, the singers sang what came to mind expressing the hope we have.  Some phrases work, and some did not.  So, we recorded the ideas from two musicians, uploaded to a collaboration website, and the group will go back later and upload tracks that come to mind as we work on the song individually.

Overall, it was a really good day.  The group’s unity led to some effective songwriting.  Even though we did not complete a song, it was still productive.  As a group, we agreed to begin using Kompoz.com to construct the song outside the songwriting events.  We also agreed to meet once a season to keep the momentum going.  Our prayer is for other congregations to see the value in these songwriting events, and join in on what God is doing through worship songwriting in the North Carolina Triad region.