Play off a one or two-page lead sheet and improvise the accompaniment. CCM songs are not difficult to improvise decent accompaniments for.

I use this site whenever I have to buy sheet music for CCM, such as for wedding preludes. You can select different formatting (full score, lead sheet, SATB, chord & lyric page) and transpose keys:
https://www.praisecharts.com/

It helps to have a good ear for music so you can imitate professional CCM recordings. Barring that, just practice playing the melody line while adding other notes based on the chord symbols.

This is a broader question than perhaps you might think -- most things praise-and-worship/CCLI aren't intended or written for Catholic liturgies/Masses, but a good chunk of "contemporary" music from GIA or OCP is intended for use at Mass. Perhaps 15-20 years ago or so, OCP started to lessen the praise-and-worship and printed more stuff intended for liturgy -- the result was a much improved Spirit & Song.

I eliminated our parish's CCLI license, because I don't and won't use praise-and-worship style music. I don't do it well, and we're not the nearby megachurch or the other nearby megachurch; in general I don't think we should use it. But I do a fair amount of OCP "contemporary" stuff and occasionally a GIA "contemporary" piece. I don't care for Voices (as One) at all, but YMMV.

Noteworthy to mention in this thread is that OCP has decided to discontinue its contemporary music annual missal/hymnal combo, Choose Christ; 2024 is its final year.

Apparently, it wasn't selling well. I welcome that news.

Next target: Breaking Bread, but that's a behemoth.

I guess the Y'all-pad thing makes some sense. If you're tapping a button to turn pages and there's a repeat of several pages, I suppose if you're using a computer program you could have it insert those pages a second time so you only have to advance forward, regardless of whether it makes it take 20 pages.

I had wondered about the weird rhythmic artifacts, and what you say does seem to explain some of the SS accompaniments that just aren't very good. Do some of these editors actually use some kind of software to transcribe an audio tape instead of just getting the music from the composer? PrintMusic! 2001 has that capability if you play into it from a MIDI-enabled keyboard, but I could never play precisely enough to get anything that didn't effectively need to be rewritten. I guess that program came out over 20 years ago now ... perhaps someone has a transcription computer program that can listen to the radio and turn it directly into sheetmusic of a sort?


I know my experience is limited, but I've not yet encountered accompaniments from GIA/OCP that are worse than PC/SS parts in unnecessary length - nothing like - though that isn't to say it couldn't sometimes go on fewer pages or move measures about to eliminate an awkward page turn (I'll sometimes photocopy a page in such cases). And while the multiple-keys thing is potentially handy, I've absolutely had requests from stuff for which they have only words, if even that. I went through more than enough of that 15+ years ago when a family friend wanted me to play for a Christmas program, and helpfully brought a photocopy with just some words on it (for some very bad poetry I'd never seen before), and made a great show of thinking I was insane, not to mention inexcusably rude, for not innately knowing how and what to play.

At least in the GIA publication I have, having fairly complete performance information lets any idiot have a go at playing even if he's only ever listened to or played better sorts of music. No need to be the least bit "musical" in the folkie sense - a few years of private lessons and classical ensemble experience are enough. At least half the battle with this stuff can be figuring out the structure, and PC/SS seem to artificially make that far more obtuse. One of the great things about good congregational music is its simplicity - in modern hymnody, something like St. Patrick's Breastplate is an anomaly in that it has two different tunes and an abrupt repeat in the first verse and in a harmony edition is notated on up to four pages; most anything else, at least in hymnals I own, is perfectly straightforward in structure, usually doesn't require page turns at all, and just making the notes happen, and providing musical contrast as we are able, is sufficient challenge for those of us who are less experienced and have limited practice time. Pop-style music adds considerable complexity just to figure out what to play and when, especially when there are two or more versions of a refrain (alternated with verses in ways that vary greatly, and sometimes each verse varies the melody so you can't just repeat the whole thing) and that's not to mention this newfangled interlude thing they call a "bridge" that may be in one place, or possibly in another. Notating the accompaniment with sufficient information, and keeping any performance notes as simple as possible, is very much of the essence - anything else really does require specialized training or experience, extensive practice time with someone else to help, or both. Voices! #191 ("Mighty To Save") is an interesting example; Ed Bolduc provides enough information that despite never having seen anything quite like it, even I could make it very musical and interesting in a short period of time, and provide a really big improvement over using poorer music that sounds like "Leavin' On A Jetplane" just because a few people like folk trios and are in rebellion against historic church music. No input from anyone, no searching for audio recordings, just the music book and a piano, and I didn't even have to learn the melody. By contrast, I was aghast recently to discover that some people called "Hillsong," who apparently consider themselves professional performers of a sort, took the same song and completely ruined it - all narcissistic face-making layered with vague guitary stuff, and no musicality at all. This guy called Matt Redman seems to have this talent as well, even with stuff he wrote himself. Makes me want to throw things!

