Paid vs. Volunteer Musicians
This is a very tricky subject. The reason I say it’s tricky is because nearly 100% of churches don’t and honestly can’t pay band members. With that being said, let me tell you that this is not a post about why you should or shouldn’t pay band members. Crossroads is the first church I’ve ever been a part of that paid band members. The idea of this post is to explain why we at Crossroads do pay band members. Hopefully this will also help you as you decide whether or not you want to pay band members.
We have some very high expectations for our band at Crossroads. It’s because of those expectations that we have decided to pay band members.
We expect a high quality of music, a high degree of ability and competence from band members, we expect strong vocal (and I mean not afraid to talk, not vocal ability), and proven leadership abilities from worship leaders, we expect each musician and vocalist to know their parts precisely, we expect our band to need very little to no assistance from us when it comes to actually performing the songs, and we expect everyone to represent Crossroads Church in a good way.
It’s because of those high expectations that we need a very high quality musician. Many of the musicians, in fact all of the worship leaders, we hire are professionals who perform and lead worship for a living. They spend their entire days honing their abilities with their instrument and preparing for the next time they play. They’ve been doing it for years and are some of the best at what they do. I don’t know of a single volunteer who has the time to practice every day, work on their guitar’s tone every day, or even practice for next weekend’s set every day.
Anyways, let’s look at each of the expectations we have for our band, and let me quickly explain what I mean by each one.
High Quality of Music
Music is universal. I’ve never met anyone who didn’t like music. And I’ve never met anyone who wasn’t a critic of music. We want to create as few critics of our music as possible. This isn’t so that we can brag about having the best band in town. It’s so that people who come into our church for the first time don’t get the feeling that we don’t care about doing things the best way we can. And we want to create as few distractions as possible for those who are worshipping God, and it’s easier for people to learn new songs when they aren’t hearing a wrong chord every time the chorus rolls around.
High Degree of Ability and Competence from Musicians
This is what helps us achieve a high quality of music. We want to have a radio sound from our band. Because of that desire we want each song to sound just like the cd from the original artist. So just being able to play some of these guitar parts requires a very talented guitarist. It’s also very easy to notice when a singer isn’t a very good singer. Sorry, but it’s the truth.
Strong Vocal and leadership abilities from Worship Leaders
We want worship leaders who will get on stage and really point people to God and boldly lead them to worship Him. Vocal abilities are important, but we also want our worship leaders to, well, as the title implies, lead!
Know Their Parts
I’ll be honest; I don’t have the time or the patience to go out a write out every single guitar part for every single song we do every weekend. We expect each musician and singer to be able to listen to the cd and either figure out their parts for themselves or be able to find it written out online so that they can perform it just like the cd. I don’t tolerate “guitarist A” asking “guitarist B” how to play a lead part “guitarist A” is already supposed to know. That won’t be getting you booked again any time soon.
Not Needing Assistance from Us
When a band member gets to Crossroads on Sunday, they shouldn’t need anyone else’s help doing anything whether it’s setting up, learning a part like I said earlier, or just being able to do what we pay them to do. Now, that doesn’t mean that if a guitarist shows up and is playing for the first time that I expect him to know where the amp boxes are. That would be just a little ridiculous. If someone has never played at your church before, you have to expect them to know nothing about where anything is or even what they’re supposed to do before they actually start playing.
Representing Crossroads Church
Basically, we expect our musicians, and obviously worship leaders, to have a relationship with Christ, and have good character. A few weeks ago, we had a musician, who had been playing with us for some time, walk into the green room and start cussing up a storm. I don’t care if you’re mad or whatever, that doesn’t happen here. Let’s just say that guy won’t be playing at Crossroads again any time soon. We pay our musicians, so we consider them staff. So guess what, we expect them to behave like staff.
Ok, well, now that you know what we expect out of our band and why we pay them, tomorrow we’ll talk about an even more important aspect of the band that is also the most elusive…
Chemistry.
Paid vs. Volunteer Musicians
How much do you pay your musicians and worship leaders. I know it probably varies but give me an approximate. Is it per gig, per month, year or..? I know it is sensitive info so feel free to email me.
Thanks,
Jake.
We pay per gig. If you play this Sunday, your check goes in the mail the following Thursday.
We have 9 worship leaders, 6 lead guitarists, 9 rhythm guitarists, 5 bassists, 5 drummers, 3 keys players, and 5 background vocalists for us to choose from on a given weekend. Typically, meaning 50 out of 52 weeks a year, we will have 1 person for each position. Sometimes we will not have a rhythm guitarist if the keys player is really good at filling the sound with pads, or we won’t have a keys players if we book 2 really good guitarists.
Worship leaders get paid the most, then all of our musicians get paid the same, with only one exception that comes to mind at the moment. That one exception was in place before I got to Crossroads, otherwise it wouldn’t have been there. Just saying. I’m more than happy to email you the deets of everything else too if you’re still interested in them.
hey travis,
I’d be interested in getting your details by email if possible. Our church is at a bit of a crossroads and I’m considering whether or not to begin to pay musicians in the next 12-24 months.
I have it in budget this year to begin paying the drums, as I believe it is the foundation of the band, and then add paid positions from there. That’s a whole other issue as well, as I’m not sure how paying one position but not others to start will go down unless I’m extremely intentional with how I lead our team through it.
All in all, lots to think about.
One other thing, Churches who decide that reaching people is their main focus have to make a very important decision: Is the worship/music ministry going to be a place to serve or not. Here’s what I mean, If it is a place to serve then you have to figure out how to plug in whoever wants to be a part. I believe that if you truly want to reach people, it is not a place to serve. Why? Because, what happens on stage, becomes who you are and how people talk about you. With volunteers usually comes, just as you said, lack of quality because of insufficient time to practice and become better. This leads to distractions which causes people to miss important pieces of info. you may want to communicate as well as the lack of accountability. You can’t hammer a volunteer, with love & humility of course, for showing up late, not knowing their music, etc. as beautifully as you can a person you are paying to “provide a service!” Lovin’ the site and the blog so far my friend. Peace…J
Yeah Justin, you’re exactly right. And, as you very well know, that’s why our band is not a place for people to serve. But I guess you helped create that culture here huh. Good to here from you bro, and thanks for giving us more to think about.
And then…I started thinking! http://justindeanmckinney.blogspot.com!!!!
I would love like to see Christians to take our singing and playing craft more seriously. We seem to have fallen in to a rut of “campfire music / singing” and though there is nothing wrong with that (for people 16 and under) this seems to keep getting spoon-fed to the church as “great modern worship.” Paul said when I was a child I spoke as a child I reasoned as a child etc. but when I became older, I put away childish things.” I wish we could do that. Also: David played skillfully before the Lord. Old testament singers & musicians were hand picked by by their talents first and then weeded out by their dedication to God (because they had so many people “trying out” that were skillful, they could afford to do that). Nowadays what we do is we pull in anyone “who’s heart is right” and leave out the talent part altogether. Paul said to run the race for the victor’s crown. The bible instructs us to study to show ourselves approved. Yes of course it means to study scripture but also to strive for excellence in all we do. I’m not in any way trying to eclipse the holy consecration of one’s self unto our creator in an abject posture of total surrender and holy communion unto our Lord, but I would so love to see the church take God seriously as though they are playing before a King, rather than it be “just good enough.”
-Vocal Coach Ken
I would also love to get the details on how much you pay your musicians and worship leaders. Could you please send that to me in an email?
BTW, great site!
Thanks!
Justin Tanner