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INTRODUCING: HYMNDEX.COM

by Don Chapman

I've had an idea for ages now - a hymn lyrics website specifically for contemporary worship. Now that I have a team working with me I can finally get some of these ideas out of my head and into production!

Here's what HYMNDEX.COM is all about: it's an index of hymn lyrics with one important distinction you won't find anywhere on the Internet - no punctuation!

The trend now in modern worship lyrics slides is to leave out (most) punctuation as it clutters the screen. If you want your congregation to sing a hymn you'll have to download lyrics from a website that looks like it was built in 1997 and then tediously remove all the commas, periods and other punctuation.

The most nifty feature of HYMNDEX is the "copy by section" button. You can copy the entire hymn OR bite sized sections that you can paste directly into your worship projection software. Take a look and let us know what you think!

01.03.21 NEW Hymn History: Amazing Grace

John Newton was a slave trader in his early years, and openly mocked religion. What better way to start a story of God’s grace?

2021 hymncharts RECAP:

I just realized... hymncharts is going to be 20 years old THIS YEAR!

With renewed health (more on that in a second) I really feel like the Lord is launching me into the next 20 years! I have several new, modern arrangements I am SUPER excited about and I hope you'll love them! You wonder if you still "have it" as you get old... I hope I still do as I plan on arranging music, Lord willing, for the next thirty years or more!

Coming soon will be, probably, one of the hits of my arranging career. Hint: it's going to be "GREAT" :)

In late 2020 I sent out an email detailing my weird health issues over the past few years and how I found an amazing natural health doctor who helped me. It really wasn't until mid 2021 I felt consistent energy and could start ramping up production (incidentally, the final key was the discovery I had high blood sugar spikes. I got a $30 blood sugar monitor at Walgreens and tested my blood "for fun" all day long and couldn't believe it LOL! Once I got that under control with simple things like cutting out sugar and walking a little bit after meals I saw my health take a sharp upturn.)

For years I only wanted to run hymncharts by myself to see just how far I could take it. There's simply a ceiling on what one guy can do so I now have a few people working for me. I want to see how far we can push hymncharts over the next decade (with my team managing the websites, newsletters, sheet music and other technicalities I'm freed up to just... write music!) To recap, 2021 brought these improvements that I could never have accomplished alone:

Thanks for your interest in hymncharts over the years - the best is yet to come!

NEW: HymnLyricVideos.com Special Introductory Price

From hymncharts arranger Don Chapman: People have been asking for lyric videos of my hymncharts arrangements for months and I've finally got the new website working!

PLEASE NOTE: All HymnLyricVideos.com videos come as a FREE bonus with a hymncharts subscription, adding to the already incredible value of that website.

However... for churches who don't want the full subscription, or for homes & small groups, I've now made the videos available for sale individually.

Special Introductory Price: The All Access Pass will let you download everything at HymnLyricVideos.com for one year for $59.99. This price will go up soon to $99.99 so act now if you're interested (you can also purchase videos individually if you choose.)

NEW: hymncharts Payment Plan

Church budgets are tighter than ever these days. Our new payment plan allows you to enjoy hymncharts arrangements for $29.99 per month for a commitment of 12 months.

Click to learn more about the hymncharts payment plan.

SATB+ and MULTITRACKS: Amazing Grace 2004

from hymncharts arranger Don Chapman:

I've now updated Amazing Grace with SATB+ files and multitracks. All hymncharts arrangements have SATB sheet music, but I've started to record some of them (put on hold during COVID) with full SATB choir. An SATB+ arrangement has SATB only sheet music (no piano for fewer pages), an SATB vocal demo MP3 and soprano, alto, tenor and bass practice track MP3s you can give to your choir.

Click to hear Amazing Grace SATB and other SATB+ arrangements

Change Key for Free!

Some of you may already have discovered this but I'm late to the party :)

I've just discovered that the free Finale Notepad can change the key of 75% of hymncharts arrangements!

Over the years I've tried using the free Finale Notepad but it just didn't work that great. It might change the key but it would also mess the spacing up so bad that the sheet music looked awful.

Recently I thought I'd take another look to see if the software had changed. It has! I tried changing the key of All Hail the Power and when it worked I nearly fell out of my chair. I'm so excited LOL!

BUT... here's why it will work on only 75% of the arrangements: the free Finale Notepad will only change the key of the entire arrangement.

That means it won't work on my earliest arrangements. Back when hymncharts started years ago it was in vogue to modulate (change key) on the final verse of a song, giving it a "lift." These days with modern worship the songs stay in the same key throughout. In fact, I literally can't remember playing a key change in a church praise band in over ten years.

This means the free Finale Notepad will NOT work on my older arrangements (about 25% of them) because it won’t insert the key change on the last verse (instead only changing the key of the entire hymn.) You’ll have to use one of the paid versions of Finale (Finale or Printmusic) to do that.

Watch a quick (1:28) video showing you exactly how it works:

Watch on YouTube

Watch on hymncharts

hymnspiration

Thro' many dangers, toils and snares

I have already come.

'Tis grace that brought me safe thus far,

And grace will lead me home.

Amazing Grace

John Nexton, John Rees

NEW All Hail the Power of Jesus' Name

To celebrate the new hymncharts website in 2021 I've remixed and remastered the vocal demos, stereo tracks and multitracks. The SATB, SAB, synth strings and instrumental parts have been revised (I do this for some my older arrangements as I feel I can both arrange and mix music better than I did when hymncharts first started.) Removed are some of the synthy leads and pads that were more in vogue a decade ago. The 3 part vocals remain the same.

Read more, listen and download for FREE!

Blended worship on a budget since March 6, 2002.