Ok!  So you don’t see what that has to do with music at all!  Well, allow me to explain!!!

The past several years, my husband, Mark has had a box garden—4 boxes in our backyard in which he grows lettuce, peppers, onions, green beans, cucumbers for pickles.  Believe it or not, these small little boxes produce so much that we’ve been able to fill our freezer and pantry!

We were able to chop up and freeze enough peppers to see us through fall and winter and still have plenty left.  We also chopped onions and put them in small freezer bags ready for use at a moment’s notice.  Even though we didn’t grow celery, I thought it might be handy to have frozen celery at my fingertips whenever I make a casserole.  So whenever I need pepper, onions or celery, I just reach into my freezer and these ingredients are available at a moment’s notice.

Was all that chopping and bagging fun?  Not really.  When we were getting the onions ready, the tears just ran down my face as I breathed in the fumes.  When we were chopping the peppers—especially the hotter ones, every time I took a breath it felt like my nostrils were on fire.  No–not fun at all!!!

But now that I have these little freezer bags filled with these essential ingredients, it is certainly a blessings to be able to just reach into the freezer and grab a bag without having to worry about prepping while I’m preparing my meal.

How Is That Related to Music??

Now relating to music—consider the time you spend “prepping” as the time you are learning scales, learning to read notes, new chords, chord progressions and fills.  Yes, it’s not that much fun and the tears may flow and your brain may feel like it’s on fire.  Oh but when you have taken the time to “pre-prep” it is such a blessing to be able to reach into the “freezer” or “pantry” of your brain and pull out those chords and progressions—all ready to use—instead of having to stop and do your “prep” work when you want to play the song!!!

Just a thought!!!!  Come on—get busy and start your “prep” work now!!!!  You’ll be glad you did!

Summer is coming quickly—that busy time of year that is filled with vacations, camp meetings and summer youth camps.

So what are you doing this summer? 

Whatever you do, don’t let yourself or your music team dry up or regress this season! Here are several ways you can stay fresh during the summer months
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Your music team
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• Refresh  choruses your praise/musicians team learned over the past year but didn’t quite “jell.”
• Review songs you want to incorporate into music program in coming months.  By listening and learning just one or two songs during the summer months, you’ll be prepared to start your fall music program with a whole lot less stress!
• Find out when your musicians and praise singers have scheduled their summer vacations.
• Plan to use less experienced singers and musicians to fill in.  With enough time and preparation, even mediocre musicians can play for a few worship services.  Begin training as soon as possible!
• Provide lead sheets to all of your fill-in musicians.
• Encourage fill-in musicians to play in children’s church or Sunday School to get more experience.
• Sing “re-runs” or repertoire with which they are already familiar.  However you MUST go over parts again to refresh them.
• Cut back on your choir practice schedule to every other week or once a month.  Don’t cut choir completely out!  It is hard to re-motivate the choir into activity again! Use smaller groups such as duets, trios, ensembles, and chorales to fill in your music schedule.

Your Personal Musicianship….

If you only play with chords or by ear, teach yourself to read notes! Learn to sing intervals and identify them by ear. (See Major Scales and Intervals file.)Focus on learning several new chords (diminished 7th, augmented, etc.) and learn to use them in new progressions.