Chris,

I appreciate you and Bart and all the other drummers that take the time to pass along their perspective and knowledge!!!

This forum and Bart are a significant reason why I'm still playing at this point.  About 6 years ago I was at a crossroads on whether I would continue to play or not after having played since the early 70's...my motor skills were in a hopeless shambles after chemo and radiation. 

After some dead-ends trying to get an instructor to work with me, I ran across Bart and his video lesson scheme.  I video'd a Sunday service to send his way...almost exactly 5 years ago.  Unfortunately, I had to edit the tape and get it moved to VHS...it was rather disheartening watching me play as you could see something was terribly wrong, but couldn't put my finger on what exactly the problems were, much less what to do.  Bart's video lesson that came back started with two words that changed everything..."Good job."  This was followed, by "There's a few things we need to work on..."    Fast forwarding to now, I'm probably playing better in a musical sense than at any other time in my life.  You guys and this forum are a part of that...I get a little emotional just recalling all of this.

Getting back to your message...new songs seem to come in spurts (usually somebody's CD was released) and I'm guessing we have a repertoire of several hundred songs at this point.  Some haven't been played in a long time, some are recurring classics, some are just what's happening now in the Church.  If something of a worship music nature is playing on a CCM radio station, then we'll probably end up playing it at least a couple of times.  We ended up playing that Lincoln Brewster song three Sundays in a row...a little unusual as we usually play a new song two Sundays in a row and then it goes into the rotation.  I suspect it will come back up in about a month.  Even more unusual is its an older song and happened to be one I suggested.

I guess this church is a mega-church for this area...we're in kind of gray zone between needing to move beyond whatever volunteer we can get to getting everyone to think more professionally about what we're doing.  I think the Saturday group is just about there...that's the worship leader who does music as a profession so that's his orientation.  OTOH, he's rotating kids in from the program at school...extremely talented and many of the ones playing guitar/singing can play drums better than me from a chops standpoint.  Fortunately, experience and cunning trump youth and enthusiasm every time so I get to play. 

I'm actually off this weekend for a family vacation, so I'm going to be doing some thinking about this science of practice thingie.

--David

Well you can only do the best you can (be the best you can be) when health issues get in the way.
As to the repertoire, I'm sure I don't know 100 songs well enough to play, let alone 'several hundred'.
It probably comes down to personal taste and where you all agree to compromise.
Keep the songs moving in and out of rotation, with fresh ones always coming along to inspire.
Or concentrate on a smaller core library, practice them, iron out any difficulties, and only then start adding songs at a slower rate.
The latter scenario is for the serious minded musician who wants to sound professional, the former is for people who want to enjoy their playing experience, keeping it fun and fresh.
Ideally, you want a bit of both. 

sometimes it just happens and other times it kind of evolves.  playing songs over and over, subtle changes creep in .  i try to not think too much while playing.  let it happen.