I totally agree with Wiley on this subject.  He expressed my thoughts exactly.
I would definitely leave out songs such as "I'll Fly Away".  All this song makes me think of is birds flapping their wings.

The Songs of Faith and Praise book is halfway to what I prefer.  But there are an awful lot of praise songs that i love that aren't included. Such as "Redeemer, Savior, Friend" and "Firm Foundation" etc.

Susie

[!--QuoteBegin--][/span][table border=\"0\" align=\"center\" width=\"95%\" cellpadding=\"3\" cellspacing=\"1\"][tr][td]Quote (marc @ May 31 2002,12:35)[/td][/tr][tr][td id=\"QUOTE\"][!--QuoteEBegin--]Glad's not Church of Christ, are they?  I know they're not strictly acapella.[/quote]
I'm not strictly acapella either.

Kebercer1 is DoC but not strictly instrumental.

We're becoming mutts!  :0

Wiley, Lester Duncan sounds like someone I would like to know, but I don't believe I have met him as yet.

I know the "speaking in tongues" miracle at Pentecost was obviously God's Way of signifying a reversal of the Tower of Babel punishment. That is, that everyone, everywhere could have praise access to God. Whether with a click or with savoir faire. How did speaking in tongues become an individual trophy?

susieface:

gasp....say it isn't so! i like that song!
i'll settle for a paste-in for the inside cover.

dj :)

Hey, now!  My excuse for being a mutt is French-Cdn on one side, and Scots-Irish on the other: I love toboganning (sp?)--you Southerners don't know what that is, not really  :p --and maple syrup; but I can sing "Oh, Danny-boy" on St. Patty's Day, too.

Seriously, I lead songs often in the congregation in the c-of-C style (shape the notes), due to a theatrical organist who shouldn't really be slaughtering tunes on the windox--and we have guitars, a cappella and all manner of loud sounds!

I've heard New Creation perform along with Echo (who I've heard a few more times).  That was back in the early 90's and I haven't heard from them since--but I've been a bit out of the loop.  

I know Echo disbanded in the early 90's and I  heard not long after they were going to get back together, but I guess nothing ever came of it.  I know Hank did some backup on some of Acapella's stuff shortly after that.

Wow!  That's a tough question for anyone to answer given the vast variety of preferences in music in the church.  I have been involved in song leading for more than 20 years so here is my view from the front as a song leader/worship leader.

Personally, I would like a song book that had about 10% of what I call the "majestic" songs of the 1600's-1800's (songs by Luther, Watts, Handel, Newton, etc), a good selection of Fanny J. Crosby songs with a few of the Stamps-Baxter-Gaither styles of music (10%), and the balance (80%)(and vast majority) of songs that are very contemporary written and sung by groups like Ken Young & Hallal, Zoe Group, New Creation, Acappella, Twila Paris, Rich Mullins, Michael W. Smith, etc., with emphasis on songs of personal worship, praise, and prayer/lament.  I would also include some devotional/responsive reading keyed directly to certain songs.

As far as song books presently in print, Howard Publishing's "Songs of Faith and Praise" makes it about 50% of the way to what I would like to see.  If SFP were edited to about 50% of it's present size, then Hallal's, Zoe's, and the other's I listed above were added in to produce a song book of the approximate size of the present SFP, and the full contemporary songs were published instead of just the refrains (eg: Step by Step by Rich Mullins), that would be what I have in mind.  I would also like to see the songbook have a matching computer database/midi program similar to SFP's with the added capability that when the song is converted to a Power Point file for projection the file would also include the four part music scores exactly as it is published in the printed book but broken into multiple slides for projection.

The song book and supporting programs of my dreams!

arkstfan, this is really stupid, but years ago a story went around that a particular congregation used white grape juice at the communion. They did this because one of their members owned a vineyard which had these kinds of grapes. (I suppose it really missed the symbolism badly).

Anyway, some rascal decided to substitute persimmon juice one Sunday. Everyone gulped it down without thinking, and supposedly the Song Leader stood up and said; "All stand, and let's whistle the Doxology."