Songwriting

The Songwriting Muscle w/ 29:11 Worship 

Zion Rempel of 29:11 Worship sat down with Loop Community Founder Matt McCoy to talk about free writing, mental health and their latest album.  

[Matt] What is the songwriting process like at your church?  

[Zion] Generally songwriting is pretty organic for us. We have songs submitted all the time, and as a worship ministry, we look at what songs we think will fit with where we’re going as a church. Sometimes our lead pastor will say where he thinks we’re headed as a church or an upcoming series and we’ll right for that. We just finished a songwriting retreat. Locked ourselves in a cabin up north and wrote. It was really special.  

[Matt] How many songwriters go on a retreat like that?  

[Zion] This retreat was five people. A small team of people, but it’s not only these five that write our music. We talk about songwriting often with our team. Songwriting is like a muscle that you’re always working out.

[Matt] It’s definitely a muscle. You have to exercise it or it stays weak. The more you write the better you get.  

[Zion] One thing we do is encourage trusted people that can handle the vision of our house, to do free writes. You’re not really writing a song, you’re just writing. Your pen doesn’t stop moving. Write, write, write. It exercises that muscle of how to put into words what the Holy Spirit is doing. We’ll do this together as a worship team. Then we’ll share about what the Holy Spirit is doing in us.  

It’s typically just 3-4 minutes. The goal is to not stop writing. At points it may sound a bit like jargon. But I’ve found the more that I do it in my life the more it has a rhythm. The goal isn’t to come up with something that’s usable elsewhere. Sometimes it can birth song ideas. But the goal is to exercise the muscle of putting into words what the Lord is saying. It helps you not get caught up in not being able to describe what you’re trying to say.  

[Matt] Do you do this with an instrument?  

[Zion] Not the free writing, but sometimes I will sit at a piano and “free worship”, and that’s a great melodic exercise. But in a free write, it’s practicing using the words.  

Watch the full interview below!

You can get the Master Tracks for 29:11 Worship’s new album All Broken Things on LoopCommunity.com to lead their songs at your church!