YouthPastor2000

Wired for Worship
By James C. Moberg

So... you don't have your own personal band for either youth group or Sunday worship? Are you using accompaniment CDs to compliment your ministry? Have you considered using computers and multimedia?

You can! MP3 is a new audio format that can make it easy for you to use CD quality tracks in your ministry without having to continually fumble with CDs.

WinAmp Shade Mode Geiss Screenshot

What is MP3?
MP3 is a file format which stores music files on a computer in such a way that the file size is relatively small, but the song sounds near perfect. It is radically changing the way that people organize and listen to music. For example, I've converted my favorite CDs to MP3 format and no longer have to stop and reach for a new CD while working on my computer. I can also listen to any song from any CD in any order.

So how does this apply to ministry?

1. You can play your favorite music during your youth events and never have to worry about CDs mysteriously disappearing.
2. You can instantly play any song and never have to worry about having to switch CDs while singing to them.
3. You can download songs by new CCM artists and hear what they sound like. Jennifer Knapp and others have their songs available for download.
4. Eye Candy. Yep... Eye Candy. There are lots of cool plug-ins that allow you to do nice real-time multimedia with the music. This is perfect before and after youth group meetings. Geiss is my favorite! (Here are some screenshots.)
5. MP3 files are smaller than any other digital format. A 3½ minute song converted to WAV format was 38.9mb while the MP3 format was only 4.2mb.
6. You can take your music on the road with you using portable MP3 Players. Just download all your songs into the player and take it with you... no more seat-hogging boomboxes and broken CD cases on your trips.

How do I play MP3 files?
If you are going to play MP3's, you need a player. Winamp is a fast, flexible, high-fidelity music player for Windows 95/98/NT. Winamp supports MP3, MP2, CD, MOD, WAV and other audio formats, custom interfaces called skins and audio visualization and audio effect plug-ins. Download the shareware version and give it a try.

How do I make my own MP3 files?
If you are going to create your own MP3's, you need a ripper and an encoder. AudioCatalyst™ is the best that I've found so far and it allows you to take any CD, make a perfect digital copy on your hard drive, and transform that file into an MP3 file. And it happens in one easy step. Download a free trial version of the AudioCatalyst and see if it is compatible with your CD-ROM drive.

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James has packed many of his CDs away for safe storage and jams to his own MP3 playlist while working on YouthPastor.Com.

Other Resources:

• Is This Stuff Legal? MP3 Audio Files
• WinAmp - Winamp is a FREE, fast, flexible, high-fidelity music player for Windows 95/98/NT.
• Sonique - A pretty cool MP3 player with neat visuals.
• C-4 - A sturdy, low CPU-Usage, audio player.
• MacAmp - for Mac users (Other Mac MP3 Players are all now available.
• Aqueousa light weight simple to use MP3 player.
• Xaudio - for Unix users
• Other MP3 players - A list of the most well-known MP3 players
• MusicMatch 3.0 - Record, download, organize and play MP3 music with MusicMatch Jukebox.
• AudioCatalyst.Com - for creating your own MP3 files from CD or WAV.
• MP3.Com - Lots of info on MP3 related issues
• ChristianMP3s.com - MP3 files from new CCM Artists
• Geiss ScreenSaver & WinAmp Plug-in - Very cool and free for non-profit public use!
• Crossfading Output plug-in - crossfades the next song with the current one between tracks!

Please notify me of any broken links and I'll immediately and gladly correct them. Email your questions, ideas, review requests and comments to .

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