Dove Award– and Stellar Award-winning Christian hip-hop (CHH) artist and Pastor Trip Lee is launching “BRAG Worship,” a worship project designed to be sung by churches, families, and small groups.
Trip Lee’s BRAG is a reference to “Brag on My Lord,” a song he released in 2011, and is built on the belief that all believers are meant to boast in God, not themselves.
After more than a decade as a prominent voice in CHH, Trip Lee told ChurchLeaders that “BRAG Worship” represents a completely different expression of his calling. While fans might expect rap verses layered into traditional worship structures, Lee emphasized the project was intentionally written as full congregational songs meant to be sung collectively.
The first EP from the project, “For Your Glory,” is scheduled for release Feb. 13. Trip Lee described it as a wide range of musical influences that includes hip-hop and pop as well as minimalist worship arrangements, with a strong focus on melody, harmony, and corporate singing.
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During the interview he explained that, rather than confining himself to established worship sounds, he sought to create music that helps people enter a posture of worship without distracting from the message.
Trip Lee shared how he drew from his experience as a pastor and explained that worship music must serve both lyrical truth and musical beauty. “I do think the lyrics are very important, but it’s not just the lyrics,” he said.
“I remember I was at a church that sang mostly older hymns, that’s where I was training to pastor, and I really grew to love a lot of these hymns,” Trip Lee shared.
“Though there would be sometimes and at this particular church, all the pastoral staff would sit around and we would choose the songs for the week, and I would say, ‘Hey, I love what this song is saying [but] the melody sounds like somebody died,’” he said. “‘These are great words—theologically rich—I feel like we’re singing about joy, but in the melody I feel like we are mourning somebody.’”
Trip Lee continued, “I think there is something beautiful about melody that serves how beautiful God is…there is something special about melody and rhythm that helps push that truth in.” So for this project, he said, “I tried to take melody and harmony with the same weight that I was trying to take the lyrics and the truth about God.”
