Do churches need to license CCM to sing in worship?

[The Liturgist]

So Pavel, what would your solution be to this problem?

Actually the Oriental Orthodox churches use beautiful music, for example, the Coptic Orthodox Church uses a distinct style of chant called tasbeha. Although new hymns are composed, for example, to commemorate newly added saints such as the nineteen new martyrs killed in Libya, these are generally not subject to copyright.

 

[WolfGate]

Well I myself am opposed to it because the money spent on CCM licenses could be spent on hiring an organist and a professional choir director, and while there are some exquisite new works for the organ and choir by composers like T. Tertius Noble, Francis Jackson, who reposed last year at the age of 103, they are generally going to be less expensive to license or less neccessary to license due to the vast repetoire that is in the public domain.

I understand that position! As I clarified a bit later you are not the people I was referencing who wanted both to use the copy written music and not pay to do so. Your option is a viable and good one for many churches, though I will point out your church is still paying for worship music if you hire the organist and choir director.

 

[Pavel Mosko]

So Pavel, what would your solution be to this problem?

Well, the easy solution is to use less of that kind of music.


If you are picky about your song lyrics and themes there have been some problems with that music for a long time., going back a good 25 years maybe more. So much of that music is focused on the singer's feelings and that is a bit too reductionistic and formulaic as far as good hymnography goes. The old hymns and ancient Christian chants focused not just on feelings of the worshiper but had solid scriptural and theological content as well.

 

[NotUrAvgGuy]

Well I myself am opposed to it because the money spent on CCM licenses could be spent on hiring an organist and a professional choir director, and while there are some exquisite new works for the organ and choir by composers like T. Tertius Noble, Francis Jackson, who reposed last year at the age of 103, they are generally going to be less expensive to license or less neccessary to license due to the vast repetoire that is in the public domain.

Which is fine, of course. So much depends on the church. Personally, I don't care for organs or choirs. Other than growing up Catholic (which I left 40 years ago), I have never attended a church with a choir or an organ. Nothing at all wrong with that! It's just not my preference. However, as long as the music is Biblical, I just go with it. There are more important things for me in a church and it's hard to find everything just the way you want it. I have some throat issues as well so I can't sing for long periods of time. I usually don't sing much during church. I mostly listen and sing in my head. I like CCM (provided it's Biblical) but that's just me. I went to one church for a while that would only sing the Psalms or hymns. Only a piano. I was fine with that until the pastor insisted on trying to force us all to sing in parts and took every opportunity to make us practice. I felt like I signed up for a choir which is something I would never do! I got stuck practicing with the bases. At church, I just sang the chorus and no one ever noticed

 

[NotUrAvgGuy]

Well, the easy solution is to use less of that kind of music.


If you are picky about your song lyrics and themes there have been some problems with that music for a long time., going back a good 25 years maybe more. So much of that music is focused on the singer's feelings and that is a bit too reductionistic and formulaic as far as good hymnography goes. The old hymns and ancient Christian chants focused not just on feelings of the worshiper but had solid scriptural and theological content as well.

Oh, I agree. So much repetition and mindless lyrics. Like some of the Hillsong stuff. Beautiful songs but some go on and on and on... They seemed designed more to elicit an emotional response.

However, I try not to judge how others worship. I am very logical, rational, and non-emotional so naturally, super-emotional music does not appeal as much to me. However, God created us with emotions and there is nothing wrong with engaging our emotions during worship. The key is balance and yeah, some songs don't have balance but I just go with it. The repetition doesn't change how I worship. I went to this RC Sproul conference once in southern California. He was a conservative, Presbyterian and loved music. Great man. Behind me was a group of youth from a heavy metal church in L.A. Now I can't imagine heavy metal worship. I don't know if that would even qualify as worship but they were on fire for the Lord. I don't like single distinctive churches but I'd rather see them in church getting to know God than somewhere else. Perhaps in time, they will come to enjoy other types of music. I would not enjoy their church but maybe that's where they needed to be at that time. I will leave that between them and the Lord.

