Episode 269
The Path to Elevation Church: Music Director
The principal focus of this podcast episode is the journey of a musician who transitioned from a conventional church setting to a prominent role within Elevation Church in Charlotte, North Carolina. Throughout the conversation, I elucidate the transformative experiences that shaped my musical and spiritual identity, particularly during a pivotal period in my life when I relocated to Dubai to pursue music. This narrative encapsulates the dichotomy between the structured environment of traditional worship and the dynamic, performance-oriented atmosphere I encountered in my new role. Additionally, I reflect on the challenges and triumphs associated with my personal evolution, including the profound impact of returning home and re-establishing my career in music. Ultimately, this episode serves as a testament to the resilience and adaptability required to navigate the complexities of life and artistry within a faith-based context.
Takeaways:
- The worship leader at Elevation Church performs live, creating an intense and dynamic atmosphere across multiple campuses.
- The speaker recounts a significant life change at age 30, including an unexpected experience in the Middle East.
- Transitioning from church to a more mainstream music scene provided a unique evolution in the speaker's musical journey.
- The speaker's personal journey illustrates the challenges and rewards of pursuing one's passion amidst life's obstacles and changes.
- The audition process for Elevation Church was a pivotal moment that transformed the speaker's career and creative direction.
- The speaker emphasizes the importance of being grounded in one's faith while navigating the complexities of the music industry.
Companies mentioned in this episode:
- Elevation Church
- Walmart
- London Drugs
- McKesson Canada
Transcript
Room.
Speaker A:So it's really something cool to see.
Speaker A:Like, you know, the worship leader at.
Speaker A:Chris would be singing.
Speaker A:At Ballantine, he'd be singing the song, and everything is getting streamed in live time, and the campuses are actually playing.
Speaker A:So he's singing the song and they're playing live, but it's at the same time, so that's intense.
Speaker A:That's really cool.
Speaker A:Very cool.
Speaker A:So that's.
Speaker A:That's Elevation Church.
Speaker A:How did that opportunity come to be for you?
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:They took you away from us.
Speaker A:It's.
Speaker A:It.
Speaker A:Well, e.
Speaker A:At about 30.
Speaker A:When I turned 30, life went upside down.
Speaker A:I ended up doing some time in the Middle East.
Speaker A:He got arrested.
Speaker A:That was really rough.
Speaker A:Let me.
Speaker A:Let me.
Speaker A:Hold on.
Speaker A:What?
Speaker A:I.
Speaker A:I stopped him deed you were in prison.
Speaker A:What's going on, bro?
Speaker A:That sounded really horrible, man.
Speaker A:We all got like, okay.
Speaker A:So I stopped mding at.
Speaker A:At my old church and started working at.
Speaker A:Started working in Walmart in warehouse.
Speaker A:And one of my friends, Jeff, he hit me up one day and he's like, hey, we got this opportunity to go to Dubai and play music.
Speaker A:I was like, yeah, whatever, bro.
Speaker A:That's.
Speaker A:That's a.
Speaker A:That's a.
Speaker A:That's a hoax.
Speaker A:Whatever.
Speaker A:He's like, no, this is serious.
Speaker A:Nigerian prince wrote me, I swear.
Speaker A:So I.
Speaker A:You know, and here's the other thing.
Speaker A:It's like, it's part of the evolution of who I am, because I only grown up in church, only known church, only known the church box.
Speaker A:And I'm sure if you've talked with guys that have been in.
Speaker A:In the same similar kind of scenarios, it has its pros and it has its cons.
Speaker A:Growing up in church, I still.
Speaker A:I mean, it's my foundation.
Speaker A:It's what I do.
Speaker A:It's what I love.
Speaker A:But there can sometimes be a little bit of a disconnect between what's really going on in the room, what's really going on in the.
Speaker A:In the.
Speaker A:In the real world.
Speaker A:And you'd know that's when we talk about, like, well, is.
Speaker A:Are they even having any influence?
Speaker A:Are they even being effective nowadays?
Speaker A:Because, like, I mean, you still still fighting about tattoos and jeans and.
Speaker A:And hair dye?
Speaker A:Like, yeah, all right.
Speaker A:If you want to waste time talking about that.
Speaker A:But I left.
Speaker A:And so we did this audition, and this is the first time I had ever.
Speaker A:It's like, it was like a 360.
Speaker A:Because in church it was like, you know, don't be too showy because, you know, God don't like that.
Speaker A:Don't, don't, don't.
Speaker A:Don't, don't, don't, don't.
Speaker A:Don't move too much because, you know, watch you be excited, but the moment that.
Speaker A:The moment that you get a little too excited all of a sudden and going to performing where you have to be on, like, you're the main show.
Speaker A:You're the.
Speaker A:You're the attraction.
Speaker A:Right, Right.
Speaker A:So we did end up getting the gig, went to Dubai, did some time, did some time, did.
Speaker A:Did the circuit out there, got engaged during Ramadan, came back, and then it was like in my couple months in, she called me and she's like, babe, I think you need to come home now.
