Interview with @misterbeardo
Tells us a little about yourself(Family, Background, Favorite Color)?
My name is Chris Etling (aka Mister Beardo). God has blessed me with a beautifully awesome wife and two wonderful kids! I have been playing music since I was in 5th grade when I started playing trombone in the band. My love for music has never faded even if my career path seemed like it should. In 1996 I started to attend a Christian college by the name of Judson College. It was here that I started to play the keys. I learned through music theory about chords and their inversion, and picked up a book or my favorite contemporary Worship songs and would play for hours in the practice rooms (I am sure that people thought there was something dying in there at that time). After I left college, my love of worship music didn’t fade. I started playing on random occasions at Tyler Memorial Church before I was married. After I married my beautiful wife, I started leading worship at Adena Road Church of Christ. Soon after I moved on to play in the worship band at Tabernacle Baptist Church and lead the youth worship band. This had me leading worship twice a week all year long. Now I have the great pleasure of playing in the house worship band for Centerpoint Church in Chillicothe, Ohio. Even though there have been many changes in my life, I have always loved the color brown. It has a realness to it.
If you lead worship where do you lead worship at?
At the moment I am still leading the youth praise band at Tabernacle Baptist Church.
Where do you play music at?
I am currently playing keys for Centerpoint Church.
Explain how you are using the apc40?
When I started getting into playing keys and not just piano, I was frustrated at how limited most keyboards are. If you wanted a pad or string sound in one song and then in the middle of that song you wanted some heavy hitting keys, it was next to impossible to accomplish. So I began looking for ways to layer sounds and adjust them on the fly. I tried Garageband and I could only enable two tracks at the same time and adjusting the sounds were very difficult. I also tried Logic Express and it had some of the same limitations. Then Ableton entered the scene. I discovered that I could enable many tracks at the same time. I could also map some of the keys on my keyboard to enable and disable the tracks. Now we had another issue. When I would disable a track if I was still playing the keys or if I had the sustain pedal on, the sound would keep playing. After searching on the wonderful interwebs, I found the Akai APC40. This piece of equipment directly interfaced with my Ableton and allowed me to change the volume of each track as I went. Now I am layering around 15 sounds and can change them on the fly without using my laptop keys! I took this all to the next level and organized the sounds in banks. Each bank of sounds then pushes to a return track which I can adjust by mapping to some of the knobs on the APC40. I have a return track for keys, pads, ambient sounds, bass, and some rhythmic sounds. Without the APC40 none of this could be possible!
How long have you been using loops?
Actually, loops are new to me. I just started using them when I arrived at Centerpoint. I have been looking at loops for a long time, and am excited about what they can do and have done for us so far!
What Program do you use to create your loops?
I use Ableton right now to make my loops and songs. It is awesome sauce.
How would you say loops have helped your worship experiences?
Loops have helped us provide sounds and melodies that are difficult and sometimes impossible to play without having a much larger band.They also help us stay on track through the song and there are no fights on silly things like “we have always done the chorus 3 times there!”.
What does it mean to you to be a contributor at Loop Community?
Loop Community is a great place to learn more about your craft and expand your talents constantly. There are a lot of great people here. I am excited to learn from everyone and to help spread the knowledge I have learned over the years.
What music are you listening to that inspires your creativity?
On the Christian side, I love artists like Elevation Worship, Hillsong, Benjamin Dunn, John Mark McMillan.
On the secular side, I dig a lot of Deadmau5 music.
Tell us about your music experience?
Growing up I listened to a lot of music in my house. From Jazz to Hip Hop to Pop and some Showtunes. I heard it all! I was a band member in school from 5th-12th grade. Starting in high school, I played Trombone in some professional Big Bands and in a small band, Goosetown Astonishers, that played weekly in a bar. I learned to play piano in college by playing chords, and started singing in church choirs. Now I lead worship in a youth group band and play keys for the awesome band at Centerpoint. Music is and will always be a huge part in my life. There is nothing better than playing on stage and hearing a crowd of people singing praises to our Lord!
Why should people check out Loopcommunity?
Loopcommunity is a great place to rub elbows with some amazing musicians! There is much to learn and much to teach in this amazing world. Loopcommunity is your central hub if you are a musician today!
Anything you would like to say.
I am always improving on my rig and adding new things to what I do in worship and in life. If you all have any questions you can hit me up on twitter @misterbeardo.
