No overhead projection. No songsheets. No hymnals. What's your playlist?

[NickAlexander]

Right now I'm reading a book detailing the early rise of the Vineyard Church, which was responsible for a healthy number of classic P&W songs over the years, including "Change My Heart O God" and "Come Now Is the Time to Worship." It stated that when they first met, they had no songsheets, no overhead projection, no hymnals. They had to come up with simple songs, because they had no choice.
Considering how far the music scene has shifted over the years, I can't help but wonder... if we were put in the same position, what worship songs would be in your repertoire? What would most work for both vertical closeness, doctrinal orthodoxy, and verbal simplicity in your environment?

[pianomandan]

I think I would be all about echo songs. The congregation would hear it & sing it back.

I would also explore creating a modern psalter where they would sing the word of God to simple tunes.

[NickAlexander]

I would definitely agree that such songs would make a solid representation on such a repertoire. That said, I was listening to an audio recording of such a worship set last week, and I was surprised at how few such songs existed with this format. Sure, early Vineyard has a share of such songs ("Isn't He", "Hold Me Lord", "Holy Is the Lord", etc.), but I don't think they depended on such songs as much as I thought they did.

[Mike on Bass]

I'd go with stuff that's been around awhile and made the rounds on Praise Radio and Worship compilation CDs.

This is one area of church music that perplexes me- people can almost instantly remember all the words to the latest Taylor Swift-esque song but in church we have to spoon feed them lyrics on a screen,,,

Congregants don't seem to need the lyrics on a screen when singing them in the shower or driving down the road, so I tend to think they will be ok singing quite a few songs without all the hand-holding.

I personally would like to see praise teams get away from music stands as well. In fact, that might be a good test. If the praise team can get through it without a cord chart, the congregation will make it too.

In all fairness, much of the recent P&W songs (last 5 years or so) are near impossible to get right without a chord chart. That's why I'd go with some older songs that could be simplified. Besides, every song that comes out seems to be covered by everyone else anyway, so do a simple version and go with that.

[NickAlexander]

I'm openly wondering if the new generation, raised on the radio-friendly/congregation-unfriendly songs of the last five years, would even remotely know any of the simple songs which came before.

[pianomandan]

People know the words to the "Taylor Swift-esque" because they listen to them OVER AND OVER. If people only hear Christian music on Sunday morning they will not know all the words.

[NickAlexander]

People know the words to the "Taylor Swift-esque" because they listen to them OVER AND OVER. If people only hear Christian music on Sunday morning they will not know all the words.

The testimony of the early Vineyard Church (1978-1983), which was outlined in the book I had completed which spurred on this conversation, begs to differ. They had even less opportunity for their songs to get noticed, as they didn't have recordings for sale nor radio airplay. And I reiterate--no books; no lyric sheets; no words on screen; not in their first five years, where they blossomed from a couple of folks in a living room to three thousand congregants.

So how did the worship team do it? They played the songs, OVER AND OVER. Not all songs can one do that today, but theirs, they could. Which songs do you think today can qualify as such?