Songs & Updates for Saturday, June 10, 2017

This Saturday is Trinity Sunday.

Mass last week was one of our strongest in a while. I especially liked how well Spirit Blowing Through Creation turned out (here and here).

Special thanks to Tom's daughter Rachel for joining us on vocals. Huge thanks as well to Eva and Joe for averting a crisis with the sound system. For those who didn't hear, when I went to turn everything on, the entire rack was completely dead. It turns out that the wall outlet is fried, so they had to run an extension cord to get everything back online. Father is aware of the issue.

Songs & Updates for Saturday, March 11, 2017

This Saturday is the 2nd Sunday of Lent.

Special thanks to Lisa and Maggie for helping out with Ash Wednesday Mass! With the three of us in attendance, 5:30 was well-represented.

We ran into a few challenges on Saturday, but considering all the new material, it overall turned out well. Besides, we have four more weeks to work out the kinks :-)

Songs & Updates for Saturday, March 4, 2017

This Saturday is the 1st Sunday of Lent.

Mass last week was pretty solid. There were a few minor issues here and there, but nothing serious. Special thanks to Eva for the piano coverage. I'd also like to officially welcome Emiyare to the group on bass!

Songs & Updates for Saturday, October 1, 2016

This Saturday is the 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time.

Mass last week was pretty solid. Thanks to everyone who was able to be there, especially Jonathan for helping us out on bass and Frances for joining us for the first time on flute!

Songs & Updates for Saturday, September 24, 2016

This Saturday is the 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time.

Very nice work last week! I think several of our more fun and upbeat tunes speak for themselves: (here), (here) and (here). Special thanks to Jonathan and Barry for (re-)joining us!

Songs & Updates for Saturday, March 5, 2016

This Saturday is the 4th Sunday of Lent.

Mass last week went very well. Thanks to all who where able to be there!

Kristen joined us again on piano. The piano was still a bit overpowering, but we also discovered that all the microphones (including the troublesome choir mics) appear to be working. Let's continue tweaking the levels in the coming weeks and hopefully we'll find a balance that works.

Really the only notable issue besides the mics was the tempo on several songs felt a bit too fast to me. That was probably my fault, though, for not giving more clear direction.

Songs & Updates for Saturday, February 20, 2016

This Saturday is the 2nd Sunday of Lent.

Mass overall went fairly well last week. We ended up crashing through quite a bit of material before Mass -- there were probably a few pieces we should have spent more time on, but we didn't run into any major issues. Huge thanks to Jonathan for the last-minute guitar coverage!

Songs & Updates for Saturday, February 13, 2016

This Saturday is the 1st Sunday of Lent.

Mass last week went very well! We had piano for the first time in quite a while, and overall, everything sounded much more confident. Moving forward, Kristen will be with us about every other week.

We also started tweaking the sound system a bit to compensate for having piano, including bringing the piano master down and the gain on the other mics up. I also asked all the singers to move to the first two rows to better take advantage of the choir mics. In listening to the recordings, the piano is still a bit overpowering, but we'll keep tweaking the levels in the coming weeks and hopefully find a balance that works.

A few of us stuck around briefly after Mass to look at songs for Lent. Speaking of that, our music for February has been approved without any changes.

Songs & Updates for Saturday, November 5, 2015

This Saturday is the 2nd Sunday of Advent.

Mass went pretty well last week -- we had a nice group of singers and a couple of instrumentalists. Thanks once again to Jonathan for coming to cover guitar on short-notice!

Songs & Updates for Saturday, August 29, 2015

This Saturday is the 22nd Sunday of Ordinary Time.

Despite a few rough spots here and there, mass went OK last week. Huge thanks to Tom for being our solo guitar coverage! I know it wasn't easy and definitely not ideal, but I really appreciate it! I also apologize for any bad or confusing cues I may have given -- with everything that was going on, I was a bit scatterbrained.

Songs & Updates for Saturday, August 22, 2015

This Saturday is the 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time.

