Church this morning was an exercise in humility and humor. I played keyboard for both morning services (8:30 AM and 10:30 AM). The band has to be there by 7:15 AM in order to do a run-through and get the final order of songs, etc. I am always there by about 6:30 or so, however, because I just like to have some quiet before-time to practice all by myself, to feel like I'm on top of things, so to speak. This morning, though, I had a horrible time waking up, and didn't arrive until 7:20. At 7:18 my cell phone rang -- it was Jeff (the worship leader) and he was worried about me, since I'm usually there before he is.
This was only the beginning of my troubles. I should've been concerned, because my inability to get it together and get there on time should've been an indication to me that I was not going to be at the top of my game.
There were two songs added to the end that I didn't have music to, but I knew both of them. They would be after the pastor's message, during a quiet time of reflection and contemplation. One of them was a song that was from quite a few years back, and it had probably been five years since I'd played it, but it's a simple song. The other one was one that I've learned since coming to this church, so it's fairly new to me.
During the 8:30 service, we usually sing the first part of the service, then sit out and drink coffee until the pastor finishes speaking -- normally we all sit in on the message during the 10:30 service. When it was getting to be time to go back in for those two extra reflection-songs, we went in and I began to play softly while the pastor was speaking. Then when he was done, Jeff began to sing. Suddenly, during the bridge of the song (the older one that I knew well but hadn't played in a few years), I completely spaced. I couldn't for the LIFE of me remember what the chord progression was on the bridge. If I'd just calmed down and thought about it for a couple of seconds, I probably could've saved it, but as it was, I panicked internally. I reverted back to the last thing someone had said during practice, which was "That's an E-flat chord", and I mindlessly landed on E flat. Oh, no, that was NOT the right chord! I was completely discombobulated, and Jeff had no idea what to sing at that point because I was the only instrumentalist and I had gaffed it BAD. I kept playing and eventually figured out where I was, but it was irretrievable. I transitioned into the second of the two songs and played it without incident, but the vocalists were still so stunned by the complete botch that they couldn't remember the words of the song. I even heard one of them accidentally combine two words into "fart". On stage!!! [shudder] It was ugly. I felt HORRIBLE!!!! Horrible, I tell you!
That's actually a relatively new feeling for me. I haven't been upset over a mistake, even a big one, in years. It's just not a big deal to me, because mistakes are part of life and I make them all the time. But this one just blew my brain and I felt personally responsible for the resulting cascade failure. After the announcements, we then usually break into one of the rip-snorting songs to close off the service. Jeff counted off the four and we all landed on a big rockin' G chord. Immediately one of the strings on his guitar broke and twoinged out to the side unceremoniously. He stopped and turned to the rest of us and sheepishly said, "Um, guys, you're going to have to take over from here." He counted four again and this time we (the bass player, the electric guitar player, the drummer and me) took it from there and finished it out.
When we hit the final cutoff, I immediately went to find a pen and I wrote down the chord progression on that stoopid song that I know backwards and forwards. I apologized to Jeff, who was busy digging through his files to find the lead sheets for those two songs so I could have music (oh, the shame! I shouldn't have to have the music!). I told him that I already knew what I had done, but he insisted. We then played through the song once, just to cement it in my mind again, and then he went off to re-string his guitar. I stayed off-stage instead of wandering around outside to fellowship with all the other folks, because I felt like a complete dolt. The other band-members were suitably soothing, and we made it into a humorous thing. I still felt awful, though. The pastor even joked a little about it, looked me in the eye and saw the seriousness, and laughed and said not to worry about it. I smiled at him, but it didn't go down very far.
The 10:30 service went much less eventfully. I didn't make any memorable mistakes, but I did end up saving Jeff when he couldn't seem to find the melody to come in on at the beginning of one of the songs. It was a fast song, but we were beginning it at a slow spot as a sort-of introduction. The problem was that the song is in E major, and we were transitioning into it from a song that we did in A-flat major. Not a real natural-feeling segue, I'm telling you. It doesn't work well. He was doing the transition himself, so I wasn't really playing except for some very light background chords. I could immediately sense that he was in trouble, so I began to play the melody line gently. He came in correctly then, and we went on. During the pastor's message, I would normally go in to the main room and sit in the back and listen. This time, however, I did NOT want to lose my focus, so I sat alone in the offstage area and listened quietly and read my Bible. I mentally went over the two post-message songs so I would NOT repeat the earlier mistake.
And I didn't. The rest of the service was completely unmarred by screwups, thank the Lord. : ) Jeff thanked me for helping him out on the one song, and we all had tons of laughs about the goofy morning. I'm glad everyone there is so good-humored; it's much more fun to joke about mistakes than to dwell on them. I know, I know... what am I doing writing in-depth about it if I'm not going to dwell on it? Well, it just helps me to work through the situation and put it into the past... and continue to thank God for once again reminding me that I'm really not "all that."
I wonder if Paul Schaffer ever does this sort of thing?
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