 

[Pavel Mosko]

I actually think this is one of those problematic things of modern times. Can you imagine if intellectual properties and corporations existed in ancient times? e.g.- the relatives of King David, and saint Paul charging Christians and Jews to use their Psalms and Epistles in ancient churches and synagogues?

Oh, I agree. So much repetition and mindless lyrics. Like some of the Hillsong stuff. Beautiful songs but some go on and on and on... They seemed designed more to elicit an emotional response.

However, I try not to judge how others worship.

I believe a valid Biblical case can be made that we should aim for more. I will give you three examples.


1) Saint Paul's talking about the milk vs. the meat of the Gospel in places like 1 Corinthians.


2) Biblical Scholar Michael Heiser has a saying that he is "Done with Protecting people from their Bible", when it comes to things like shying away from the hard to explain passages and areas. (People need to grow in relationship to understanding the Bible and doctrine etc.)


3) There have been various parodies of the Christian music industry and scene. South Park had an episode where the main antagonist Cartman was taking the basic pop/rock music format for love songs, and simply transferring that over to being a love song about Jesus. I got admit, 4 years before this episode ever aired, I noticed this very thing happening myself, and it really grated on me after a while.

 

[WolfGate]

Well, the easy solution is to use less of that kind of music.


If you are picky about your song lyrics and themes there have been some problems with that music for a long time., going back a good 25 years maybe more. So much of that music is focused on the singer's feelings and that is a bit too reductionistic and formulaic as far as good hymnography goes. The old hymns and ancient Christian chants focused not just on feelings of the worshiper but had solid scriptural and theological content as well.

That certainly makes it easier because you have to do a lot less work to select excellent songs with good theological content or if that is your preferred style. Time has separated the chaff from the wheat for us. Remember that Charles Wesley, who has dozens, perhaps even hundreds, of hymns sung in churches every Sunday, wrote over 6500 hymns, only a small percentage of which stood that test of time. There is really good music for the church being written and distributed today, but worship leaders have to find it in a sea of other songs that will soon be forgotten.

So your solutions works for a church that desires to use older music. However it still remains for churches that prefer a more modern style.

 

[Pavel Mosko]

That certainly makes it easier because you have to do a lot less work to select excellent songs with good theological content or if that is your preferred style. Time has separated the chaff from the wheat for us. Remember that Charles Wesley, who has dozens, perhaps even hundreds, of hymns sung in churches every Sunday, wrote over 6500 hymns, only a small percentage of which stood that test of time. There is really good music for the church being written and distributed today, but worship leaders have to find it in a sea of other songs that will soon be forgotten.

So your solutions works for a church that desires to use older music. However it still remains for churches that prefer a more modern style.

I think it all comes down to what churches can afford, and who they are affiliated with as far as their denomination or culture goes. Also, Some folks probably use bootleg stuff which raises obvious ethical questions.


I think when talking about this stuff it is good to examine your conceptions and assumptions. Going back to at least 1996, many folks were influenced by Rick Warren's original book, "the Purpose Driven Church" and that book seemed to influence a lot of people's thoughts on the subject. I actually greatly disagree with some of its foundational assumptions especially in regard to worship. Anyway, the basic assumption of the book is Christians have a free hand when it comes to worship just as long as they work according to a basic Biblical criterion of goals and values. It sees the Worship service as largely Evangelistic the way a good chunk American Protestants do going back before Billy Graham to the generation or two before him like Billy Sunday etc. This model sees musical style and genre as a way of evangelizing a specific kind of demographic, in a way analogous to how radio stations and TV try to target a specific kind of audience demographic (Age range, ethnicity etc.)


So you got to ask yourself are these your assumptions? Or are you just trying to fit into your denomination of general church culture norms? The answers for why you are doing something, can influence the back end of things like how much you are willing to pay etc. Sometimes we assume things as givens that aren't really givens or needed things.