The short answer? No, not in the least do I object to change qua change, though I'm afraid I would be slow to object to complete stagnation. I've played saxophones, strings, and even my guitar in church, for example, though I consider an organ to be the default church instrument. I also experienced an environment that seemed to me to have gotten hide-bound slightly beyond reason in insisting that every congregational song had to be accompanied by a piano, even when the music director was insisting that those of us so able play along on strings and flutes every Sunday. You'll meet wonderful Christians who have big objections to specific instruments in church (Old Regular Baptists and Reformed Presbyterians have the only total solution for that), and conventional wisdom highlights a generational divide between old people only "knowing" "old hymns" and young people always employing "contemporary songs" (which I would have expected, but found inaccurate in my experience ... also, I'm personally incredibly stupid when it comes to "knowing" a song, leading to extremely slow comprehension when I'm told "no, we can't use that, no one knows it.").

In a nutshell, I think my biggest concerns are threefold:

* Risk of idolatry - placing of one or more musicians front and center in worship with a giant spotlight has the potential to draw focus to man rather than the Creator.
* Risk of hypocrisy - hypothetically, people who have perfected the art of looking "worshipful" for a video camera may be unsaved/unconverted/unbelievers and so lead people astray by promoting false teaching or an unholy lifestyle ... also, emotionally manipulative musical and presentation styles may encourage a pattern of getting "high on Jesus" on Sunday morning and compartmentalizing an extremely wicked life during the week.
* Lack of charity - categorical dismissal or disrespect toward musicians and other churchmen who have not already adapted to new customs that tend to accompany CCM - in other words, the unspoken attitude that if you're not already in the in-group and willing/able to sway, strum, listen to CCM radio constantly, memorize everything that's newest under the sun, improvise from lead sheets (or sometimes just chord charts!), and use an iPad instead of a music book, you're generally no good and lacking in seriousness. Hopefully I'm exaggerating, but the careless attitude I seemed to get from publishers whilst trying to purchase accompaniments was a big part of the impetus for starting this thread in the first place.

These concerns of course don't address the likelihood toward bad or trivial music and theologically questionable lyrics, specifically because I've found a diligent pastor/musician team ought to be able to avoid those problems most of the time - but those could also be concerns where leadership is less discerning. Obviously, the risks I enumerate above are not unique to the CCM movement, and it doesn't follow in the least that something will necessarily happen just because it's possible or even likely, but to some of us it appears that the CCM movement may provide new opportunities for such risks. And to be fair, I've been short on charity myself toward musicians and music fans who differ from me, so it's something I try to repent of regularly, and adopted the discipline of always referring in my mind to "Brother so-and-so".

All that said - I've been talking with people as I have the opportunity, doing a bit of reading here and there. I've found out that for all the years I was happily singing both modern and historic traditional hymns in traditional mainline Protestant churches, and somewhat less happily singing a mix of traditional modern hymns, turn-of-the-20th-century Gospel hymns, and certain CCM in hymn form in a traditional independent Baptist church, a broad segment of the visible church had largely moved away anything I would have recognized as normal churchmanship. Apparently as far back as the 1990s, some churches had a CCM music supplement in addition to a more traditional hymnal, and some were even using video screens as an integral part of services! Possibly some of you already knew that, but I would have had no idea if I hadn't been told. My kneejerk 20+ years ago was to assume all such congregations were minority outliers and not really serious churches, but circumstances as well as new information have made me reconsider. I've commented that contemporary churchmanship seems like a rebellion against traditional churchmanship, which may well be true, but on the other hand there may be any number of possible reasons for abandoning traditional churchmanship, from individuals finding they'd been hurt by "traditional" churches that apostasized or "conservative" churches that became uncharitably legalistic.

Here are some resources I've come across that I'm finding helpful, which appear to be at least trying to find a fair perspective. The first is a book I'm currently about halfway through by what seems to be a fairly traditional pastor, the second is an interview with two of the Newsboys about musicians leaving the faith, and the third is just sort of a monologue by a traditional PCUSA layman.

https://www.amazon.com/Why-Johnny-Cant-Sing-Hymns/dp/1596381957/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuTTv8kqtvQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_3FjwocKlY

Finally, it turns out Grammy-winning CCM superstar Matt Redman also wrote a book, which may be helpful, but so far I've only made it through the preface.

https://www.amazon.com/10-000-Reasons-Thankfulness-Inspired/dp/1434702901/

One of the best synopses I've seen so far, @Adam Wood! The roadmap/rhythm/rhythm synopsis does pretty succinctly summarize my practical issues trying to get my brain around the stuff in the first place (and continues to be a challenge still). It's also reassuring to hear that I'm not the only one crazy enough to re-engrave things (for better or for worse).

It's interesting how in my communications with some musicians who do nearly or all contemporary style on Sundays (for both new and old music), they talk about their classical training but their current practice seems quite different, as you say (i.e. not producing scores at all).

I think much of "contemporary" sacred music is not sacred and is entertainment, not worship. In the minds of many, there is no barrier or distinction between the two. Gone are the days when the world is left outside the temple doors. Now it is welcomed in with open arms. As far as the publishers, it seems they throw things against the wall and see if they stick and generate any income.

I think most of the people who compose, perform, and publish this music have good intentions and are sincere and earnest.

what is their "good intention?" The greatest of sinners are sincere and earnest to do what they do. Ignorance, however, is the real issue... the devil plays on that one big time.