Speaker A:And I had been feeling like, I need to come.
Speaker A:Yeah, I need to come home.
Speaker A:Which is scary when you leave what you've been building for, you know, a certain amount of time.
Speaker A:Yeah, you lose connects.
Speaker A:And life.
Speaker A:Life has to go on.
Speaker A:Like, you know, people are gonna fill your gig or, you know, like, it's not to say that you got forgotten, but, like, life goes on.
Speaker A:So, yeah, you're coming back and you're, like, starting from ground zero.
Speaker A:Like, you're.
Speaker A:You're.
Speaker A:You're literally starting from the.
Speaker A:From the bottom again.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And so we ended up.
Speaker A:That was the first time I heard Elevation Church when I was in the Middle East.
Speaker A:And, you know, it was like, you know, one of those.
Speaker A:It was like a surreal moment where I flipped open my laptop, was watching on YouTube, watching my pastor, and he said, doesn't matter what you've done, doesn't matter where you've been.
Speaker A:God loves you as a call for you on your life.
Speaker A:It's time for you to come home.
Speaker A:And it was too close to what we had been talking about to me to be a coincidence.
Speaker A:So told my band, you know, handed in my two weeks.
Speaker A:Broke out of jail, Matt.
Speaker A:Yeah, handed in my two weeks and then.
Speaker A:And so left.
Speaker A:We went back to Calgary, actually.
Speaker A:So we didn't.
Speaker A:I didn't go right back to Toronto.
Speaker A:Went back to Calgary.
Speaker A:It was surreal because I couldn't do music.
Speaker A:Like, Calgary really didn't have a.
Speaker A:I don't know, man.
Speaker A:It was weird.
Speaker A:There was.
Speaker A:I was at a good place.
Speaker A:I was newly married, learning about marriage and just enjoying that phase of life.
Speaker A:And I set up all my keyboards in our apartment, and I would play and I would practice, but didn't want to go work in another church at the time, didn't want to do any of that, so ended up using my biology degree and went back into pharmacy.
Speaker A:So I was legit going to Go back into pharmacy in Calgary.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:So worked at London Drugs as a pharmacy tech for a while.
Speaker A:But during that, I would follow elevation, and it was the strangest thing.
Speaker A:So when we initially started talking about going backwards to learn foundations, Yeah, I would wake up every morning, 6:00 clock, 5:00 clock, and just get up and practice.
Speaker A:I didn't know what I was practicing for.
Speaker A:I didn't have a job.
Speaker A:I didn't have nothing lined up.
Speaker A:But I would get up and I was cutting up things.
Speaker A:I'd be, you know, listening to jazz standards and working on my chops and.
Speaker A:And just getting.
Speaker A:Getting better.
Speaker A:Gotta say, shout out to Chick Corea, one of the greats who just.
Speaker A:He just left us was doing that.
Speaker A:And then on Sunday, because the church service would be streaming live, we would hook up our laptop and we would watch and I would play along.
Speaker A:Oh, wow.
Speaker A:So I would play along with the songs.
Speaker A:Just me and my living room just playing along.
Speaker A:And I didn't know they had.
Speaker A:They were asking to do auditions, and my wife came in one day and she's like, hey, you need to do this audition.
Speaker A:And I was like, nah, I'm not really trying to do that.
Speaker A:I was.
Speaker A:Plus, they're in America, man.
Speaker A:They got.
Speaker A:They must have thousands of keyboard players.
Speaker A:Just true.
Speaker A:Lining up, ready to get at the.
Speaker A:You know.
Speaker A:So got home one day from work.
Speaker A:She's waiting for me at the door.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:And she's like, you're gonna do this audition?
Speaker A:So she filmed it.
Speaker A:We did the audition time.
Speaker A:I sent the audition in.
Speaker A:They called me originally and said, hey, do you want to come down to do the live audition?
Speaker A:But things didn't work out, so I still stayed in Calgary.
Speaker A:And then we decided that our time in Calgary was up, so we went back to Toronto, back to.
Speaker A:We had a house in Brampton.
Speaker A:Back to our house in Brampton.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:And we're gonna start over again.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:So this time I'm working at McKesson Canada, so I had, like, music was just like, you know, it was just something that I did in the background at least.
Speaker A:Still practicing still.
Speaker A:It's still a part of me, you know, But I just wanted to be a good husband and build for my family and do all that stuff.
Speaker A:So the audition went to Elevation Church in Toronto and just.
Speaker A:Just started serving there.
Speaker A:Just started playing.
Speaker A:Just wanted to be on the team.
Speaker A:When I walked in, you know how, like, people from your past, there's always somebody from your past that, like, kind of trickles into where you.
Speaker A:Where you want to be.
Speaker A:So I walk in, they don't really have a keyboard player.
Speaker A:This old dude from my old church.
Speaker A:Oh, my God, LJ's here.
Speaker A:Oh, wow.
Speaker A:You know, did the whole thing.
