Matt: I’m a 28 year old living in downtown Chicago. I was born and raised in San Diego, California by amazing parents – who are both musicians. My mom plays the piano and my dad plays guitar. My dad was a pastor most of my life in the Vineyard church movement, so I grew up surrounded by worship music and ministry. I spent most of my free time at the church, or in the back yard playing in my two story fort that my dad and I built together one summer. When I was in 7th grade, my dad taught me to play guitar and encouraged me to lead worship at our youth group (sound familiar?). The worship leader in our church, who was in his early twenties, spent a year working with me and a few of my friends every Wednesday night. He taught us how to play our instruments… from scratch. We didn’t know anything. He wanted to develop a youth band out of us – and that’s what he did. One week he asked if I would lead a song…. scared to death, I hesitantly said yes. A few weeks later, “How about you lead 2 songs this week?”. Then “How about 3 songs?”. Eventually he stopped showing up and the rest is history. I’ve been leading worship full time ever since. His investment and desire to mentor really changed my life. I went to college, while leading worship at the Vineyard in Cincinnati. After graduating, began leading at Willow Creek Community Church and Harvest Bible Chapel in Chicago. I also travel with my band year round leading for conferences, youth retreats and other events. Unfortunately, I don’t have a fort in my back yard anymore…Matt: I’ve been incredibly blessed to lead worship the past 5 years at an event called IndyCC. It’s a CRU event where thousands of college students from around the midwest gather in Indianapolis to worship and hear from God. It’s by far one of the most impactful events I’ve ever been a part of and I love the heartbeat behind, and the staff of CRU. This past year, I decided to write 5 songs for the conference. We taught the songs to the students all week, and then on the final night (New Years Eve,12:01 AM) hit the “record” button! It was amazing singing these songs along with thousands of college students – and “Shine” is a recording that captured that night. No better way to kick of 2013. If you’re interested, check it out on iTunes:
TCC: What’s the heart behind Loop Community?
Matt: We are passionate at LoopCommunity.com about resourcing the church with quality tracks and content for worship services. What makes Loop Community unique is that it is a community of worship leaders from around the world. The tracks on Loop Community were created by worship leaders, for worship leaders. This means that every time you purchase a loop or multitrack on Loop Community, you are literally supporting a worship leader and church ministry. If you’re a worship leader or musician who makes tracks, you can upload them to Loop Community and help enhance worship services / support churches around the world – but also get paid for your work. I want worship leaders to feel like they are a part of something… something bigger than themselves. That they aren’t in this alone. Together we can resource worship ministries around the globe. I’m also passionate about teaching churches and worship leaders about how you can use technology to enhance your worship service – whether you are a church of 10,000 people or a church of 10 people. Loops and MultiTracks can help raise the bar of excellence in your music.
How have you seen God work through Loop Community?
One of my favorite things is hearing stories about how Loop Community is an integral part in many churches worship ministries. Churches from big to small. There are countless small church plants – who are either lacking musicians, or their musicians aren’t very strong. I’ve heard stories where they are using our free iOS app (http://loopcommunity.com/
Matt: Looptimus has been the never-ending project. Haha. We started developing Looptimus nearly 2 years ago because we saw a need. There really weren’t any foot controllers for Ableton Live on the market that were 1.) Easy to use 2.) Designed for worship 3.) Affordable or obtainable. There was a huge need. I had so many worship leaders asking me where to find a good controller… and got so tired of it that I decided to build one on our own. It was a big task though because I’ve never designed or manufactured a piece of hardware before. There is A LOT that goes into it and I’ve learned a lot this past year. We launched a KickStarter campaign in September to help fund the initial batch of pedals. We needed to raise $50,000 in 35 days. Honestly,there were days when I wasn’t sure if we were going to make it, but God willing, we raised $70,000!!! Amazing. Doing a KickStarter campaign was a lot harder than I thought it would be. It was a full time job and I have a few gray hairs because of it. But hey – raising $70k in 35 days isn’t a bad gig! Looptimus is now in full production. We decided to have it manufactured and assembled in the USA. We’re on schedule to begin shipping the pedals in December and have more big plans in store for 2014. The demand still hasn’t died down and we sell more Looptimus pedals each day! I fully believe that Looptimus is the BEST USB MIDI foot controller on the market for worship leaders. You probably won’t see a Kickstarter from me again, but check out Looptimus at http://looptimus.com
If you’re using Ableton or tracks in worship, this pedal was built and designed FOR YOU!
TCC: Where should a worship leader who wants to use Loops and MultITracks start?
Artist Feature // Darren & Jessie Clark // Calvary SLO