 

[NotUrAvgGuy]

I think it all comes down to what churches can afford, and who they are affiliated with as far as their denomination or culture goes. Also, Some folks probably use bootleg stuff which raises obvious ethical questions.


I think when talking about this stuff it is good to examine your conceptions and assumptions. Going back to at least 1996, many folks were influenced by Rick Warren's original book, "the Purpose Driven Church" and that book seemed to influence a lot of people's thoughts on the subject. I actually greatly disagree with some of its foundational assumptions especially in regard to worship. Anyway, the basic assumption of the book is Christians have a free hand when it comes to worship just as long as they work according to a basic Biblical criterion of goals and values. It sees the Worship service as largely Evangelistic the way a good chunk American Protestants do going back before Billy Graham to the generation or two before him like Billy Sunday etc. This model sees musical style and genre as a way of evangelizing a specific kind of demographic, in a way analogous to how radio stations and TV try to target a specific kind of audience demographic (Age range, ethnicity etc.)


So you got to ask yourself are these your assumptions? Or are you just trying to fit into your denomination of general church culture norms? The answers for why you are doing something, can influence the back end of things like how much you are willing to pay etc. Sometimes we assume things as givens that aren't really givens or needed things.

An old pastor of mine had a saying, "When the church gathers, it is to worship God and edify the saints, when the church scatters it's to seek and save the lost." Those may not be the exact words, but the point was that when we gather on Sunday (or other times) as a church, the purpose is to gather as a family and corporately worship God and be equipped. The rest of the week, we are seeking and saving the lost, spreading the love of God, etc.

I could be wrong, but I think it's a modern concept to consider church services evangelistic. Church is for the people of God to come together and worship and be equipped. Visitors should be warmly welcomed but the service should not be tailored to meet their needs. The message should not be watered down or censored to avoid potentially difficult passages. The music should not be designed to appeal to the unchurched. This is our time as a body of believers. Greet the visitors, make them feel welcome, and provide them with information, but don't design everything around them. Too many Christians today think evangelism is inviting someone to church. That can be evangelism but most effective evangelism is done day-to-day while interacting with friends or coworkers and witnessing with our lives and our words. When we try to turn church into evangelism we end up with sermons of milk and pop concerts for music. I visited such a church once and while we were taking communion, a musician was performing a rather loud electric guitar-centered song from the old Christian rock group Petra. I love Petra but not during communion. Maybe something very mellow softly played on the piano but not a guitar solo from a Christian rock song. I found it totally distracting and inappropriate for contemplating the Lord's Supper. When a church bends over backward to make the unchurched feel comfortable it loses its purpose. Evangelism is not the first priority of our church services. Our music and our message should be centered on the worship of God by His people gathered as a family.

 

[dqhall]

There is a fee to sing copyrighted songs. Not a huge fee but it has been steadily increasing over the past few years, might possibly be a burden for a smaller fellowship.

Some Christian groups do have an issue with paying to sing songs, Jesus said 'Freely you have received, freely give'. That doesn't sit well with paying for gospel truth. God Bless

Some songs like Amazing Grace, Old Rugged Cross, Great is thy Faithfulness, Love Lifted Me, and O Holy Night have expired copyrights.

I was in a church where we had a hymnal for every section of the pew. Those without hymnals were instructed to look at their neighbor’s hymnal. Every one was using a song book purchased for the purpose of singing songs with copyright permission bought and paid for.

Licensed contemporary song books might be needed in order to sing modern songs without infringing on someone’s copyright.

 

[Pavel Mosko]

An old pastor of mine had a saying, "When the church gathers, it is to worship God and edify the saints, when the church scatters it's to seek and save the lost." Those may not be the exact words, but the point was that when we gather on Sunday (or other times) as a church, the purpose is to gather as a family and corporately worship God and be equipped. The rest of the week, we are seeking and saving the lost, spreading the love of God, etc.