Speaker A:I was just trying to sneak in the back, mind my own business, slide out.
Speaker A:Yeah, this guy, you know, I gotta thank him for it because it has me where I am today.
Speaker A:But he talked to the md and the MD there was like, well, you know, if you want to join the team, you know, there's an audition that we usually do.
Speaker A:And I was like, oh, you mean like this audition?
Speaker A:Because I had it on my phone from a year and a half ago.
Speaker A:So I showed him that audition and he's like, yeah, so.
Speaker A:And you know what, man?
Speaker A:I was good.
Speaker A:I was good to just do that for the rest of my days.
Speaker A:I wasn't looking to do anything else.
Speaker A:We were at a school at the time, so we would get up at five in the morning, set up, play, really play two songs.
Speaker A:Got to see the whole point to point thing from Charlotte.
Speaker A:I was like, man, this is cool.
Speaker A:Pack up, go home.
Speaker A:We moved to a new location.
Speaker A:One of the worship leaders from down here, one up there, heard me play.
Speaker A:And I didn't know that they were looking for a guy with a unique set of skills down here in Charlotte to Play.
Speaker A:So I'm 40, Pastor Steven's 41.
Speaker A:So we grew up in the same era, in the same time, with the same music, same hymns, what not.
Speaker A:He grew up.
Speaker A:He grew up.
Speaker A:He didn't grow up Baptist.
Speaker A:I don't want to say he grew up Protestant, but he grew up in one of those denominations just like me, who we sang a lot of hymns.
Speaker A:And so they were looking for a guy that could play hymns but could play gospel as well.
Speaker A:Because Pastor Steven's a gospel head.
Speaker A:I'm gonna tell you, he's a gospel head.
Speaker A:Like he's like a real one and a real one.
Speaker A:And yeah, he's a real one.
Speaker A:Like.
Speaker A:Like a real one.
Speaker A:His first text to me about gospel was like, yeah.
Speaker A:He sent me James Hall, God wants a yes.
Speaker A:And he said, top, top 10 gospel song of all time.
Speaker A:You gotta know gospel to know James hall in New York and all that stuff.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:So the guy, the worship leader that was in Toronto took my name back down and said, hey, man, you gotta hear this guy LJ play.
Speaker A:He's at the Toronto campus.
Speaker A:Then Mack, who was there at the time, said, wait a minute, was that the guy that sent his audition in two years ago from.
Speaker A:From Calgary, but couldn't Come down.
Speaker A:And then Mac messaged me, which I thought was another hoax, because, like, these are like the big time guys to me now.
Speaker A:He's like, hey, you know, I remember your audition for a couple years ago.
Speaker A:You wanna.
Speaker A:You wanna come down and do this audition?
Speaker A:And.
Speaker A:And then they said, but there's one catch.
Speaker A:You know, we're looking for a specific guy.
Speaker A:Do you know these songs?
Speaker A:And he sent me a list of all these hymns, which I had.
Speaker A:Like, I told you, my dad was a song.
Speaker A:So I grew up playing all of those.
Speaker A:And then there was a list.
Speaker A:And then the list got weird because it was like, all this Israel Houghton stuff.
Speaker A:I'm a big Israel Houghton fan.
Speaker A:Like, huge.
Speaker A:Aaron Lindsay, New Breed, all that stuff.
Speaker A:Then there was some gospel stuff in the list.
Speaker A:There was, like, Vashon Mitchell.
Speaker A:There was some weird stuff in the list.
Speaker A:And I was like, yeah, I wrote them back.
Speaker A:And I was trying to be humble.
Speaker A:Trying to be Canadian.
Speaker A:Sorry, man.
Speaker A:No lie.
Speaker A:I.
Speaker A:I probably don't know about five of these songs.
Speaker A:Yeah, I'm pretty sure they've heard that before.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:So flew down at our Blakeney campus.
Speaker A:I met Chris, geeked out a little bit because that was like my dude that I would see on TV all the time.
Speaker A:And.
Speaker A:Yeah, I mean.
Speaker A:I mean, the rest is history, man.
Speaker A:Sat down, did the audition, and kind of never turned.
Speaker A:Never turned back, man.
Speaker A:Just came down.
Speaker A:And the rest has been a beautiful journey from where I started to where now you're the MD there.
Speaker A:I'm actually the broadcast worship director.
Speaker A:So it's.
Speaker A:I was the.
Speaker A:Can you explain to our audience real quick, though, what a musical director does and specifically what your role would do in a church setting?
Speaker A:All right, so when I first.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker A:No, no.
Speaker A:When I first got down here four years, five years ago, all I was was.
Speaker A:I was Pastor Steven's keys guy.
Speaker A:So he would preach, I played keys, and then I was a part of the team.
Speaker A:Then the.
Speaker A:I wasn't even directing the band.
Speaker A:There was another great guy named Lance who was directing the band.
Speaker A:Lance transitioned, and then I became the music director, which would be the guy who would be calling everything to all the other campuses.
