KEYS
ADAPTING ELEVATION WORSHIP ’ S “ THIS IS THE KINGDOM ” FOR MINISTRY MOMENTS | Ed Kerr
In my last article I gave you a detailed analysis of the piano part in Elevation Worship ’ s beautiful song , “ This Is the Kingdom ”. Really detailed . If you don ’ t know the song yet , please take some time to listen to it . It ’ s overflowing with Scripture and reminders of how willing God is to hear our cries for more of Him in our lives . Ah . So good .
The song ’ s arrangement is quite long , close to ten minutes , and Elevation Worship packs lots of dynamic moments into their recording . It ’ s so powerful . The church where I ’ m Worship Arts Director typically doesn ’ t spend this long on one song . We fit two songs in less than ten minutes . How about you ? Do you ever wish your church or your team made space for such extended arrangements , instrumental solos ? Me too , sometimes . And then I take a deep breath and hear the Lord say , “ This is where I have you today .” And I ask myself what I can do in my ministry context to create powerful moments for my congregation where the Lord can whisper of His love to His children and the people gathered can lift up prayers and praise to Him .
What can you do where you are , on your instrument , with the team your part of ? One of the first thoughts that came to mind for me was “ You can play with tracks .” True . You and I have amazing resources available through
companies like MultiTracks , Loop Community and PraiseCharts , where we can find master tracks for the recordings we love , like this one from Elevation Worship . We use tracks on a few of our songs at my church , and the result is a beautiful , full sound .
And then the tracks end . Then there ’ s a moment as we prepare for our weekly Communion time when people are coming forward for the bread and the cup and a song with tracks just wouldn ’ t quite work . I need to have a musical element that can be whatever length I need it to be before we start singing our next song . I need the freedom to extend or shorten this musical element however long Communion takes .
Let ’ s say I know in an upcoming service we ’ ll be singing “ This is the Kingdom ” after Communion is served . What do I do ? I look for hooks ! You know , hooks , those melodies played by keys or guitars that start so many of our songs , like this one from “ This Is the Kingdom ”. ( 1 )
Here are four bars of that hook , along with the chords heard with the melody . ( 2 )
My proposal ? Play that progression , and that melody 4,321 times , or as many times as you need to fill the Communion moment , or the prayer time , or whatever time .
If you know anything about me at this point , I hope you know that I ’ m kidding . My actual proposal is that you create something original that ’ s musically substantial with your team in these moments . I ’ m not suggesting that you write a 4-part fugue in the style of J . S . Bach or a harmonically elaborate instrumental ala Rachmaninoff . I ’ m suggesting that within the chords and melodies of this hook there is tons of potential for you to create something beautiful and effective for these moments where you ’ re not yet playing the full song .
Here are a few ways you adapt the material from this beautiful hook into something new . The first thing I notice about this hook is that there ’ s lots of repetition of the melodic activity from measure one . This repetition happens over chords that change every measure . I note also that the melody is played in the middle register of the keyboard , with the E above middle C as its highest note . So , one variation of this material could involve playing it an octave higher , and not changing chords every measure . Like this . ( 3 )
To further develop this variation , rather than have continuous melodic activity I could pause the melody for a moment . Like this . ( 4 )
Notice what I did in measure 4 . I paused .