I could be wrong, but I think it's a modern concept to consider church services evangelistic. Church is for the people of God to come together and worship and be equipped. Visitors should be warmly welcomed but the service should not be tailored to meet their needs. The message should not be watered down or censored to avoid potentially difficult passages. The music should not be designed to appeal to the unchurched. This is our time as a body of believers. Greet the visitors, make them feel welcome, and provide them with information, but don't design everything around them. Too many Christians today think evangelism is inviting someone to church. That can be evangelism but most effective evangelism is done day-to-day while interacting with friends or coworkers and witnessing with our lives and our words. When we try to turn church into evangelism we end up with sermons of milk and pop concerts for music. I visited such a church once and while we were taking communion, a musician was performing a rather loud electric guitar-centered song from the old Christian rock group Petra. I love Petra but not during communion. Maybe something very mellow softly played on the piano but not a guitar solo from a Christian rock song. I found it totally distracting and inappropriate for contemplating the Lord's Supper. When a church bends over backward to make the unchurched feel comfortable it loses its purpose. Evangelism is not the first priority of our church services. Our music and our message should be centered on the worship of God by His people gathered as a family.

Yeah I agree on the theology and the outcome. Historically speaking the worship service has been directed at God. There also have been some interesting developments in people studying all the Seeker Sensitive of the 90s, that they largely do not succeed in their basic models that believers will move on from their consumeristic beginnings into mature serving.


1) The biggest finding was the Willow Creek model's congregation came out with a study where they realized the problems of their Model (they are the guys who are responsible for popularizing the model of a church sanctuary being more like being in a giant oversized living room).

Willow Creek's 'Huge Shift'

Influential megachurch moves away from seeker-sensitive services.

www.christianitytoday.com

2) Something similar happened to Rick Warren's Saddle Back "Base Ball Diamond" model of Church as well. It was much less dramatic that Willow Creek where they didn't completely abandon it, but had to spend much more effort to get people to move on from being just consumers of Christian content to getting more involved in the Church ministry, using their spiritual gifts etc.

 

[Hazelelponi]

3) There have been various parodies of the Christian music industry and scene. South Park had an episode where the main antagonist Cartman was taking the basic pop/rock music format for love songs, and simply transferring that over to being a love song about Jesus. I got admit, 4 years before this episode ever aired, I noticed this very thing happening myself, and it really grated on me after a while.

So .. elephant in the room...

What are you doing watching South Park?

Lol

 

[Pavel Mosko]

So .. elephant in the room...

What are you doing watching South Park?

Lol

lol yeah, your way slow on the draw with that, expected that a long time ago.

I actually brought it up in a way where there was plausible deniability that I simply read about it or watched a clip on YouTube. (I didn't I saw the episode). My defense I guess is stuff I have related in places like my past two threads below.

I have seen the effects of this kind of thinking from going to strict Christian parochial schools in kindergarten to high school and it aint pretty, and I think is often damaging and counterproductive to the cause.

The Problems of the Christian Ghetto

This something I have talked about online, blogged on, and video blogged on. My Christian Forums Blog synopsis I define the Christian Ghetto as being the phenomenon where Christians (At least in the US, especially Evangelicals) want to create their own sub culture that is parallel to secular...

www.christianforums.com

Salvationism, Christianity as an idealogy

I've been working on doing some kind of web series on the theme of Christianity as a "Journey of Faith". On that general theme, the first topic scheduled to be covered revolves around some unhappy experiences attending some Christian parochial schools. Looking back, I believe that some...

www.christianforums.com

 

[Kees Boer]

If you sing the songs in the Bible you don't need to worry about any copyright.

That should be true. But the translations are copyrighted.... Now if you were to sing from the KJV, yes, there is no copyright on that. Or you could sing from the Originals...

 

[Deegie]

As a pastor who deals with copyright issues ALL the time, I just want to make sure we have the right answer to the question posed in the OP.

There is an exemption in the Copyright Act for the performance of nondramatic literary or musical works of a religious nature, during a religious service at a place of worship (paraphrasing 17 USC 110(3)). That exemption means you can sing whatever you want, without regard to copyright. However, a number of other protected rights are not exempted, the main ones being: you cannot reproduce the music or lyrics (either by photocopying or projecting) and you cannot record, transmit, or broadcast the performance (such as via livestream).

