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To Get Better Music Parts, You Need to Think Like an Arranger

By Derek Volkmann, 7.13.2024

For many of you singers and instrumentalists, it's time to take your mindset to the next level when comes to creating your parts for the Sunday morning worship set.

Many worship teams I work with come out of what I call "jam band" mentality. Not to knock on those kinds of groups (I love listening to the Allman Brothers, Tedeschi-Trucks—they're great), but what I'm talking about in this case is a "throw-it-together" situation, where the parts that are sung and played seem like they are run on autopilot. Now, I regularly encourage folks to operate from what they know how to do, but oftentimes it becomes license for too much "rinse-and-repeat." And more often than not, the result is a somewhat unpolished, almost haphazard presentation that could be so much better.

Getting to the Bottom of It

This method belies a mentality that only goes as far as the part that is directly in front of the musician and not thinking about the project on a larger scale. Here's where I see it pop up the most:

• Lead players filling almost every spot with licks, riffs, and lines.

• Guitarists only using one way of voicing and strumming chords on a tune.

• Background singers always singing harmonies, 100% of the time with no breaks.

• Drummers play the same backbeat over each section of the tune, no matter the mood.

• Bass players only play root notes over chords, without exploring passing tones or fills in between.

• Keyboard players moving the same chord shape over all the keys, regardless of range and register.

This shows that familiarity has become a crutch instead of a place from where you can creatively explore. Sure, you might be playing or singing your part very well, but does it fit what the song truly needs?

The Solution

To fix this problem, it really comes down to observing how two fundamental factors of music interact together: dynamics and texture. 

• Dynamics has to do with intensity and volume.

• Texture has to do with density of parts.

Your dynamics directly affect the degree of your textures, and this is where you have to think like an arranger. Loud vs. soft sections, differences in groove, how "busy" a lyric is—these all have to be considered when crafting your part within the group. Let's look back to our "list of offenders":

• Lead players: Realistically, your improvised fills should occur 4, maybe 5 times in a tune. (This is excluding specific lines from recordings or what the arranger has instructed to play.) The rest of the space should be left to others to fill, or let a pre-arranged passage shine through without muddying up the waters. 

• Guitarists: See how you can create moving lines in your chords that compliment the melody, especially with suspensions and harmony notes. 

• Background singers: You do NOT have to sing a harmony line for EVERY. SINGLE. PHRASE. Save the multi-layered texture of stacked harmonies for things like choruses, bridges, a line or two on a verse—but not every phrase. The listeners' ears get fatigued and lose focus on the main thing: the melody. 

• Drummers: Experiment with half-time grooves and "orchestral" playing to break up the monotony of backbeats. Also, move your hands to other parts of the kit instead of the trusty hi-hat/snare/kick combo. You have the greatest number of tools at your disposal, so implement them every once in a while!

• Bass players: Connect the chords with passing tones where appropriate. (Sometimes, it's built into the arrangement; in this case, stick to the ink.) Also, you can play fills like a lead player—but PLEASE DO IT SPARINGLY. Your job is to hold the fort down, not wave the flag from the top.

• Keyboard players: Like the advice given to guitar players above, learn how to incorporate movement in your chord voicings. Also, expand your knowledge of inversions and "spread" voicings, instead of the standard root-3rd-5th shape you learned in piano lessons. 

The key to all of this is sensitivity and erring the side of less being more. You must pay attention to when a musical moment calls for lots of notes, harmonies, and activity vs. when it needs to be sparse. When you scale back, it allows the special moments to shine even brighter, and when you branch out of your comfort zone, a whole new world reveals itself in your creativity. 

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