Playing in Church.

[bass_dinger]

On 13/07/2025 at 20:19, Rosie C said:

As the Deer Pants for Water

 

"Deer pants" has a nice descending bass line - I always used to play the octave line from Bach's Air on a G string underneath it.

[nilorius]

You don't need reverb fx pedal when playing in church.

[SimonK]

8 hours ago, nilorius said:

You don't need reverb fx pedal when playing in church.

 

Does anyone use one on bass - I never have!

[nilorius]

7 hours ago, SimonK said:

 

Does anyone use one on bass - I never have!

I have one on my pedal board. Little, small extra.

[GoodShowSir]

Yes I too have one. Very subtle though.  And I debate with myself if a little bit makes the sound a bit fuller or not all the time. It would be the first pedal I get rid of 😅

[SimonK]

Came home buzzing as had a great service - got a lovely growly sound out of the Warwick (ended up using its passive mode) and following the friday practice was far more comfortable with the five strings today - then stomped in a mid boost using a Boss GEB-7 for the two songs I played fretless on and got enough mwah that the worship leader even looked at me and smiled... small things!

Edited July 20 by SimonK

[SimonK]

ooh new bass sound to aspire to. Not quite sure why this came up in my watchlist but I like it!

 

 

[LeftyP]

For the third year in a row we had a Church Weekend Away at a local Guide & Scout centre.  The weather was excellent and so was the food!  Friday night BBQ followed by a Ceilidh.  Saturday morning there was a service and Bible talk with refreshments in the middle!  Saturday afternoon fun and games such as Badminton and Frisbee Golf (so much better than real golf) and more great food.  It was back to church for Sunday morning before returning to the centre for a picnic and more games.  It was a great way to meet and get to know new members with over 150 people attending.  I was playing bass in the band and the singing was brilliant.  I can recommend such an event to build church relationships.

[GoodShowSir]

Curious question for you all. Do any of you use a bass synth in church?

[nilorius]

24 minutes ago, GoodShowSir said:

Curious question for you all. Do any of you use a bass synth in church?

I only had to play in church once (3 songs) and in one i used MXR envelope filter. No problem. But bass synth - i don't know.

[SimonK]

1 hour ago, GoodShowSir said:

Curious question for you all. Do any of you use a bass synth in church?

 

I was thinking of getting one because they are in all the videos from the big churches, but then discovered a combination of my fuzz, octave pedal and chorus gave a similar effect without having to spend any extra money! I felt all satisfied that I was equipped to make that sound, but then only ended up using it once in a six month period, so ended up taking the pedals off my board again!

 

Out of interest do you have a load of songs where you have a need for it? My experience of church is that 95% of the time a simple punchy bass tone is all that is needed!

[bass_dinger]

2 hours ago, GoodShowSir said:

Curious question for you all. Do any of you use a bass synth in church?

 

When I played, I did so without effects (and indeed, without effectiveness).  

 

It felt unnecessarily complicated to add layers of effects to so short a setlist. Indeed, I never even touched the pickup selector or tone controls. 

Any variation that I wanted, I could achieve with different finger-placement on the plucking hand.  

 

 

[LukeFRC]

It depends on the church doesn’t it? I think the grindy bethel style bass makes little sense unless you’re in a setting where there’s a big stage and band. 
Personally it’s my opinion that some of the vibe led, minimal melody songs we have been using in the last few years just arent amazing for communal sing worship unless you go big and loud and very front led - which I’m not sure would work for the majority of U.K. churches and I would question why we would want to as part of our worship (other than the PA team want a big new PA and the guitarists have all gone bought that new big sky mx and want to use it) 

 

So short answer - if you can do synth stuff and it adds to the music - go for it! 

[GoodShowSir]

1 hour ago, SimonK said:

Out of interest do you have a load of songs where you have a need for it? My experience of church is that 95% of the time a simple punchy bass tone is all that is needed!

 

Nope   Maybe one or two that we tend to play with a synth style backing track, mainly Phil Wickham ones. 

 

But I was just curious of peoples experiences. Think I am just trying to justify to myself I should get something, but also for the wedding cover band I am in which it would be way more used. Not sure if my church is ready for it, I played a 5 string bass once and it seemed to blow their minds. Or maybe... that was just the first step.  

 

Seriously though, I agree with you all, I'm quite skeptical of it and when I did hear one live at a place I went to I found it super distracting. Like I was at a gig not church.

 

Edit - didn't help they also had a smoke machine!! 

Edited 3 hours ago by GoodShowSir

[LukeFRC]

11 minutes ago, GoodShowSir said:

Think I am just trying to justify to myself I should get something, but also for the wedding cover band I am in which it would be way more used.

I mean if you want to try a C4/MXR/Fi4 this is hardly the forum to be discouraged and can be fun to try

[Risk101]

So I've used my Moog Little Phatty several times in church, most often at the bigger events like Christmas or Easter when there are some "performance" songs. It sounds awesome (imo 😂😂). (But you do have to make sure the keys player leaves you the bandwidth...)

[SimonK]

3 hours ago, GoodShowSir said:

 

Edit - didn't help they also had a smoke machine!! 

 

...I played Sunday morning services a few times the morning after the old Cutting Edge (aka Delirious) events back in the late 90s early '00s and we used the whole stage rig including smoke machines just because we could... and yes it's not quite the same on a Sunday morning!!

 

(in danger of name dropping @mowf (who is on this forum) used to play with Martin Smith on the Saturday nights)

 

Edited 22 minutes ago by SimonK