My church maintains five licenses from three different companies in order to give us the flexibility to draw from a large pool of music, print the music in the bulletins, and livestream our services. One of them also covers performance during non-worship, so we can sing at social events, concerts, youth events, and even have choir/organ recordings as our hold music.

So...is it a hassle? Most definitely. I spend a lot of time making sure we only use works that are licensed and that we give the proper credit to the people who made them. But this is their livelihood, and to take it without compensation is theft in my book.

 

[Techo]

The issue comes down to trading. This was a characteristic of Satan when portrayed as the ruler of Tyre in Eze 28:5, 14. The whole of society today is locked into this system rather than a Godly one where each gives from the abundance that God has provided. This is why my Church does not use CCM music or Hillsong stuff. Instead we encourage our people to write songs that express what we are hearing from our teachers. Months before the young adults or teens have their camps they are asked to submit songs to be taught there. We get 20 or 30 songs from the younger members of our fellowships nationally each year. These do not necessarily make into general congregational usage. Other members of our fellowships also produce music, 30 or so songs each year, which we do generally sing within the congregations nationally.

All these songs carry a copyright so they cannot be 'stolen' (as has happened in the past) and passed off as somebody else's song for which a copyright fee is then demanded. Typically the copyright carries the permission:

"I freely offer this song into the fellowship of 'the body of Christ' for the purpose of worship and fellowship. It may be used and copied freely for this purpose."

Any church, anywhere in the world could freely copy and use these songs rather than pay to use CCM. The main issue would be that we don't do 'bless me' music or music to get people hyped up into some spiritual emotion... it is for "teaching and admonishing one another" Col 3:16 so it carries the message and teaching we have been receiving from the pulpits of our fellowships. If the Holy Spirit is guiding and directing each Church then this message should be similar but perhaps this is not always the case. They may not have use for that music.

 

[Kees Boer]

I really liked what you shared there. We only sing Scripture Songs here and we went to the studio and got them recorded. Of course here in South America, we could get them recorded professionally for a lot less money. They are all in Spanish, but I'm happy to give them to you as karaoke files. I have the English lyrics for most of them, I just need good vocalists to sing the English part. So, if you know how to sing, let me know. The good part is that you memorized a couple hundred verses from the Bible!

Here is a sample:

Scripture Songs Sample - Google Drive

drive.google.com

 

[Kees Boer]

I really liked what you shared there. We only sing Scripture Songs here and we went to the studio and got them recorded. Of course here in South America, we could get them recorded professionally for a lot less money. They are all in Spanish, but I'm happy to give them to you as karaoke files. I have the English lyrics for most of them, I just need good vocalists to sing the English part. So, if you know how to sing, let me know. The good part is that you memorized a couple hundred verses from the Bible!

Here is a sample:

Scripture Songs Sample - Google Drive

drive.google.com

This is a video about how and more why we decided to only sing Scripture Songs. Oh, by the way, folks love it!!!

 

[Techo]

Kees,
Scripture in Song is a thing that has been happening for the past 50 years. David and Dale Garratt in Kiwi land have been putting out albums since 1968 and, as you say, it has been a good way to remember scripture. It has probably been hijacked by the world with copyright fees.
I have found that when a song is translated from another language some of the content seems to be a bit... strained? by have to fit different words to that tune. i.e. the new language does not seem to fit as well as the original one.
There is more to a Christian's growth and development that simple memorising scripture. It needs to be applied. Connections between passages need to be made to bring understanding of who God is and how we commit our lives into His service.
As far as singing goes... well... I am pretty bass-ic. When I married in 2000 they only gave us 3 months before my wife was asked to join the choir. She could sing all parts from soprano down to tenor so I was quite expecting her to be asked to join. What did surprise me is that they also asked me to join. Maybe they just needed more basses. They stopped putting me on the roster 13 years later. Probably got better singers, I expect.

