Inverted

I got the awesome privilege of leading worship for the first time at my current church in Calgary. Aside from tripping over a couple of words, I was feeling quite good about the experience.

However, there were some technicalities that I felt rather strange about.

Everything was inverted!

What do I mean?

After having lead worship for several years, I got accustomed to the way the stage is usually set up. As all worship leaders should, I usually stand somewhere near the middle of the stage so I can make good contact with everyone. I had my leading instruments almost always to my right. Lead instruments usually included piano/keys and drum. As I rely heavily on those two instruments to drive the music, I got pretty used to looking back that way when I needed to. Hand gestures or whatever also got pretty good for me as I could pause my strumming for a couple of beats to signal something, and it was pretty straight forward. And generally speaking, I had my own space where I got to lead from - my own bubble, so to speak. In my space, I usually set my music stand to the left, and my mic stand to the right. This allows me an unobstructed view at my lyrics in the case that I need to remember some words. Having the mic stand to the right really allows me to continue singing even if, like I mentioned, I need to give some signals. So that is basically the setup that I usually use.

Today, though, I felt like everything was a violation of what I am so used to. My percussionist was directly behind me and slightly to the left; so looking back, giving signals, and any of that kind of stuff felt really strange as I didn't want to let go of the chord I was strumming to show something. On top of that, I had to share my music stand with the other singer, who was so kind to help sing. But the problem was she was right in my bubble! I didn't have the liberty to "move and groove" like I usually do. So, in that sense, I did feel like I had to hold back at the very least a little bit. My mic stand was on my left, and my music was to my right (since I needed to share it). I'm so not used to seeing my music to the right that I found myself trying to look through my mic stand in order to get to my music sometimes. This thing with looking at music is a nuance that I think a lot of guitarists can relate to. Just like nuances for people when they play piano and drums or whatever else. When I play guitar, I can look to my left a lot easier because my left hand is the one that is changing chords; so it will be natural that I can take a quick peak down to the left to make sure my hands are in the right position. That really took attention from singing the songs and into trying to get the words right. So basically, the set up on this stage was inverted from what I am used to.

I've realized how lucky I was to have access to so much space on the stage though. At SGAC, the worship team is basically pushed to a little corner because if they were anymore central-staged, they would be blocking the projector.

Also, I know we complain about equipment, cables not working, monitors not good, a bad sound board, etc. But, I think I'm just going to go into every worship thinking that there could always be worse. I don't get to lead the way I'm "comfortable" with when I'm leading here, but I think that's why it is so cool being able to lead in a different environment.

I think that aside from one occasion at YIC in my senior year of high school, I've lead basically the same way at NEAC and at CCBC. So, now that I've gotten my first experience out of the way, and even though I sang songs that pretty much no one knew, it was pretty awesome.