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Print Attending Indiana Bible College’s Music Fest has been an annual tradition for the music staff of our church. This year, our music director decided that instead of the normal group of attendees, participation would be opened to several of our local up-and-coming musicians/singers. On April 13th, six girls left town for an adventure at Calvary. Wednesday, April 13th After a few minutes, we realized we had gone to the wrong place. We were at the Bible College, instead of the church where the conference was located. For whatever reason, all correspondence from the Music Fest lists the college address, not the church. We all compared mailings and flyers to get the church address, but everything we received listed the college. No big deal, a few of us had attended before so we thought we could figure it out. After circling the city for hours, we changed our minds and decided to call *411 (on a side note: the lights of Indianapolis are beautiful from I-465). A friendly Calvary Church usher gave us the exit number, and after we spotted the crosses on the top of the church (inspiring us to someday write a song titled “Don’t Lose Sight of the Cross from the Highway of Life”), we were able to navigate our way to the church. At 9:45 PM, we thought we’d have missed the entire service, but were in time to hear the IBC Choir sing a few songs from their newest recording, “Hold On.” Since we only heard the last few songs we can’t make a final decision, but the title track was our favorite. There was a technical difficulty with the soloists’ microphones toward the end, and that dampened the song, but it was still great. We decided to buy their CD. Thursday, April 14th Intermediate Piano/Diane Horsley—gave the pianists great fill-ins for spicing up and playing between songs. She explained the newest technique, which is for the piano to be more of a background instrument with the guitar/bass leading. New Ideas to Enhance Your Music Department/Various—many great ideas, including giving “pink slips” to vocalists/musicians if something needs improvement, having choir members sign in with their name and time of arrival to reduce the number of latecomers and several useful websites for music downloads or cheap/free sheet music. Bass Guitar/Landy Ewing—focused more on the spiritual/ego side of music, rather than technique. He did mention the “West Coast style” of playing/songwriting. We have no idea what this is, but you’ll definitely want to learn all about it, as it is apparently the newest great thing. Hear & Write Chord Charts from a Recording/Dedie Cooley—our newer, inexperienced pianist left feeling very confident that she could return home and help the choir or song leader by writing basic chord charts. Developing a Music Program from Ground Zero/Kim Ballestero—if you are starting a home missions church and you can’t get adults involved, train children. Her church is under ten years old and has nine pianists she rotates for services. We will be sharing her ideas with our daughter church. We actually arrived on time for the evening service and thought we were getting good seats in the balcony. Unfortunately, we could only see the lower half of the video screen, and a portion of the platform. This made for some very interesting moments (won’t go into detail, but imagine being able to view only portions of people). So unless we already knew the name of the performer, we can only tell you where they are from and what their shoes look like. Our favorites—Murrell Ewing and Vonnie Lopez were the highlights. The atmosphere of the service changed when they were on the platform. Sis. Jean Urshan also sang and it was a bit sad to see her without her husband, but she seemed so strong we were encouraged. A little girl from Apopka, FL, (pointed toe flats with a kitten heel) amazed us with the confidence of five adults. Other comments—“Promise” from the Calvary Church sang and before they did the screen said something about “beautiful young ladies.” We were wondering—if you are talented, but not so beautiful, would you be allowed to be in their group? Also, what if you were really beautiful, but tone-deaf? Would you be allowed to sing? Timothy Freeman sang as well. Since we are so used to his Bunch & Breeze alter ego, it was a bit weird at first. We kept expecting “awesomized” or some other trademark to show up in the song, but he was actually serious, so we tried to be. He sings surprisingly well, so we look forward to hearing him again. Friday, April 15th Achieving a Strong Gospel Sound/Mark Yandris—our favorite class of the entire conference. He shared mentoring ideas, vocal exercises and management techniques he uses. We’d love to hear his choir! Developing Creative Ministries/Nathan & Deborah Roberts—great ideas dramatic ministries. The best tip? Using paint gloves and a pan of paint for dowel rods. Anyone who has spent hours swiping and rotating ½” sticks can appreciate this. Teaching Voice Lessons/LeAnna Grissom—none of us teach vocal lessons, but since our other choices were a bit limited we thought we’d attend. We were surprised at the amount of useful information we left with—everything from organization and breathing exercises to dealing with different personalities, music styles and levels of confidence. During the Friday afternoon concert the sign choir “Silent Praise” from Barberton, OH, performed. This group was possibly the most outstanding sign choir we have ever seen. Junior Percussion Praise (from Michigan) performed and we were impressed that there were so many young drummers playing together without complete chaos. Bunch and Breeze also performed and were as funny as always (We practiced our “full-body spasms” later that afternoon, but we still can’t get it right). The evening concert was packed out, and we were once again stuck in the balcony. Our seats were a little better than the previous evening, so we actually received more from the service. Our favorites included worship leader Myles Young, Dennon Dearman’s bass solo, and of course, the McGruders. We really dislike southern gospel music, but the McGruders minister so much when they sing, we are big fans. If you can listen to them without feeling the presence of God, it is possible that you are dead. The Barberton, OH, sign choir “Silent Praise” performed another song. Did we mention they are the most outstanding sign choir we’ve ever seen (by the way, if anyone from their group reads this, could they please contact us? We have some questions)? Notes ■ The “New Songs You Can Use” is well worth the cost of the entire conference. We always buy the accompaniment CDs and can get at least 20 songs out of the pack. ■ It would be nice if they could rethink their tape/CD sales tables. We wanted tapes of a few of the classes we missed, but in order to purchase them we had to have the CD table run our credit card, give us cash and then take the cash over to the tape table. Since one of the tapes ended up being a CD, we had to go back over to the CD table. Oh, and about 30 other people were trying to do the same thing. And for whatever reason, the checkout line was in front of the CD table, so if you were trying to look for something, you had to either use X-ray vision or endure dirty looks from people who thought you were trying to cut in line. Also the whole line was pointless, because the students working the table were taking payment from both ends of the line. It was basically mass confusion. ■ We listened to some of the tapes we ordered, and the quality was okay, except when the clinicians would talk over the top of music. Regardless of how soft or loud the music was, it completely drowned out their words. Conclusion
ninetyandnine.com © 2005, Rachel Cox, Sarah Dahl, Adina Lashley, Amber Lutz, Brittney Mernick, and Allison Sursa ----- When not lost on the interstate, Rachel Cox, Sarah Dahl, Adina Lashley, Amber Lutz, Brittney Mernick, and Allison Sursa can be found in Peoria, IL. When they grow up they want to be just like Lindel Anderson, only different. |
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