Ben Shive, Harmony, and the Blood of Jesus

All the recent posts about the AP Christmas concert at the Ryman last weekend reminded me of one little amusing thing that I had heretofore failed to relate. It happened during the AP Christmas concert in Cedar Rapids a few weeks ago, which I have written several posts about already.

As AP and crew were coming back from intermission to start the second half of the concert, Andrew came up to the microphone with his guitar and led the audience in a verse of the hymn Nothing But the Blood of Jesus. He used the guitar only long enough to get everyone started on key, then he stopped playing. Ben Shive, keyboard guru to the stars and really nice guy, was still playing keyboards as we sang.

When we hit the chorus of the hymn (“O precious is the flow…”), Ben went to play some funky chord instead of the standard I (one) chord. Now, I can understand that… the hymn is pretty boring, harmonically. I, IV, V, that’s about it. It’s definitely ready for some spicing up. The problem for Ben was, there were 700 people singing along, and singing in full standard harmony. When he hit that chord, Andrew looked back at him with raised eyebrows as if to say “well, that’s not gonna work…” and Ben responded with an amused look of his own, and switched back to standard harmonization.

I realize at this point that I may be the only one ever to read this who would’ve been amused by this situation. But it’s my blog, so I can write about whatever amuses me. :-) So, word to Ben: keep up the funky harmonies, man. I would’ve (and have, many times) done the same thing. Or, next time, you can just let everybody sing a capella. :-)