“Singability” In Worship Music: Can The Congregation Follow Where The Worship Leaders Go?

On her Blending Worship blog, worship leader Mandy Thompson presents an interesting question on “singability: do you sing your best when leading?”

 It’s an interesting question for worship leaders — we’ve all witnessed or heard about churches where the the worship team or choir puts on such a dazzling display of vocal pyrotechnics that the congregation goes from “participants” to “spectators,” either awed by the talent or frustrated by the fact that they aren’t talented enough to sing along.

And to be fair, sometimes it’s the fault of the song — there isn’t much a worship leader can do with a melody that requires huge leaps or abrupt changes in time signature, except to ask, “Is this really fit for corporate worship?”  So not only should leaders be mindful of the need to sing the melody without a lot of embelishments, but worship writers should write songs that a congregation of varying ability can work with.

Of course, even this can be taken too far though.  Sojourn Worship Pastor Mike Cosper and others have talked about the Bono Effect:  go to a U2 concert and witness 20,000 people, very few of whom have a range anywhere close to Bono’s, singing along on every song, regardless of the fact that most of the songs require much more from the singer than most worship songs do.

And so it goes back to the singer — regardless of the relative degree of difficulty, are you singing in such a way that you encourage people to join in?  After all, many of those people in the pews may have popped u2 CDs into their car stereo hundreds of times  over the last couple decades, but be completely unaware of the old hymn you’ve unearthed, the latest Crowder song you’re trying to cover, or the new tune that a songwriter in your congregation came up with.  So are you singing it in such a way that people will be able to pick up on the melody in short order and lift up their voices?