Mass went pretty smoothly last week. We ran into a few communications issues with the Communion song, but otherwise, no major problems. We also continued using one of the 11:00 sound profiles, which seems to work OK overall. Thanks as always to everyone who was able to be there!

Songs & Updates for Saturday, August 15, 2015

This Saturday is the 20th Sunday of Ordinary Time.

The Feast of the Assumption of Mary also falls on Saturday this year.

Mass went pretty smoothly last week with quite a few strong pieces. Thanks as always to everyone who was able to make it!

The sound system was working, but we used a different sound profile since the one for our group didn't appear on the list.

Songs & Updates for Saturday, August 8, 2015

This Saturday is the 19th Sunday of Ordinary Time.

There where a few rough patches here and there, but mass went fairly well last week. Huge thanks to Chip for being our solo guitarist and Jaclyn for singing with us for the past few months! Jaclyn won't be able to join us again until December.

We once again ran without microphones, since I got feedback the moment I pressed the un-mute button. The ambo microphone also didn't work, which caused issues when we did the Psalm.

Songs & Updates for Saturday, August 1, 2015

This Saturday is the 18th Sunday in Ordinary Time.

Despite being down a few people, mass went pretty smoothly last week. Thanks as always to everyone who was able to be there!

The only noteworthy issue we ran into was feedback over the sound system, which has been a reoccurring problem for the past month or more. In the end, we ran without microphones to avoid any problems during the liturgy. If anyone has any thoughts or ideas on how we can 'fix' this, I'm open to suggestions.

Songs & Updates for Saturday, July 11, 2015

This Saturday is the 15th Sunday of Ordinary Time.

Mass went fairly well last weekend. Jim was back, and I bounced between singing, playing and directing as needed. Karina also joined us to help cover some of the instrumental parts.

We did run into some feedback issues with the sound system once again, but Chip made an adjustment behind the board that seemed to fix this.

Father also commented on how good the harmony sounded on both the Psalm and Offertory songs, so nice job all!

Songs & Updates for Saturday, May 9, 2015

This Saturday is the 6th Sunday or Easter.

Despite having several guitarists out last week, mass went pretty well! Cindy played accompaniment for everything except for the Psalm, which was covered by guitar, bass and melodic instruments. Huge thanks to everyone who was able to make it!

We also had some issues with feedback over the sound system, probably due to some adjustments made by musicians from OLV who covered a wedding earlier that afternoon. Adjusting one of the dials behind the board seemed to get rid of the problem.

Ginny and I stuck around after mass to look at a few songs for this Saturday with Cindy, including 'All the Ends of the Earth', 'In This Place', and 'With One Voice'.

Songs & Updates for Saturday, April 18, 2015

This Saturday is the Third Sunday of Easter.

Things went fairly well last week. We ran into a few minor issues with some of the less-common songs, and also had problems with the podium mic, but nothing too serious.

Songs & Updates for Saturday, April 11, 2015

This Saturday is the Second Sunday of Easter.

I hope everyone had a good Easter!

Things went fairly well on Sunday despite issues with the sound system and not much practice time. We ended up doing most of mass without microphones, and several songs where limited to only a verse or two since the Hall was maybe only half full. Once again, huge thanks to everyone who was able to sing, play or otherwise help out with the Triduum masses!

Songs & Updates for Saturday, March 14, 2015

This Saturday is the Forth Sunday of Lent.

Despite another rushed rehearsal, we made it through mass without any major problems. We spent the first half of practice working out some issues with the sound system. We had a visiting priest, and Chip and Barry covered guitar in Jim and Jonathan's absence. Probably our biggest challenges were intros and communication. Huge thanks to everyone involved!

Songs & Updates for Saturday, January 31, 2015

This Saturday is the 4th Sunday in Ordinary Time.

Mass last week went pretty well -- I once again pass along compliments from a visitor who approached me after mass. Nice work, all!