photo Mike Erskine via Unsplash
But when that chorus is allowed to develop and change lyrically , it ’ s no longer the central place that looks the same every night — with the fire in the same pit , offering the same light to the same trees and dirt . Instead , the backpackers still make their fire at the end of each hike , gathering around to cook a meal and tell the stories of the day , but each time they do , it ’ s in a different location . The hike itself can go for days in a single direction , with each night ’ s fire illuminating and providing warmth in a new context , thus marking the new distance traveled rather than simply representing a single home base .
The fire still offers comfort ... it still FEELS like home ... only now we ’ re benefiting from no longer imposing a limitation on ourselves — a limitation that kept us shackled to the idea that we can only venture so far from a home base before we run out of slack .
The difference is whether a chorus is
• The spot you ’ re always returning to as a lyrical center , or
• Something that can evolve to cover new ground as the other elements of the song do .
A standard approach , where a song ’ s chorus is always the same , can be nice because it always feels familiar . But this can also prevent a song from developing its themes , ideas , and imagery to the degree they might want to be developed . If base camp has to be the same place every night , I can only ever venture out so far in any given direction . Base camp is holding me back . But if I take the fire with me and go to the trouble to build it in new environments each day , I can cover a lot more distance and see things I would never see otherwise .
In this way , most worship music imposes the same limitations on itself that Pop radio does . And Pop radio is not exactly the benchmark of depth . It ’ s not generally where people turn to commune with mystery . So , the practice of writing worship through that filter can prove to be an unnecessary roadblock to where your songs want to go .
All boundaries are conventions waiting to be transcended . We tend to do a lot of what we do automatically . It ’ s easy to adopt unnecessary “ default ” settings with our writing simply because we ’ ve become normalized to whatever non-essential thing we see a lot of , and we assume it ’ s “ just how we do things ” because we haven ’ t slowed down to ask why .
If you thumb through an old hymnal , you won ’ t find many “ choruses ” as we know them , but you will find plenty of songs that are quite wordy . You will see that four or six verses used to be an entirely normal thing in songwriting for worship , and you will see refrains that change lyrically every time they appear , tailoring themselves to the specific context provided by each verse .
All that to say … It ’ s an option . Something to keep in your toolbox .
The average length of each song being sung in a service has increased over the past 20 years anyway . Considerably . So , there is certainly room to say more when you should as a lyricist , and when that ’ s what a song wants . Many people joke about the modern worship song structure : Verse 1 , Chorus Verse 2 , Chorus , Chorus Bridge , Bridge , Bridge , Bridge , Bridge Chorus , Chorus Bridge , Bridge Chorus , Chorus …
It ’ s a lot of repetition ! But imagine instead a song that flows something like this : Verse 1 , Chorus 1 Verse 2 , Chorus 2 Bridge Verse 3 , Chorus 3
A song like that keeps taking us to new places . And if you write a song like that , with places
worth going , you can deal more intricately with important themes , offer more nuance , and surprise those who join in to sing along as you tell much bigger and more resonant stories . Chorus 1 could bring desperation , asking God for something we need . By Chorus 3 , we could be receiving what we asked for . And isn ’ t that the very sort of impact we ’ d like to encourage ? Isn ’ t that why we write ?
A chorus doesn ’ t have to be the old place we return to each day .
It can be the new place we light our fire , offering a new adventure each time we set up camp .
Kevin MacDougall Worship leader , published and recorded songwriter , engineer and producer . macdougall . k @ gmail . com