 

[The Liturgist]

Kees,
Scripture in Song is a thing that has been happening for the past 50 years

It‘s been happening for the past 2,000 years. Consider that the entire Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Assyrian, and traditional Western (Latin liturgies of the Roman Rite according to various uses such as that of Sarum, Rome, the Dominicans, Lyons, Braga, the Carthusians, York, the Norbertine, and likewise the Gallican Rite liturgy and the closely related Mozarabic Rite, and its other relatives like the Ambrosian Rite and Beneventan Rite) are, like the more recent Lutheran and Anglican liturgies, composed almost entirely from hymns, antiphons, litanies, canticles, psalms and so on whose words are taken from the Bible (for example, 93% of the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom consists of direct quotes from the Bible, not counting the proper Psalms, Prokeimenon, Epistle and Gospel, which are also straight from the Bible, and almost the entire liturgy is sung.

Likewise the other Eastern Orthodox liturgies are almost entirely taken from the Bible and almost entirely or entirely sung (for example, the Coptic Divine Liturgy, Raising of Incense and Psalmody is sung), and this was true of the Roman Rite until around 900 AD, when priests stopped chanting the Low Mass in monotone and began praying it silently).

Some high church Anglican parishes, chapels and cathedrals have sung entire services, most frequently Choral Evensong. I have a recording of it sung and chanted entirely, including both the Old Testament and New Testament lesson, at York Minster in 1979, and more recently at King’s College in Cambridge during Advent conducted by Stephen Cleobury.

There is also the famous Lutheran Singmesse composed from hymns by Dr. Martin Luther around 1525 AD, and other examples of entirely sung Lutheran services, such as Vespers and Compline in the LCMS/LCC, as my friend @MarkRohfrietsch can confirm.

For my part, one of my pet peeves concerning most CCM music is that it doesn’t quote or paraphrase scripture as much as the ancient hymnody, and when it does quote scripture, the quotes are usually of particularly popular verses and tend to be short and repeated frequently.

Compare this with the Psalms, the Evangelical Canticles (Benedictus and the Magnificat from Luke 1 ch. 1, Nunc Dimitis from Luke ch. 2) and other Scriptural Canticles like Benedicite Omni Opera from Daniel and the Song of the Suffering Servant from Isaiah, and ancient hymns like the Phos Hilarion and Ho Monogenes.

The hymns of Luther, Charles Wesley, Isaac Watts, Sir Arthur Sullivan, etc, in the style known as chorales, which dominated Protestant music from the 18th through 20th century, but which sadly since the 1990s have been displaced from a large number of churches in North America, mainline churches and conservative confessing churches, even some parishes in denominations like the LCMS and ACNA, and have completely taken over some denominations like the Christian and Missionary Alliance and the Non-Denominational churches, which is so sad given the historic importance and beauty of these hymns (for example, they have always been integral to Lutheran, Moravian and Methodist music) are frequently paraphrases of scripture relevant to the liturgical function or date of the hymn, and fairly sophisticated paraphrases at that. And in some cases, for example the Christmas hymn and carol Angels We Have Heard on High, feature a direct quote from Scripture and from the Latin liturgy of the Western Church (the extended Gloria in Excelsis Deo, which is how “Glory to God in the Highest” is translated in the ancient Vetus Latina Bible, which dates from the second century, and which remained in use as a source of liturgical phrases even after the Vulgate displaced it as the Bible read during church services, for during the decline of the Roman Empire the Vulgate, with its Vulgar Latin, was simpler and easier to understand for the different people even as Vulgar Latin divided into the Romance Languages (some of which, like Italian, Castillian, Catalan, Sicillian and especially Sardinian are closer to Latin than others, like French, Portuguese and Romanian (although Romanian vowells are probably the closest to how Latin was pronounced in ancient Rome, where the m and s on words like Imperium and Germanicus not pronounced, compare Romanian last names like Ionescu).