{"id":943,"date":"2015-01-02T17:30:05","date_gmt":"2015-01-02T22:30:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/?p=943"},"modified":"2015-01-02T17:56:47","modified_gmt":"2015-01-02T22:56:47","slug":"planning-your-music-year-january-december-2015","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/?p=943","title":{"rendered":"Planning Your Music Year &#8211; January &#8211; December 2015"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #4b0738; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\"><span style=\"font-size: 22pt;\">Happy New Year!<\/span><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">If you\u2019re like me, I always have the illusion that once the Christmas season is over, things will slow down and I\u2019ll get projects done which have been sitting on the shelf.\u00a0 <em>Did you notice that I said illusion?\u00a0<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Those of us who live in colder climates should take advantage of any down-time to get organized and make plans for what we\u2019d like accomplish music wise this year!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Here is an overview of 2015 ideas and special dates!<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #4b0738; font-size: 16pt;\"><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><span style=\"font-family: book antiqua,palatino; text-decoration: underline;\">January \u2013 February \u2013 March<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Never stop learning!\u00a0 Take\u00a0any down time to learn additional music theory or get out those finger and scale exercise books and practice, practice, practice!<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Organize your music files!\u00a0 If you have music scattered everywhere, you might want to take the time to download organizational articles in order to get you motivated and give you a sense of direction in getting organized.<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Preview and learn new worship choruses.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Start a new music group at your church.\u00a0 How about a men\u2019s quartet, ladies\u2019 trio or ensemble to sing for a special occasion?\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Start training young musicians in your church on piano or other instruments.\u00a0 <strong><em>Don\u2019t forget them\u2014they are our future Pentecostal musicians.<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Every quarter there is one month with 5 Sundays.\u00a0 Consider the possibility of a theme-focused service on the 5th Sunday of every quarter.\u00a0 Feature an adult choir, ensemble, youth group, trio, duet or solo.\u00a0 Many times non-church goers will attend a theme-focused service when they will not attend regular services.\u00a0 Work in conjunction with your Outreach Department to use this event as a tool to reach your city!<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">March 29 is a 5th Sunday.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #4b0738;\"><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><span style=\"font-family: book antiqua,palatino; font-size: 16pt; text-decoration: underline;\">April \u2013 May \u2013 June<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Easter is April 5 this year!\u00a0 Start in January or February to get your music lined up and your soloists, groups, ensemble or choir ready to sing!\u00a0 Give your group <em>at least 6 to 8 weeks<\/em> to get things together!<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Mothers\u2019 Day is May 10 and Fathers\u2019 Day is June 21.\u00a0 Don\u2019t wait until the last minute and endure the frustration and embarrassment of having to throw something together.\u00a0 Preview and plan NOW!\u00a0 <em>Remember 6 \u2013 8 weeks to get things together!<\/em><\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Pentecost Sunday is May 24 this year!\u00a0 This is also Memorial Day Weekend!<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Plan and Prepare to Avoid the \u201cSummertime Blues\u201d:<\/span>\n<ul style=\"list-style-type: square;\">\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Take summer vacation time into consideration.\u00a0 Most everyone plans their vacation&#8211;find out when music team members are scheduled to be away and prepare in advance so that services run smoothly.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">With enough preparation time, less-experienced musicians can play for a few worship services.\u00a0 Begin training musicians before they are needed!\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Provide chord sheets to all of your fill-in musicians.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Encourage fill-in musicians to play in children\u2019s church, Sunday School, youth and mid-week services to get more experience.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">In the summer months let your choir sing \u201cre-runs\u201d or repertoire with which they are already familiar.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Cut back practice schedule to every other week or once a month.\u00a0 Don\u2019t cut practices completely out, because it can be hard to re-motivate!<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Use smaller groups such as duets, trios, ensembles, and chorales to fill in your music schedule.<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Use sound tracks.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">May 31 is a 5th Sunday<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #4b0738;\"><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><span style=\"font-family: book antiqua,palatino; font-size: 16pt; text-decoration: underline;\">July \u2013 August \u2013 September<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Independence Day (July 4) falls on Saturday this year, either weekend would be ideal to plan to have a youth band play a medley of patriotic tunes to celebrate the July 4 Holiday.\u00a0 Preparations should start as early as possible\u2014allow 8 \u201310 weeks to get things together!.\u00a0 Try very easy arrangements or a medley of these tunes:<\/span>\n<ul style=\"list-style-type: square;\">\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">America<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">God Bless America<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Battle Hymn of the Republic<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">America the Beautiful<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">August 30 is a 5th Sunday.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Grandparents Day is September 13<\/span>\n<ul style=\"list-style-type: square;\">\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">What a great weekend to plan a program of music, readings or poetry to honor the senior members of your congregation.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">How about a \u201cDown Through the Years\u201d program of music, poetry and readings to honor your seniors?\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">You may want to plan a service to honor those who have been in church over 20 years.\u00a0 You may want to choose a song from each decade\u2014one you get started, you will find a lot of great \u201cclassic\u201d or &#8220;old school&#8221; material that you haven\u2019t heard for years! Be sure to involve your seniors in the service.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #4b0738; text-decoration: underline;\"><strong><span style=\"font-family: book antiqua,palatino; font-size: 16pt; text-decoration: underline;\">October \u2013 November \u2013 December<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Pastor\u2019s Appreciate Month is October!<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Veterans Day is November 11<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Thanksgiving is November 26<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"ListSpace20\"><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">Christmas falls on Friday this year!\u00a0 Start Christmas music practices by mid-September.\u00a0 Early preparation avoids last-minute stress!\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #993366; font-family: book antiqua,palatino;\">January 1, 2016 falls on Friday.\u00a0 Start music for Watch night Service in November.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Happy New Year! If you\u2019re like me, I always have the illusion that once the Christmas season is over, things will slow down and I\u2019ll get projects done which have been sitting on the shelf.\u00a0 Did you notice that I said illusion?\u00a0 Those of us who live in colder climates should take advantage of any &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/?p=943\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Planning Your Music Year &#8211; January &#8211; December 2015<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-943","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-planning"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=943"}],"version-history":[{"count":25,"href":"https:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1076,"href":"https:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943\/revisions\/1076"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=943"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pentecostalmusicians.com\/PMblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}