5 Tips For Musical Transitions Between Worship Songs
When you craft a worship set, it's not about each individual song. It's about how they all work together. It's about having the bigger picture in mind when planning your gatherings. It's not just about song 1, then song 2, and so on. It's about finding a way to make it a cohesive time of worship because that eliminates distractions.
How can you best musically transition between worship songs?
Here are 5 tips for musical transitions between worship songs:
1 | Ask: How can I best eliminate dead air between songs?
The primary goal of focusing on musical transitions is to eliminate "dead air" between songs. Those are those moments where nothing is happening and the people you are leading are left wondering: "What's next?"
2 | Pick the same key
The easiest way to transition between songs is to simply put adjacent songs in the same key. That way, you can head into the next song right as the previous one finishes. You might pick 2 or 3 songs in a row that work in a similar key.
This works for a couple songs but if you have a longer set it will:
1. Be hard to find that many songs with similar keys
2. All start to sound the same
What else can you do?
3 | Pick similar keys
There are certain keys that are easier to transition between than others. Musically speaking it boils down to having common notes in their scales. But, an easy way to remember which keys work is to pick keys that are 4 degrees apart. For example, the key of E works well with the key of A (A is the 4 chord in the key of E).
4 | Use different musicians to initiate different transitions
Apart from song keys, you can use different musicians to initiate the transitions. For example, you could have a guitarist end one song and a keyboardist start the next. This indicates a change not just in key, but also in tonality which helps the ear adjust to a new key.
5 | Don't overthink it
At the end of the day, it's much more important to simply be AWARE of transitions than figuring out some intricate way to make it happen. It can be perfectly acceptable to end a song that's in one key, then pause for a moment, and head into a new key. Eliminating "dead air" doesn't mean never utilizing silence.
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