You know it when you hear it

Sometimes you get absolutely no warning. It just happens. Other times, you’ve heard rumblings and even felt the buzz, so you’ve got an idea that there may be something special going on.

Art is subjective. No question. But even in the midst of a subjective form of creativity, there are still some moments when most people would say, “Wow!”.

Ennio Morricone’s score to ‘The Mission’

The opening of ‘Saving Private Ryan’ on Omaha Beach.

The first scene when Carrie Ann Moss jumps up in slow motion and the camera(s) spin around in ‘The Matrix’

For me, I watched ‘Wicked’ on Broadway with not a lot of prepping. I knew it was supposedly amazing, but I didn’t have a clue. I’m watching it. It is truly phenomenal. BUT THEN they start singing, ‘For Good’. Still, to this day, I get goosebumps (chicken skin as my sister calls it). I KNEW I was hearing one of ‘those songs’.

In the world of church music, the first time you hear Keith and Stuart’s ‘In Christ Alone’ may be one of those moments.

My wife and I were on staff (for 10+ years) at The People’s Church in Franklin, TN. A few years back, the church had decided to do a live worship CD. Michael Neale was the worship leader. My wife, Dana, is a session singer and she was asked to sing on stage for the live worship recording. I stayed home with the kiddos (school nite/bedtime). She came home and said, “It was good. There are some good songs. But there is one GREAT song. You’ll really like it.”

Thus was my introduction to Krissy Nordhoff and Michael Neale’s, ‘Your Great Name.’

My wife, was (or course), right. It really is such a great worship song. Great lyrics. Strong melody. And a well crafted build with some nice moments in it.

When looking at worship songs to include in our new ‘Horns & Rhythm’ Retro Worship collection, I just knew we HAD to include it.

I based my arrangement off of The People’s Church recording version from the ‘Shine Out’ CD. This arrangement is an instrumental feature. On the recording, it is a guitar solo taking the lead. This arrangement is in Bb and works great as a congregational arrangement as well so you could open the service one week with the instrumental version and you could use the congregational arrangement that day or another day.

For more information about the arrangement and the entire series, click here.

So how about you? When have you had moments where you heard a song or watched a movie or watched a musical and you ‘just knew it’?

(Here’s a little bit of the back story of Michael and Krissy writing ‘Your Great Name’

Double click below to hear a sample of the recording:

Your Great Name (works as congregational accompaniment as well)