I found this great passage in the sleeve notes of Jeremy Riddle's new live album (Prepare the Way: Live) - for me it paints a great picture of worship:

"There is a moment that I love more than any other moment I've experienced on earth. I love the moment when God's people gather together, lift holy hands, and with one raised voce exalt the King of Kings. I love these moments because God Himself inhabits these moments. He sits enthroned on the praises of His saints. This recording was not an attempt at musical perfection or nailing the best vocal takes. In fact, at one event where multiple songs were recorded, I was singing with walking pneumonia and my vocals were barely hanging on. This recording was about capturing worship and the felt sense of His manifest presence that was often strong during the events where these recordings took place. So we release this recording in hope that it also releases worship in your heart and His presence fills you with joy."

As worship musicians, it can be really easy to focus on the music, to chide ourselves at missing a chord change or singing a note slightly off tune. It is reflections such as this that keep you thinking more about the worship than the music, and more about the heart than the musicality.

Jeremy Riddle - Prepare The Way (Live)

When you listen to a live worship album, you don’t just want to listen to it, you want to feel part of it. Jeremy Riddle covers this succinctly from the outset of this album - praying for His presence in the worship, and carefully building a chorus to the uplifting “Rain Down”. Over the past month or so, I have been seen this idea of starting a worship set with a chorus coming in more and more, and I feel that it sets the tone, atmosphere, and focus of a worship set squarely on the Lord from the word go. With a simple, yet very effective chorus such as this, worshippers have an opportunity to enter into His presence without over-complication of lyrics or musical texture, and again this is apparent with Jeremy’s offering. I recently commented that Jesus Culture had managed to create a ‘brand’ to their sound, while using worship songs written by a wide variety of songwriters, and to an extent Jeremy Riddle has also done this (though this is by no means a comparison). The opening track (“Rain Down”) was written by Delirious - and is quite upbeat by Jeremy’s standards, while “How He Loves” was written by John Mark McMillan, though this is closer to Jeremy’s style. The use of the songs of others in this context is a nice touch, very few worship leaders do a 10 song set without including another songwriter’s material, and it provides the album with a sense of familiarity. Speaking of familiarity, the set includes many of Jeremy’s better-known self-penned songs - “Sweetly Broken”, “Full Attention” and “Stand In Awe” all make the album. The ‘branding’ of this album is all in Jeremy’s unique, rootsy vocals for me. With an expansive, though (in my opinion) not inaccessible range, melodic control, and a passion being expressed insightfully, this is a very approachable album. It was recently commented to me that it isn’t always easy to worship to recorded media (CDs, DVDs etc.), that the ‘corporate’ feeling of worship could somehow be lost, though with this album I feel this isn’t the case. The production of this album has a very ‘live’ feel to it, crowd vocals come across well, and there is a distinct atmosphere to the whole affair. I must confess that when he first came on to the worship scene a few years ago I wasn’t sure how much I liked him, yet the live album has presented him in a new light. Give it a listen and see what you think.