Your first question actually might be, “what’s a key, anyway?”
Very broadly speaking, a key is a letter assigned to a song that instructs musicians which notes to play. If you’re playing in the key of “C,” there are eight notes that fit within that key, no matter what instrument you’re playing. The key of “A” has a different set of eight notes, some of which overlap with “C,” but some of which don’t.
If you’re looking at printed music, the key is shown by the “key signature” at the beginning of the staff. For more music geekery about key signatures, visit wikipedia, otherwise read on.
When a song is written or recorded, it has a specific key that it was written or recorded in. However, depending on who the singer or writer is, that key may not be friendly for your church. It might be too high (most often the case) or too low to be comfortable for everyone to sing together. There are other reasons people don’t sing, but this is a biggie – “it’s just too high.”
So how do you know? Try singing along with the recording of the song yourself. If you have to strain, you might have a song that’s too high. The truth is, it’s very subjective… what’s high for someone may be comfortable for someone else depending on their voice.
At LifeWayWorship.com, we’ve tried to take the guesswork out of this process for you. For our LifeWay Worship Songs and Hymns, we’ve placed them in two keys, both
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